Read other letters about this article
The OED defines abuse as:
-Wrong or improper use, misuse, misapplication, perversion.
-A bad or improper usage (i.e. a use which has become chronic), a corrupt practice.
-Injurious speech, reviling, execration; abusive language.
-Improper use of words (Chiefly rhet.)
or as a synonym for violation. Nowhere in the entire entry does the dictionary even mention intention. Abuse comes from the Latin word to either use up, or mis-use. Again, no mention of intention. It's pervertedly amusing how abuse can refer to catachresis, when that's the precise tool the Bush administration has used to keep its stranglehold on absolute power.