Consider these two sentences:
X. Keep straight on, swerving neither left or right. X. An assistant commissioner said they could neither vouch for the truth nor accuracy of the reports.
What is the matter with each of them? Neither . . . nor . . . is not neither . . . or . . . as in the first example. And the neither . . . nor . . . construction must balance, which it fails to do in the second sentence. The elements that follow neither and nor should be grammatically symmetrical, generally having the same pattern of parts of speech. So the second sentence should read either they could neither vouch for the truth nor confirm the accuracy of the reports or they could vouch for neither the truth nor the accuracy of the reports. But as it stands the sentence does not balance.
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