I agree with you, too – what sense does it make to send all these people to the border so they can stand around pretending to be doing something for the next year?

BUILD THE WALL AND BE DONE WITH IT!

I have no problem whatsoever with how people speak in their homes or out in public, etc. but expecting the government to provide taxpayer funded services, when, if a person is here legally, they were supposed to pass an English proficiency exam, is ridiculous. And if that person is not here legally, I want them to be as uncomfortable as possible until they leave or assimilate. That goes for any foreign person, not just Latinos. There are a lot of things I admire about Mexico, and their border enforcement and immigration laws are high on the list. I don’t really have any brilliant ideas for stopping the balkanization other than getting people to speak the language.

if the language of an area is changing that change is being driven by social & economic forces that the government really has no business meddling in. it would be foolish for a government to even try to meddle in those areas. in each and every rematch of the epic bout of man vs nature, nature is still undefeated.

what we’re talking about is a natural change being driven by free-market forces. if a business wants to cater to english-speakers, more power to them. but if that business can’t stay IN business by operating only in english, then that business is no longer serving the people and it soon either learns to adapt or it goes out of business. why would it be any different with government?

just 20-30 years ago, there were large parts of chicago that you couldn’t get by in if you didn’t speak polish. same was true for italian and new york/new jersey. when wisconsin became a state in 1848 all government operations, including debate in the state legislature, were carried out in german.

i agree with you about the dangers of balkanization. what would you offer as a solution? i think that scaling back or stopping bilingual services will only serve to further isolate those people that you’re looking to convert to english speakers.

Yes, the language thing bothers me a great deal. I understand Spanish reasonably well, I took it for four years in high school, but allowing enclaves of ANY subset of society in this way – and language is a large part of that – is a terrible idea. There are places in Miami, and plenty along the border, that if you don’t speak Spanish, you can’t get along too well. That kind of Balkanization is a really bad idea.

I ask because the language thing doesn’t really bother me. Of the many problems that illegal immigration brings, I just don’t see language as being a big one.

Besides, have you any idea how hard it is to get a decent pack of flour tortillas when there isn’t a large mexican section?

Here in New Orleans we have a massive, sudden increase of illegal immigrants, so it’s a very hot topic for me. Even my grocery store has started carrying items in Spanish. The first time I saw the Kraft “Cream of Rice” box in Spanish was a bit jarring. Not dual language. It was only Spanish. And that’s happening a fair amount.

i get the feeling that the ‘learning english’ part was thrown in to appease people like my mom; whenever she gets going, her only focus is on “when your grandparents came over here they had to learn english! (the US government) didn’t put everything in polish for them! it’s ridiculous that everything is in spanish now!”

of course, she’s talking about the spanish-speaking lady that she hears when calling citibank or sbc, not some spanish-speaking lady at the state-run dmv. i told her that private business has the right to put their outgoing message in whatever language they want, and all she says is “it’s still not right!”

what i’m getting at is that, rightly or wrongly so, my mother is fixated on the language thing. i can just picture her and millions of others, sitting and watching the speech, seething the whole time over every word out of the president’s mouth, but then triumphantly declaring “damn right!” when he mentioned the speaking english part at the end.

in reality, the president made no promises about requiring that immigrants learn english. not only does he have no control over private entities, but the federal government has little control over state-run programs (eg public school).

the president didn’t really say a whole lot of anything, did he?

a related question that i thought of while writing that: are louisiana govt materials also printed in a second language, eg french or creole?

I’m George W Bush, and I did not approve this post!

I have a feeling that Bush’s speech tonight is going to be a lot of, blah blah blah……