This Why We Can't Have Nice Things

One of my favorite phrases is, “that’s why we can’t have nice things.” It sums up a lot in life, including pretty much every office policy about remote work. It seems it also applies to global sports, ...

Parade on MSN: Tourists ruin historical fountain in Italy as a pre-wedding dare, and this is why we can't have nice things

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Tourists ruin historical fountain in Italy as a pre-wedding dare, and this is why we can't have nice things

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My mother used to say, "Why can't we have anything nice? You boys just break everything!" We weren't malicious. We were just clumsy, thoughtless kids. The plan, as I understand it, was for her boys to ...

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All throughout American history, political and economic elites have insisted that better policies — ending child labor, establishing a weekend — were impossible to achieve. They were lying then, and ...

Why is a just a rather odd wh -word. Its distribution is very limited -- it can only have the word reason as its antecedent, and since it's never the subject it's always deletable. Consequently it behaves strangely, as you and others point out.

Why have a letter in a word when it’s silent in pronunciation, like the b in debt? Can anyone please clarify my uncertainty here?

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The grass is wet because it rained last night. This seems the simplest and most elegant expression of the meaning. I am always suspicious of "reason (s)" and "why" being next to each other. There can be reasons for things but there is usually a better way of expressing "reasons why".

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