In other words, a melting pot, right?
In some respects, the southwestern portion of the country has always been a(n?) Hispanic nation. We moved the border after the war with Mexico, but everyone stayed here.

Just because a poll says a large majority of people are “concerned” about illegal immigration, that doesn’t mean said people aren’t willing to grant amnesty to the ones that are here. These continuous crap polls need to be stopped. They should not be used to frame the issue in every major media outlet. It’s an absolute disservice to the American public.

Your key graf: “Should America plan to become a Hispanic nation?” with the two possible answers of sporting the Mexican flag and calling senators to voice concern, is a piece of shit argument and you know it. It’s a false choice. The answer to the question does not exist because the duality between “becoming a Hispanic nation” and “staying an American nation” does not exist. That frame is a tired one that is used far too often in politics. The left uses it too with regards to taxes and benefits for all sorts of programs. Or by framing the tax rebate as benefitting the rich more. Sure, big picture, true, but they are burdened by taxes by quite a bit more. I would have no problem with Bush’s tax cuts if budget was actually balanced as well. This is my main beef with Bush’s economic policy and why I think it’s irresponsible. I hate the false choice frame. It’s one of my (many) pet peeves.

Compare that to this:

http://www.theconservativevoice.com/articles/article.html?id=13559

This guy is mad!

Read this => she says it better than I can

Key graf:

Should America plan to become a Hispanic nation? The question is neither “racist” nor “xenophobic,” but central to any coherent policy. If the answer is yes, we all might as well salute the red, white and green. If not, we better call our senators

In another post recently you have attacked Paul as someone who puts words in your mouth and now you are putting words in my mouth. I, however, don’t give a shit as I can clear the record rather easily (not that I need to for the likes of frame or whoever knows that you like to do this as well and take everything you say with a grain of salt, which, oddly enough is what I do with everyone as a force of habit anyhow).

It sounds to me like you’re bitter about whatever problems have been occurring relating to dealing with Mexicans (and, you assume illegality but do not KNOW they are illegal). Sure, it’s a nuisance to not know Spanish and then have to deal with the consequences, but I don’t see a reason for us not to learn Spanish in schools. Learning a foreign language at a young age is much easier and can actually help us understand English better as well as direct objects and verb tenses are necessary to speaking both languages well.

I agree that if kids are dragged over the border year in and year out then that’s a problem, but I don’t know enough about the issue to comment otherwise. I’m assuming it’s well documented so I’ll keep my eye open for an article about this topic.

If I was in charge in hiring someone to man my phones, I would hire someone who was fluent in both English and Spanish (if living in an area with a large Hispanic population). So, if you didn’t understand the person speaking English to you with a Hispanic accent, well, maybe you need to get out more or have it repeated rather than sitting there being frustrated. So, no, I would not hire illegals who did not speak English that well. And, yes, I do care that people do hire inadequate help, and that’s what it’s all about, inadequate service, not Mexican culture replacing American culture.

For the record, I never said you were a racist, I said when righties (or lefties) begin framing the illegal immigrant issue as one about culture, then that is what is racist. The issue is about the legality and not the culture. What happens to our culture is going to happen regardless of what decisions are made now. People are going to continue to come across the border, both legally and illegally. It is inevitable for bordering countries to share cultural habits, just as you have stated previously. It is why we will probably adopt something similar to the Canadian health care plan.

How do Mexican store owners cheat their countrymen with every sale? The Mexican store owners would not have been able to be store owners in Mexico as people in America have more liquid assets. I don’t understand your logic. Or maybe it’s as you insinuate. I don’t care. Riiiiiiight.

Perhaps you could see people waving foreign flags protesting the inability of their countryment to stay here illegally as the solution and not a problem. They are explicitly telling the government what they want. Put them on a path to citizenship (with slight penalties) and they won’t have to protest now will they? And, it will benefit the country culturally. It will add people to pay into social security. Some of them will become rich and pay even more into the treasury.

In any event, you complete dodged the main purpose of my last post which was to clarify why exactly the American melting pot including Mexican culture is something to be worried about.

Talking about immigration is not the same as being opposed to immigration.

