>
> Doug Henwood wrote:
>
> > After Packer's talk, I politely asked him if he
> > regretted his support for the war. He did. "I wish
> > I would have had more information at the time," he
> > told me.
>
> "Would have had" -- what's that called in grammar: past continuous?
I think it's something like a past imperfect. Between "had had," "could have had," and "would have had" I hear distinct shades of meaning aroud the difference between "can" and "will." "Had had" is impersonal. "Could have had" implies that having that information was impossible, i.e., not having it was nobody's fault. "Would have had" seems to put an agent who willfully held back information from Packer.
Yours WDK - WKiernan at ij.net