Posted by Frank James at 12:52 pm CDT
Former Speaker Newt Gingrich can always be counted on for the controversial and didn’t disappoint over the weekend with a comment in which he appeared to say that the language of Cervantes and Lorca, is the “language of the ghetto.”
Here’s a larger excerpt of the Associated Press story:
WASHINGTON (AP) — Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich equated bilingual education Saturday with “the language of living in a ghetto” and mocked requirements that ballots be printed in multiple languages.
“The government should quit mandating that various documents be printed in any one of 700 languages depending on who randomly shows up” to vote, said Gingrich, who is considering seeking the Republican presidential nomination in 2008. He made the comments in a speech to the National Federation of Republican Women.
“The American people believe English should be the official language of the government. … We should replace bilingual education with immersion in English so people learn the common language of the country and they learn the language of prosperity, not the language of living in a ghetto,” Gingrich said to cheers from the crowd of more than 100.
“Citizenship requires passing a test on American history in English. If that’s true, then we do not have to create ballots in any language except English,” he said.
Peter Zamora, co-chair of the Washington-based Hispanic Education Coalition, which supports bilingual education, said, “The tone of his comments was very hateful. Spanish is spoken by many individuals who do not live in the ghetto.”
Needless to say, Gingrich’s statement is likely to do little to further President Bush’s vision of expanding the Republican party with Hispanic American voters. It does help keep him in the news, however, although probably not in a way that moves him closer to the Republican Party’s presidential nomination.