Maybe this will make it clearer: Valuing your culture requires something. If you were affected by Mexican immigration in the real, immediate and personal way that I am, you’d have a better understanding of what I am talking about.

Frameone blithely talks about having Hispanics around him that “have been here for hundreds of years.” Most of you, don’t see a Hispanic person until you go out to eat and he brings a pitcher of water to your table. If you’re really lucky, he trims your hedges and cuts your grass.

I have to deal with people who don’t speak English unless it’s necessary, on a daily business. First they don’t understand you, then they ask if you speak Spanish, then they speak English, when all else fails. I’ve missed appointments because of receptionists whose English is so poor, I didn’t understand what they said over the phone. Is it their fault? No.

Who hired them? A person who doesn’t care — the kind of person you are — the kind of person you want me to be.

Lots of Mexican kids get hauled off to Mexico by their parents for months and months at a time, and, as a result, they get left back in our local schools when they return. Who cares? Not people like you. No, I care. I guess that makes me a racist, huh?

Some of these kids end up in Special Ed, where they do not belong, and then they end up with that stigma. Who cares? Not you. No, I care. I guess that makes me a racist.

I’ve lived in this town all my life. Now there are places where I go that the clerks, waiters and waitresses, operators and receptionists can’t even speak English. It’s inconvenient as hell, if I can get away with not going back, I don’t. If they go out of business, who cares? Not you. No, I care. I guess that makes me a racist.

Mexican store owners cheat their countrymen with every sale, as the Italian predecessors did before them. Should we let that continue? Who cares? You don’t. I do. I guess that makes me a racist.

But keep pretending there are no problems. Keep telling yourself that millions of people waving foreign flags protesting the inability of their countrymen to stay here illegally, with our Congresspersons in the crowd, doesn’t represent a problem.

Maybe it will go away.

Were you simply implying that some person at some point will be framing these issues as such as opposed to how it ought to be framed? I don’t think that is the case as the last statement in the post your comments was pulled from is “Pretending that there is no American culture to protect is hiding your head in the sand.” Why do we need to protect it? Let the melting pot melt a little more. What’s the big deal?

When conservatives do frame the issue like this, it makes them a racist and that is the “answer” to their framing of the issue.

America is not an  amalgamation of cultures  are all of you so uneducated on anthropology?
Can I clear something up for all of you: First of all, in one sense, with rare exceptions, all cultures are an  amalgamation of other cultures. Some anthropologists even theorize that, in a  Heisenbergian* way , once a culture had been observed, it has, to some degree,  absorbed the culture of the observer.
However, for the most part, this definition of culture will suffice:

The totality of socially transmitted behavior patterns, arts, beliefs, institutions, and all other products of human work and thought& These patterns, traits, and products considered as the expression of a particular period, class, community, or population: such as American culture [fd]& These patterns, traits, and products considered with respect to a particular category, such as a field, subject, or mode of expression&

*Colin Turnbull once produced an album of Mountain Pygmy music. The last song on Side 2 was  My Darling Clementine.

The point I have been trying to make literally for days, despite a heavy blowback, is that saying that American culture is an  amalgamation of other cultures, is really saying nothing at all, because all cultures are an amalgamation of other cultures. It’s like saying, “I drive a car with rubber wheels and an internal combustion engine.”

Saying that America is a “nation of immigrants” is a similar description. There is hardly a nation on earth that is not populated with people from different countries.

BTW, I am a newbie poster here, relatively speaking. I thoroughly enjoy the intellectual jousting that goes on between the primary combatants here (and you know who you are) and, though I don’t remember what was said to make me sign up and respond, it was most likely Frank D. A bunch of you folks are probably a lot smarter than I, but I thank you for allowing me to speak.

You know what cracks me up about you?

You come strolling onto the blog after three days, you probably haven’t read a word I posted. After all, elevated BP blurs the vision.

I know you didn’t read this: “If you want to tell me what I think, or tell me what I mean, then the mistakes are all yours.”

If you figure that “American  culture is nothing more than a conglomeration of other cultures,” than you are woefully uneducated in the subject of culture, American or otherwise.

