Grappling with Grammar: A Grammar Gallimaufry

Being the nerd that I am, I was thinking the other day about how coordinating conjunctions can change the meaning of sentences. It made me think of a student-made video that I watched in a class in high school.

One of the students asked other students around the school about the upcoming presidential election. One of the girls on the video said, "My parents are republicans, but I'm going to vote for Bush!" Oops!

Poor girl--we all laughed when we heard that. You would think that by high school, people would figure out the difference between "and" and "but".