Verb tense

[Benjamin Barrett]

I agree with you, though you do here this. Try inserting "that" after
"imagining" and emphasizing the "was." To me, that makes it much more
palatable. BB

On Aug 6, 2008, at 6:53 PM, Wilson Gray wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Verb tense
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>
> A teaser on the cover of The Boston Globe Magazine:
>
> "WHAT IF? Twenty years later, imagining there _was_ a President
> Dukakis."
>
>
> It seems to me that this should read, "... _had been_ ..."
>
> Has language-change once again left me in the lurch? Or is this merely
> an artifact of my personal concept of tense?

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