And the next time you want to ignore a comment, ignore it, OK? I didn’t make the comment with you in mind, and I don’t care what you think about it, either.

If you didn’t come here to “get me,” then what’s with the condescending and snide remarks?

Go back to the trailer, Toots, I think “Wheel of Fortune” is coming on. That’s your culture.

I am choosing to ignore the comment about young girls in tight pants. Can’t afford to get my blood pressure that high.

BTW, I certainly don’t arrive here just to see what Frank said today; or thinking “How can I get Frank today?” But you sure do make it easy and fun. Maybe Oliver ought to thank you for boosting the numbers on his site meter.

This would be, um. your devout Catholic side talking, Frank?

Oliver, there is nothing “implicit in my premise.” We’re not looking at a third party’s work, and disagreeing about it. You’re talking about me, and I’m telling you what I mean, and you’re telling me, “That’s not what you mean; you mean something else.”

If you said, “It seems like you’re saying this or that,” that would be fair, and that would represent a (sort of a) request for clarification. But, when you’re saying, “This is what I say you mean (no matter what you might subsequently argue) that’s not a debate — that’s more like a prosecutor’s argument, but there’s no jury.

Do you remember this statement by Jay C yesterday?
His [meaning my] questions seemed rhetorical at best. It didn’t change the tone of the comments one bit, and no one even disputed it.

That Paul is one dangerous dude.

Think Ted Bundy with an internet connection.

One more racist, for the road.

We don’t agree on that. The assimilation of Mexican culture is going to be good for America, if only because so many of them are practicing Christians (mainly Catholics) — surprised you, didn’t I?

It’s not our assimilation of them that is problematic — where I live, there’s about a dozen thriving new restaurants, and that’s in a town of less than 70,000. Two religious processions pass my house each year. It brings tears to my eyes just to type it now. Oh, yes, there going to have a positive effect (not to mention that the girls wear the tightest pants on the planet!)

It’s their assimilation of us that’s the problem. Somebody said before that third generation immigrants from Hispanic countries speak perfect English.
That’s fine, but in my neighborhood, they’re all 1st generation immigrants. Their children often get short – changed in the education department because their parents take them back and forth to Mexico for up to 10 months at a time.

And, by the way, Mike, you never — NEVER — heard me say that Mexicans had an inferior culture. You guys need to get your antennae repaired — I don’t know where you’re getting your signals from.

And, by the way, I don’t see why I have to define “American culture”, except in the most general of terms: (Putting together two definitions): The totality of socially transmitted behavior patterns, arts, beliefs, institutions, and all other products of human work and thought, considered as the expression of a particular period (now), and community (Americans here and now).

By the way, it’s not anybody’s speculation that is “causing Oliver’s misinterpretation.” It’s Oliver’s attitude to deal with, I’m not solving his problems for him. If you want to tell me what I think, or tell me what I mean, then the mistakes are all yours. Like many of the people on this thread, Oliver is the kind of guy who forms an opinion from what he thinks you said, no matter what you say afterwards — kind of like frameone, JK, and jadegold… They just go on and on in their own little world, tossing out witticisms, snappy comebacks, insulting invective, you know what I mean — “sound and fury, signifying nothing.”

You could bury them in links and citations, and they’d never change their minds, but they’re amazed when you don’t. If I’m reading them wrong, feel free to show me the error of my ways.

One of the more amazing things about these threads is that I have found myself “debating” as many as four or five people, with insults thrown in for good measure, people popping in to say one thing about me, and leaving; and then somebody says that I’m making the thread “all about me.” Like I held a gun to their heads!

….Frame (shouting): “…and you are totally racist, don’t try to deny it”!

(Mouse in corner looks in general direction of Frame flailing arms)

Frame (staring icily at mouse): “I don’t care if you are dating the cockroach, you have no cred here, Moron.”

Golfish: “Glub, glub”

Frame (with veins popping on forehead): “That is total bullshit! You can take that straw man and stick it in you gills! I refuse to argue with a fish who hasn’t been out of that tank in two years, so stick that victimhood shit! Idiot!