re:Fool's-object ``whom''

From: berlin1 (hannischmelzer_at_hotmail-dot-com.no-spam.invalid)
Date: 09/29/04 

Date: 29 Sep 2004 04:29:09 -0500

Ron Hardin wrote
> A slight flaw in this analysis is that I have the feeling that ``who
it is (that)
> you employ'' is a cleft construction, which would fall under a
prescriptive rule
> for objective case (``it is him that you employ'').
>
Yes, I believe it is.

Perhaps the VP is underlyingly
'to rethink who it is whom he employs'
and we have ellipsis of 'it is whom'.
This may have been mentioned.
I also agree with Hardin that the use of 'who' here may be preventing
the the analysis of the relative clause as a fused relative
construction (with 'whom' being anaphoric to 'the person whom'):

*to rethink [the person whom] he employs