A modestly interesting article in The Atlantic about the influence of parents on their children’s politics includes a delightfully ambiguous sentence. It quotes a Christian conservative Floridian:
“My son, when he was 16, thought he should be able to decide for himself whether or not he would go to church,” he recalls. “I explained to him that I agreed with him and when he moved out and was self-supporting, he could certainly make that decision for himself. Today as an adult he does not miss church.”
So, does the son attend church or not? From the smug context I presume that, in fact, the son attends church regularly — that is, he “never misses church”. But on my first reading I missed a few cues, and thought that the son never goes to church, and he “does not miss” it.
Common Infirmities 