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Subjunctive: Difference between revisions
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“If I ''were'' to have been writing an article about [[subjunctive]]s [''i.e., but I am not''], what would you think about that?” (This is confusing, of course, because I ''am'' writing an article about subjunctives. But to make sense of this example, imagine I ''were'' not.) | “If I ''were'' to have been writing an article about [[subjunctive]]s [''i.e., but I am not''], what would you think about that?” (This is confusing, of course, because I ''am'' writing an article about subjunctives. But to make sense of this example, imagine I ''were'' not.) | ||
Similarly, “If I ''were'' subject to the EMIR clearing obligation —” it imagines a benighted world that could exist, but in fact, happily, does not. | Similarly, “If I ''were'' subject to the EMIR [[clearing obligation]] —” it imagines a benighted world that could exist, but in fact, happily, does not. | ||
===In everyday usage=== | ===In everyday usage=== | ||
[[Brexit]], and our [[Magic circle law firm|learned friends]]’ nervous proclivities give us the | [[Brexit]], and our [[Magic circle law firm|learned friends]]’ nervous proclivities occasioned by it, give us the chance to use this word — with its sibilants, nasal plosives and fricatives it is quite fun to say, so it’s a shame we don’t get it out more often — unshackled from its technical grammatical sense. | ||
How so? Well — at least until some scenery-munching | How so? Well — at least until some scenery-munching little Englander politician rips up the European rulebook in earnest — we now have ''European'' [[MiFID]], [[EMIR]], and so on, and ''UK'' [[MiFID]], [[EMIR]] and so on. In point of fact they are, at the time of writing, to all intents the same, but in that curious way of [[non-fungible token]]s, they are at the same time, somehow [[ontologically]] ''different'': UK EMIR applies if you are in the UK, and EU EMIR applies if you are in the EU. You can’t be in both places at once though, of course, you can move. | ||
But what of a UK counterparty treating with an EU one | But what of a UK counterparty treating with an EU one? Here we have a guaranteed conundrum: where does one become the other? When the golden threads of commerce stretch betwixt the knights of Albion and the gallic and teutonic hoardes to the south, what gust of wind, spiriting starlings high above the chalky cliffs, impels them between their petulantly immovable regulatory regimes? How does one neatly describe a regulation that, in practice, applies to both but, in law, applies to only one at a time, ''seriatim''? | ||
This issue has, presently, defeated the very finest professional wordsmiths in the English language. They resort to such toe-curling conditionals as this: | This issue has, presently, defeated the very [[Magic circle law firm|finest professional wordsmiths in the English language]]. They resort to such toe-curling conditionals as this:<ref>I might be exagerrating ''un peu''.</ref> | ||
{{quote|''The issuer represents that it is: | {{quote|''The issuer represents that it is: | ||
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*[[Passive subjunctive perfect progressive]] | *[[Passive subjunctive perfect progressive]] | ||
{{draft}}{{egg}} | {{draft}}{{egg}} | ||
{{ref}} | |||