...and he speaks French!

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Mitt Romney has been trying to hide the fact that he speaks French. I can see why a Repugnican would find such an accomplishment to be an enormous source of shame.

Michael Dukakis also let it out that he spoke Greek and Spanish. That's what ultimately cost him the election against Bush the Elder.

Well, that and the racist Willy Horton adds. Nothing like the notion that the other guy might release a scary looking black sex offender into the community to scare white people into voting Republican.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

Two things caused Dukakis to lose.

1. His picture in the tank.

2. On a candidate interview show he was asked by the interviewer

Interviewer: Governor, if some one attack your wife wouldn't you take violent action?
Micheal the Good: -silence-
Interverview: Governor? How would you answer that?
Micheal the Good: I'm thinking, I'm thinking.

And so it went.

ruveyn

Granted, that didn't help.
It needs to be understood though, that back in those days, the Democrats were fixated with snatching defeat out of the jaws of victory.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

Those things were just minor icing on the cake. He lost because he could speak Greek and Spanish, and didn't try to hide it.

A politician who speaks French is regarded as much too intellectual to be president of the United States (although Thomas Jefferson spoke French).

A politician who speaks Spanish is regarded as soft on Hispanics, and has no chance of winning.

And all this from the nation which is the "defender of the free world". To be fair the present opposition here tried to get traction from Kevin Rudd's ability to speak fluent mandarin and his constant use of it when visiting chinese officials. Rather than portray this as dangerous they tried to portray him as being "up himself".

That the level of debate can be brought to such a level exposes the abysmal lack of political consciousness amongst the majority of voters.

Isn't french still known as the language of diplomacy? <.<

Willy Horton took an axe. Gave Dukakis 40 whacks. When he saw what he had done, he gave Dukakis 41.

Horton was not merely scary looking, he was just plain scary. An evil man.

Are you fond of making excuses for Democrats? Just asking.


ruveyn

Not in the United States of America it ain't. American English is all that counts, here. And, actually, in a lot of the world.

Here, very few people bother to study a foreign language. Of those that do, only a tiny fraction learn the language well enough to compose a coherent sentence. Such people are universally dismissed as members of the intellectual elite.

Mitt Romney knows very well that if he is ever caught uttering a word of French again, or caught watching a French movie or reading a French website, then his political career is over.

Absolutely not. But the fact remains, Bush's people had used Willy Horton - who was not just an evil man, but an evil black man - to sink Dukakis. If Willy were a white man, do you honestly think the Republicans would have broadcast his image to a white electorate?
And for the record, it was an all out lie that Dukakis had put Horton on work release - that had been done under the aegis of the previous Republican governor. Dukakis was just too dumb to realize that people would actually fall for it.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

one does not have to be a fluent frenchie to know that his accent makes inspector clouseau sound proper. he probably speaks french better than shrub speaks spanish, but he needs to brush up on his enunciation to really fit the part of francophile-in-chief.

Now, that's actually funny.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

Republicans promoting stupidity, and people are surprised?

No. Just bemused and disgusted.

I think you mean amused.



On the other hand, maybe you were right the first time.

It is amusing, on some level. We can either laugh, or cry, or laugh and cry at the same time. I wonder if any of the emoticons capture that?