Will I ever be recognized as American?

I like Lagat btw, and consider him an American, but he still did run for Kenya one Olympics WHILE a citizen here...I can see where some people would get upset.

I don't get this fear of Spanish. Multilingualism is a positive attribute. Everybody should be learning multiple languages; what is the negative drawback?

Another view...excerpts from a piece in today's Wall Street Journal

[...]

A new study shows that, as of Aug. 31, a whopping 23% of players on active rosters in the majors were foreign born. That's more than double the percentage as recently as 1990 and about 10 times what it was in the 1920s and '30s.

But you don't hear Americans complaining about this group of immigrants. And we're not aware of any U.S.-born hitters accusing the Red Sox home-run champion David Ortiz--or the other Dominican players here on visas--of stealing their job. Of course not. They get it, we all get it: [to paraphrase SNL character Chico Escuela] 'Foreign players been berry, berry good to baseball.'

The new study [was] by the National Foundation for American Policy, a nonprofit organization focused on trade and immigration issues. Executive director Stuart Anderson told us that the statistics he compiled about baseball point to the benefits of immigration for our society as a whole. [...] The dream of coming to this country is a huge motivator for talented people who are willing to work hard in order to make a better life for themselves. In baseball, as in many other spheres of life, the ones who make the journey here tend to be achievers.

Most striking, however, is what the study reveals about the relationship between the soaring number of foreign-born players and major-league salaries. One of the most potent anti-immigration myths says that granting visas to foreign workers drives down salaries for Americans in the same field, be it technology or anything else. Like the cry that "they're stealing our jobs!" this myth ignores reality. In truth, an employer's ability to hire all the skilled labor he needs tends to lead to higher productivity and, ultimately, a growing economy that will create a demand for more jobs, not fewer.

[...]

As the percentage of foreign-born players doubled after 1990, average salaries quadrupled. Among the factors at work: the visa-holders contributed to more exciting play and higher attendance.

You don't hear whining about foreigners in baseball, Mr. Anderson notes, because everyone understands that "they make the whole enterprise more successful, and everybody benefits." That's the larger history of immigrants in America. "There always will be people on the short end of a dynamic economy," he says. "But the solution of closing the doors is never a good solution."

Copyright © 2006 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

...well now, that depends... why would be learning them?

Remember: "We're not a multicultural country; we are multiracial, but not multicultural. We already have a culture - always have; and we already have a language - so if you move here - learn it."

[quote]Joseph McVeigh wrote:

"But the solution of closing the doors is never a good solution."

No one is advocating protectionism, which is indeed and always has been a bad economic idea. However, there is an APPROPRIATE protocol for gaining citizenship, and many are circumventing this protocol, attempting to create their own "spheres of influence."

The fear isn't of immigration of SKILLED workers of any race, which can be a boon for the economy and an ongoing way to support the sundry entitlement programs we have established. The fear is of unskilled, illegal immigrants who, rather than adopting their new homeland's tongue, pursuing an appropriate path to citizenship, and gaining necessary higher vocational skills, instead get on the dole, send wages totalling one-quarter of their country's GDP back to their homeland, and remain unskilled, thereby ULTIMATELY detracting from productivity growth ON AVERAGE for the entire economy. Big difference.

Native born Americans or Americans whose ancestors have been here too many generations are just too soft, too lazy and to entitled to keep America going. Yes there are people who milk the system and this should be prevented or discouraged..but nativists are putting America at great danger when they speak of America of Americans...Native born Americans cannot compete wtih many immigrants and the children of them

The fear is not of the language it is the fear of losing what it means to be American and not having a common bond that frightens most people. It's the uncertainty of what the influx of Hispanic immigrants means culturally, socially, and politically. Are you a racist if you don't or can't speak Spanish? Will Cinco de Mayo become more important that Independence Day? Will your children get a decent public education with more and more dollars getting spent on ESL classes? Eventually, will Hispanics be a large enough voting bloc and install the sort of corrupt and inept governments we see in their homelands? Will the Catholic Church be a omnipresent force or supplant the Constitution in the new Estados Unidos when El Presidente Lopez is in charge? What about La Raza or Nation of Aztlan? Will white, blacks, and Asians be discriminated against? Will all of the "white" money and corporations flee / cash out and leave you without a job? Would you and your family need to become "illegals" and flee to Canada, Ireland, Australia if that came to pass?

I think many people truly fear that the lack of language assimilation with new immigrants will also indicate a lack of desire to become educated, embrace democracy, or respect those people already here.

That's constructive, idiot.

Even if that was sarcasm, my reply is still the same.

Alberto Salazar is not Mexican, he is cuban...but that does not change the fact that he is American.

hispanic? show me on a map where there is country called "hispain."

Great White Hope wrote:

[quote]Joseph McVeigh wrote:

The fear isn't of immigration of SKILLED workers of any race, which can be a boon for the economy and an ongoing way to support the sundry entitlement programs we have established. The fear is of unskilled, illegal immigrants who, rather than adopting their new homeland's tongue, pursuing an appropriate path to citizenship, and gaining necessary higher vocational skills, instead get on the dole, send wages totalling one-quarter of their country's GDP back to their homeland, and remain unskilled, thereby ULTIMATELY detracting from productivity growth ON AVERAGE for the entire economy. Big difference.

You need to take economics 101 again. Your scenario above implies market clearing, and therefore demand. This would increase OVERALL productivity. What you are concerned about is Multi-Factor Prodcutivity, which is mostly (80%) a result of capital formation....and that has very little to do with the immigration of unskilled labor.

No, the point is that we already have a huge pool of unskilled labor in this country driving down the median real wage. Squeazing more output from unskilled labor with little room for improvement does not enhance productivity GROWTH in the long run. Producing skilled labor that is capable of embracing and enhancing the PROPER deployment and allocation of capital investment is what boosts long-term GAINS in productivity.

As vastly underrated as the current strength in employment growth is (due largely to the extrapolation of the archaic employment survey rather than the household survey, as well as the usual underreporting of jobs by the government, subject to upward revision) it could be much better if we produced ENOUGH highly-skilled workers to fill "high-tech" job creation. But we don't. No one ever considers this angle. We are largely becoming a country of unskilled labor and facilitating "brain drain" through our cumbersome immigration law.

Massive immigration is not responsible for the robust productivity growth enjoyed over the past ten years. Proper deployment of capital into high-tech business investment, utilized by HIGHLY-SKILLED labor is. One can only hope it will continue.

mexi ameri wrote:

hispanic? show me on a map where there is country called "hispain."

He/she doesn't need to; hispanic is a linguistic rather than a nationalistic distinction.

The Latino wrote:

Will I ever be recognized as American?

I am Mexican and born in America.

What are your thoughts?

Stop calling yourself Mexican. That might be a good first step.

Unbelievable......

and you've never heard a white American say, "Hey, I'm Irish..."

I believe,

If you live in American and abide by it's laws and culture no matter where the hell you were born, you're an American.

Born in America just means you obtain natural citizenship.

There are lots of people who represent Americanism reallt well even though they weren't born here.

dbc wrote:

and you've never heard a white American say, "Hey, I'm Irish..."

sure. come to Boston or NY.

quote: "Let's just say that we are either men or women.

And if you were born a man and change that then you cannot get women's records."

Actually, you can.