Nuestro Paìs, Nuestro Presidente

Here is a letter I’ve mailed (old style, via the U.S. postal service) to President Bush about his use of the Spanish language and encouragement of Hispanic nationalism as part of his electoral campaign:

Honorable George W. Bush
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500

Dear President Bush:

I protest your Spanish-language advertisements and your speaking in Spanish to gain the votes of Hispanics.

The language of this country is English. It is one of the prime bases of our national unity, which George Washington in his Farewell Address told us we should cherish above all other political goods. By using the Spanish language in your campaign, you are saying that Spanish is as much the language of the United States as English is. You are dividing our country. This is the most dangerous and irresponsible thing a leader could do.

Also, in your ad, instead of addressing Hispanics as individual citizens, you are addressing them as a distinct and unified people, apart from the rest of the American people. Further, the ad shows a series of Latin American flags. If you had broadcast a tv ad directed at European Americans, with images of the flags of European countries, there would be outrage that you were appealing to white European nationalism and chauvinism. Yet you don’t hesitate to appeal to such chauvinism on the part of Hispanics.

I have no words to say how wrong and offensive it is for you to display the flags of foreign countries in an ad directed at U.S. citizens in a U.S. presidential election.

Republicans and conservatives—most importantly President Reagan—used to oppose multiculturalism and multilingualism. You have abandoned that national-unity position and are now helping to turn America into a multilingual, multicultural country.

This is my message for you and Vice President Cheney:

No matter how bad Senator Kerry is (and he is very bad), I will NEVER vote for a candidate for President who supports the linguistic and cultural division of America.

Sincerely,
Lawrence Auster

Note: The Bush Spanish language tv ad and an English translation of the text can be found at the Bush campaign site.
Posted by Lawrence Auster at August 09, 2004 11:50 PM | Send