@JTT,
The main issue Dave and I argue about regarding this, is that his basis for phonetic spelling is wrong. It supposes everyone pronounces words the way they do in his particular part of New York.
David is also completely inconsistent. Anyone who thinks "shud" is a phonetic spelling of "should" completely ignores bud, cud, dud, luddite, suds, and mud. English phonemes number somewhere in the low 40s, depending on the dialect, and only 26 letters to represent them. Spanish which he often uses as a counter example has around 28 phonemes, and the way they use the spelling around 29 letters, so it works for them. David, to use a Spanish example, is too quixotic for his own good.
@MontereyJack,
The one word which foxes American actors when they attempt an English accent is 'python.' In America, the last syllable is pronounced 'onn.' In the UK it's pronounced 'ughn.' Quite often I'm impressed by certain actors mastery of our accent until they say python or pentagon.
