More Grammar Matters

The Toronto Star's Editor-in-Chief has written a column saying, basically, what I said about CTV's interview with Stephane Dion, which is nice to see. What's irritating about this, for me, is not that the interviewer--whose job requires, if nothing else, clear and effective communicative skills--made a mistake. Everyone makes mistakes. What's irritating is that neither CTV's anchor, who was unable to recognize his mistake and clarify the question, nor CTV's editors, who chose to run the interview uncut, realized the mistake. These people are journalists?

When Grammar Matters

I've avoided posting about the Canadian election, but I want to comment on this exchange because it concerns the English language, and particularly listening and speaking it as a second language, an area in which I have some knowledge. Here's the exchange:

"If you were prime minister now, what would you have done about the economy and this crisis that Mr. Harper hasn't done?”

“If I had been prime minister two-and-a-half years ago?” Mr. Dion replied.

“If you were the prime minister right now.”

At this point Dion begins talking about his plan for today. But he stumbles and again he asks for clarification: "“If I was prime minister starting when? Today?”

The question is a difficult one, grammatically--you've got the second conditional, and you've got present perfect. Add to that something I haven't seen mentioned in the media: The question isn't grammatically correct. Asking what Dion would have done (which is a question about the past) if he were prime minister now (in the present) doesn't make sense. The question, as Dion appears to recognize, should be: "If you had been prime minister since time t, what would you have done..." (if the interviewer wants to know about the past) or "If you were prime minister now, what would you do..." (if the interviewer wants to know about the present). As it is, it's unclear what he wants to know.