Oh, boy...where to start?
According to Barack Obama, Americans are not only bitter and clinging to God and guns, but apparently now we're a bunch of ignorant rubes since we're not all bilingual! Never mind the fact that Obama himself is not bilingual...and never mind the fact that his own kids are not bilingual. He is nothing if not a liberal, and that means there are two sets of rules - one for him and his elite friends, and one for the rest of us stupid plebes.
And, why is he so insistent on copying Europe? Have you noticed this? I can't recall the last time he spoke positively about America - his first reaction to every single issue is that America's got it wrong. He wants to implement many of the policies (universal health care, for example) that have proven to be disastrous to Europe, and he is straight out of the European socialist playbook. Why does he want to copy Europe when we're better in just about every way? As Thomas Sowell so eloquently points out:
If anyone suggested that Tiger Woods should try to be more like other golfers, people would question the sanity of whoever made that suggestion.No kidding! Sowell goes on to show how Europe is doing fine compared to the rest of the world, but next to the U.S., they don't hold a candle in productivity, standard of living, and overall economy. If that's the case, why do elites like Obama want to copy it?
Powerline points out another great thought: this shows how vastly out of touch Barack Obama is with the normal, every day Americans who make this country work:
The ugly American abroad is a stereotype from the 1950s and 1960s. Does Obama really not know that for the last several decades, every school district in America has been relentlessly pushing the study of foreign languages? Is he unaware that it is now commonplace for American high school students to travel abroad in school groups to practice their German, French, Spanish, Japanese, and so on?To top it off, Rasmussen Reports just released a poll that shows Americans soundly reject Obama's suggestion of bilingualism:Obama himself never attended a public school, so perhaps he really has no idea what goes on there. As he moved from his tony Honolulu prep school to Columbia to Harvard, he may have assumed that it was only the chosen few who learned foreign languages (although not, actually, Obama himself). That's not the case:
As of 2004, 85 percent of America's 17 million high school students were graduating with two or more years of foreign language instruction and a third had three or more years.News flash, Barack: the average American high school student probably has more foreign language proficiency than you do.
Eighty-three percent (83%) place a higher priority on encouraging immigrants to speak English as their primary language. Just 13% take the opposite view and say it is more important for Americans to learn other languages.This is just the latest in a long string of obvious examples of how badly out of step Barack Obama is with Americans. He is completely unprepared to lead our country, not only because of his elite, snobbish attitude toward those he would lead, but also because he either doesn't know what Americans think about important election issues, or he doesn't care. Either way, it's bad news for America.
Last fall, a Rasmussen Reports survey found that 77% of Americans believed that employers should be allowed to require employees to speak English while on the job. With the Supreme Court recently upholding tougher standards for voter identification at the polls, 65% of voters now believe election ballots should only be printed in English.
Only 26% believe that every American should be able to speak at least two languages.
There's my two cents.
4 comments:
Obama did not say we're stupid. He said that it's embarassing when we're in ANOTHER COUNTRY and can't speak any of their language.
Why do we expect people from OTHER COUNTRIES to come to ours and only speak our language, but then it's "elitist" or "out of touch" to suggest that we should speak THEIR languages when we're in THEIR COUNTRIES? Who's got the double standard?
No, he didn't say the words, but he certainly implied it. If you didn't notice, there was just a wee bit of condescension in his voice there.
Personally, I agree completely with you - I expect international visitors to speak English when they come here. Similarly, when Americans travel abroad, I expect them to take a stab at speaking the language of the country they're visiting.
No double standard here.
The point of this post isn't so much about the bilingual thing, but about what conclusions we can draw from his statements about the bilingual thing. To recap:
1. he's a condescending hypocrite who suggests we do one thing while he does another
2. he once again reveals his opinion that America is wrong and Europe is right
3. he is utterly, hopelessly out of touch with Americans
For these reasons and many more, he is unqualified to be President.
Granted he did not say Americans are stupid, but I'm wondering why, if the purpose of learning a second language is to have more opportunities in the global economy, he would suggest learning Spanish and not Chinese. I'm no economics major but it doesn't take one to see there's more economic growth in Asia than south of the border. Or was he just appealing to the Latino vote again?
That's a good point. I think you're probably right, on both counts!
Post a Comment