Anybody else?

[Arnold M. Zwicky]

On Nov 3, 2005, at 10:27 AM, Wilson Gray wrote:

> Has anybody else noticed the TV voice-over guy who speaks of "rare but
> serious fatalities" that have or may occur as a consequence of using
> the patent medicine that he's shilling for?

i hadn't caught this one, but it looks like a telescoping of
something like:
   rare but serious side-effects, including/even fatalities
or possibly like a blend of
   rare but serious side-effects
and
   rare fatalities.

in any case, two related ideas have gotten compressed.

noted on at least two blogs:

Side effects include "rare but serious fatalities" I wonder exactly
what a nonserious fatality would be. That was on a commercial just
now. ...
mtgrammar.powerblogs.com/


and from The Devil's Robot,
   http://blog.munge.net/page/2/

-----
10.08.05  Semantics are Fun!

Posted in Random at 2:07 pm by Aaron M
So I just saw a commercial for some asthma medicine. The disclaimer
section included the phrase “rare but serious fatalities occurred in
a study….”

I’m guessing those are way worse than trivial fatalities.