http://www.isnare.com/?s=author&a=Bill+Moore Religion Bill Moore Tue, 18 Dec 2007 00:00:00 -0800 http://www.isnare.com/?aid=88150&ca=Religion Truthiness is a word whose time has come. It was coined by Steven Colbert on “The Colbert (pronounced coal-bear) Report (pronounced repoor) on Comedy Central. It refers to how a person can claim to know something instinctively without facts or reason. A gut feeling, to the truthinist, is superior to... Writing Bill Moore Wed, 26 Sep 2007 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.isnare.com/?aid=124541&ca=Writing Everyone should be sure of the rules when they use an indefinite pronoun. Or, maybe, everyone should be sure of the rules when he uses an indefinite pronoun. Or else, when he or she uses. . . And that’s the problem. For many years, the Mavens of Grammar have stated , unequivocally, that indefinite p... Writing Bill Moore Wed, 25 Jul 2007 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.isnare.com/?aid=110813&ca=Writing Misuse of who and whom is an error in grammar often committed by the very people who consider themselves most refined and grammatical. The correct use may surprise you. When to use who and when to use whom is probably one of the most confusing grammar problems around. Well, I’m about to give you the... Writing Bill Moore Tue, 01 May 2007 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.isnare.com/?aid=95950&ca=Writing Like everything else conceived by the minds of humans, grammar and its rule come into and go out of fashion. Shakespeare could use double negatives, but we’re not supposed to. An educated person in the 17th Century could say ain’t, but not now. When you’re a writer-for-hire, it’s your job to know th... Writing Bill Moore Fri, 27 Apr 2007 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.isnare.com/?aid=96552&ca=Writing When do we use shall instead of will or will instead of shall? The short answer to the question is that, to an overwhelming extent, in American English, will as a verb meaning intend to can be used in every construction where will or shall is a choice. It hasn’t always been that way, and for writer... Writing Bill Moore Fri, 27 Apr 2007 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.isnare.com/?aid=95948&ca=Writing There are many rules of grammar: good rules, bad rules, sound rules, and silly rules. The problem is knowing which ones you have to follow and which ones can you ignore. I’ll give you my rule about that in a bit, but first, let’s look at who decided whether it was good grammar or bad. Like most rule... Writing Bill Moore Thu, 26 Apr 2007 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.isnare.com/?aid=95940&ca=Writing Does the correct choice of her/she bar you from being a good writer? Well, we’re going to break the her/she bar and give you a sound method of using these and other pronouns accurately. Of all the little words in the language, none causes as many problems as the simple pronoun. The next paragraph is... Writing Bill Moore Thu, 19 Apr 2007 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.isnare.com/?aid=91743&ca=Writing If the rules of English grammar are carved anywhere, they’re carved only in butter. A lot of the rules are arbitrary at best and sometimes even silly. And it’s possible that you can violate many of them and still be considered a good writer. But should you? Like everything else, the rules come into... Writing Bill Moore Mon, 02 Oct 2006 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.isnare.com/?aid=77752&ca=Writing You’d probably never write a sentence like this unless it was a direct quotation: “Well, I mean, you know, we just kind of, you know, kicked it around some until Mel goes he won’t, like, support the campaign.” People speak like that. It’s called speaking “colloquially,” which, technically, means as... Writing Bill Moore Mon, 02 Oct 2006 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.isnare.com/?aid=77754&ca=Writing Shakespeare didn’t want to kill all the lawyers, and Robert Frost didn’t think that good fences make good neighbors. Sometimes, people use famous lines by famous people to support their arguments. And, too often, the words they quote not only weren’t intended to support what they’re saying, they act...