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It's my responsibility as an American citizen to make sure that every politician upholds the US Constitution;whether he can read and write in Spanish or not.
I dont abrogate my responsibility to anyone...even a politicain.
Actually I would not care (porque yo tambien hablo espanol) but he needs to keep it to himself or it would be fine when he's traveling to a Latin American nation to speak their language. If he speaks it here in the USA especially while campaiging, I would see it as major pandering to just one ethnic group and especially to the illegals.
Only in America would it be seen as a negative a politician being bilingual.
Only in America.
why do you say it is a negative, here or anywhere else? I do see it either way, but if anything, it would be a positive more than a negative. I just look for other qualities, not how many languages a person speaks.
Malamute: I disagree with you, I think, depending on the audiance, if a candidate can speak another language and the audience is mostly of that language I see nothing wrong with speaking it.
Nothing is mandatory in politics. Just expected due to the changes in the publics opinion about what makes a good candidate for office.
Speaking another language, or more than just one, is a definite help for any candidate, but I don't believe it will ever become a necessity. Anyone who decides to run for office will easily find a spokesperson who speaks in a foreign tongue. And it doesn't take much in a major speech for a candidate to insert some phrases, even if the person can't speak the language.
You assume Spanish will become the second language of the U.S., but that could well prove to be wrong. The world's immigration patterns are constantly changing unpredictably.
The U.S. could see new waves of immigrants from Asia, Africa, the Orient, or Europe at any time in this decade.
In addition, we may see a lot of Mexicans moving back to Mexico, including our Mexican-American citizens. Mexico is a 1st world country, a leading force in Latin America, and is rapidly overcoming the financial mis-steps of 30 years ago which caused the legal and illegal immigrations here.
Remember that the richest man in the world is Mexican. This may not mean all that much by itself, but it is a real indicator of Mexico's rise in importance world-wide. Do not mistake Mexico's current problems to be eternal. Things change just as rapidly there as they do here.
But things do not change rapidly in Asia, especially China. Mandarin or Cantonese could become our unofficial language in the future.
When a candidate shows up at some rally and shows he or she can speak both English and Spanish the crowd goes wild and the media plays it up. Good publicity.
I only speak English myself.
You already know some Spanish. Our language is full of it.
Spanish is an easy language to learn for Americans. You might think of taking a short course just to be able to converse a little. Most Latinos can easily understand Spanglish, and are happy to provide the words you don't know in a conversation.
Meeting a person halfway when speaking to them most often has happy results for both people.
I think it's far more important to support a candidate whose policy positions more closely align with mine - that's the main criteria. Sure, it would be desirable to have politicians who are bilingual or multilingual but it's not the most important thing. For example, Senator Marco Rubio of Florida may be bilingual but I disagree with his political positions and feel I cannot support him.
Speaking both English and Spanish is a very popular skill to have in America. Many employers require it, why not the voting public?
It is only a matter of time before Spanish is going to be the primary language in America, why not require our politicans to speak it (along with English) so they can relate better to the Spanish Speaking public? Your thoughts?
I would be more likely to vote for someone (regardless of party affiliation) who will tell the truth to the American people, and who is deadly serious about fixing our financial mess. It's all about the money. I don't care how many languages (or which languages beyond English) that they can speak.
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