The NantKwest Saga: Do Gov't Expenses Include Attys' Fees?

By Charles Miller, Kelly Morron, Robert Rando, Alan Sack and Chris Colvin (December 17, 2018, 12:22 PM EST) -- Language is inherently susceptible to imprecisions that are often subtle and not immediately obvious or discernible. Inconsistencies and ambiguities can arise in discourse resulting in different interpretations of polysemous words and phrases which in turn lead to confusion and misunderstandings. For example, how would a metrologist and a carpenter interpret the expression "They don't make yardsticks any longer"? What did Yogi Berra have in mind when he said "If you see a fork in the road, take it"? Even terms of art in the vocabulary of the law, especially ubiquitous ones such as "costs," "fees" and "expenses," are prone to miscomprehension when read in an isolated vacuum of "ordinary" or "plain" dictionary definitions without the proper contextual framework.[1] In the interpretation of statutes, the true meaning of a word depends on the context which, if ignored, invites judicial holdings that the legislators may not have intended....

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