If you start studying a language at sixty rather than six, you're doomed to sound like this guy...

[StefanX]

After implying that Spanish is a "language of the ghetto",
Newt offers an apology in broken Spansish

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/4/4/234822/1824

Newtie's cynical, tone-deaf, smarmy mea culpa is a perfect argument IN FAVOR OF bilingual education starting in elementary school.

If he'd been exposed to a second language back then as a child, then he wouldn't have flamed out so bad in this pathetic attempt to pretend to speak Spanish. He would have picked up some of the language's phonetics, instead of garbling the pronunciation by reading cue cards prepared by a Spanish speechwriter.

[whistle]

1. Sounds like Newt is talking Pig Latin, however he seems to know enough

...Spanish to get laid in Tijuana

[SharonAnn]

8. Compare this to John Kerry's excellent Spanish. Quite a difference.

[bluedawg12]

13. Newt sounds and looks like a pig

no matter what language he speaks.

[nuxvomica]

2. He sounded like he studied under Peggy Hill

I'm no one to talk cuz I can't speak it but jeesh if I were actually studying Spanish I would try to speak it with a little more gusto.

[irish.lambchop]

3. I heard that sound clip

on Air America Radio today (Sam Seder) - hysterical! Of course, Sam was "interpreting" and said that newt was saying, "Jewish people should eat less bagels"! Did anyone hear Sam's recording of going shopping with his wife in NY? A takeoff on mcCain going "shopping" in Baghdad - complete with machine gun fire and helicopters.

[originalpckelly]

4. It sounds like some twisted type of Latin.

I think he must have studied Latin or something, he pronounces like it.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

5. i take offense at this.

I self study languages, history and more. Comparing me (on the edge of 50) and my accent with a neut is really insulting. People have three choices, to grow, to stagnate or to seriously veg.

then again, hearing neu, I am convinced that usted aspira en los penes muertos del burro. But, that is just my opinion.

[StefanX]

18. No offense intended

I respect you for starting to study a language at ANY age.

What I meant (which I guess I didn't express explicitly enough) was that starting bilingual education at an early age is the best way to learn a language.

Of course, we can't all be so lucky to have bilingual education in elementary school (especially if creeps like Gingrich get their way, robbing us of this opportunity because of their misplaced "English-Only" crap). But it would be better if MORE people could learn two languages when they're young, when (according to many neuroscientists) or brain for some reason has an easier time of picking up new languages.

In other words, if Newt had had the benefit of bilingual education from an early age, it's a pretty good bet he'd sound WAY better than this.

[SheilaT]

6. A surprising number of those

who study foreign languages make no real effort to accurately reproduce the sounds of that language. I took several semesters of Spanish recently at my local junior college, and I was rather amazed at how many of the 19 year olds -- all of whom had taken two or more years of Spanish in high school -- essentially pronounced it exactly as if it were English with a weird spelling. And Spanish isn't all that difficult to pronounce. Not that I expect an American to sound like a native Spanish speaker, but c'mon, anyone can do better than that!

[ComerPerro]

7. And when an immigrant speaks in English as badly as he is speaking Spanish, RWers still get pissed

[Lydia Leftcoast]

9. Not only right wingers

I've had arguments with plenty of DUers who think that immigrants should just automatically pick up English some how and that if they don't, they're "refusing" to learn English.

But if right wingers realize that Newt's Spanish is bad, they'll think it's an endearing trait, just like when Reagan mangled mi casa es su casa into "Me cassa ess soo cassa."

[Hardrada]

10. Some sounds in other languages are really almost

impossible to reproduce unless one grew up with them. I picked up correct sounding German at an early age, gutturals and all but I will never be able to pronounce the Danish version of "red cross" (and without the right o with a slash I can't even type it here.)

[ComerPerro]

12. yeah, like Bush's drunken Spanish.

"Soy Americano. Tengo dinero. Donde esta la cerveza y la tequila?"

[madeline_con]

15. Doesn't your username mean "to eat a dog"?

I'm kidding. Trying to be a smartass. :rofl:


Edited beacause I can't spell in any language!

[ComerPerro]

16. it does, in fact. intentional, literal translation. long story, joke with a friend

[madeline_con]

17. Cool. eom

[madeline_con]

14. Oye! Oye!

:rofl:

[Hissyspit]

11. That's the first thing I thought of when I saw it last night.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

19. Is there an age after which you can't learn a language?

Is the number 60 some sort of learning "wall" after which we can't learn a new language? After that I should just be satisfied with the languages I already know?

When does the "language learning" brain cell just hold up it's hands and say "No mas!"?

Sounds like age-prejudiced BS to me.

[Swamp Rat]

20. ¡Ufa! ... ¡Es IMPOSIBLE escucharlo!!

:puke: :puke: :puke: :puke: :puke: :puke: