Apparently there are people to whom the results of the Mexican-American war of 1848 are still a live issue.
I remember in the mid-90s something came up called "Proposition 187" which had to do with denying illegal immigrants jobs and health care. One response was a protest in L.A. in which people walked around carrying the Mexican flag. Another was that California was stolen from Mexico and that Mexicans should be free to move there or stay there ("we didn't cross the border, the border crossed us"), or should be given back, etc.
I know. But where would we be if we Italians were still demanding that Corsica, Malta, Istria, Italian Switzerland, and Dalmatia be "returned" to us? Or Corfu and Rhodes? Crete? Cyprus? And yes, I know about the treaty of Trianon and one day soon you will find my opinion why everything about the end of WWI was wrong and why Woodrow Wilson was a villain, but the fact is, there is no mystical ownership in land or territory.
Yes, I know you know how many Hungarians love to complain about the Treaty of Trianon. :) But honestly I've always struggled with the whole issue and I can't tell you if any lost pieces should be returned to a country. I guess what I worry more about is how the new minority is treated in their new country (e.g. Hungarian Transylvanians).
And I'd love to hear your opinion on the end of WWI. (I thought it was quite unfair to Germany and helped lead to WWII ... but that's based on my meager history classes, so who knows what I'll think when I learn more!)
But where would we be if we Italians were still demanding that Corsica, Malta, Istria, Italian Switzerland, and Dalmatia be "returned" to us? Or Corfu and Rhodes? Crete? Cyprus?
Goose-stepping in a review before Benito Mussolini's prettier descendant? Though actually I don't know if her political platform is that ambitious ...
And yes, I know about the treaty of Trianon and one day soon you will find my opinion why everything about the end of WWI was wrong and why Woodrow Wilson was a villain ...
No argument from me on that. I know bad things about Wilson's domestic policy you may not be aware of, including his imposition of segregation in the Federal civil service and his role in the Red Scare of 1918-20. And yes, given that Italy specifically joined the Allies to get territory from Austria-Hungary, denying Italy those territories was both dishonest and stupid -- it helped bring Italy into the Second World War on the other side.
WRT the ad itself, my only regret is that it's vodka, which I don't drink anyway, so my saying "See if I drink Absolut after this!" is an empty threat.
The pity of it is that, according to people who know such things (I don't drink vodka either) Absolut is either the best or among the best vodkas in the world. And this is typically Swedish: produce a superlative product (the Swedes have, in my experience, better food and better and more tasteful housing than anyone else north of Italy) and then wreck it by naive, provincial, ignorant arrogance and stupid attempts at PC.
It amuses me that article I read about the ad (I hadn't heard about it, so I had to go look it up) included this line:
"Some Mexicans use the term "Reconquista" (reconquest) to refer to the growing presence in California of Mexican migrants and their descendants."
Given the delicacy of Muslim-American relations right now, I wonder how well that would go over if more Americans knew enough history to remember what the original "Reconquista" was about.
You might add that, in Mexican history, the "conquista" was what Cortez and co. did to the Aztecs. How the Aztlan maniacs, with their rose-tinted notion of the Aztec Empire, reconcile that with a positive idea of "re"-conquista at the expense of America and in the name of Cortez's tongue is a conundrum even in the usual insanities of ultra-nationalism.
Another reconquest suggested (tongue-in-cheek)lametigerApril 14 2008, 17:22:09 UTC
As the son of a Welshman (who, however, went to Canada as a teen) I have sardonic thoughts of the Welsh and other Celts chasing the descendants of Anglo-Saxon (and later, Norman) invaders out of the British isles. But then, I shouldn't be too hard on the English, because my American-born mother is of mostly English derivation. This all colors my reaction to people who try to turn back the demographic clock in any part of the world, whether it be the American continents, Palestine, or wherever.
About bilinguilismlametigerApril 14 2008, 17:44:32 UTC
Excuse me for double-posting, but I felt this was better as a separate comment entry because it deals with a separate line of thought. In December 2006, I returned (for the first time since a child) to South Africa, the land of my birth. It was interesting when traveling around to find (African) natives that spoke different European languages in addition to their various tribal languages, depending on where they had grown up. Even if they also knew English, natives in some parts of the country were more comfortable conversing in Afrikaans than in English. I did not, however, detect (at least among the people I met on my rather short stay) a sense of competition between the two languages. On the other hand, among the whites, I suspect I would have found more linguistic chauvinism. On the whole, I feel that SA does as good a job as most countries with multilingualism. With majority rule there are now something like 7 official languages (I don't remember offhand exactly, and don't want to take the time to look it up) but the two colonial
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I remember in the mid-90s something came up called "Proposition 187" which had to do with denying illegal immigrants jobs and health care. One response was a protest in L.A. in which people walked around carrying the Mexican flag. Another was that California was stolen from Mexico and that Mexicans should be free to move there or stay there ("we didn't cross the border, the border crossed us"), or should be given back, etc.
As far as I know it's still an issue there.
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And I'd love to hear your opinion on the end of WWI. (I thought it was quite unfair to Germany and helped lead to WWII ... but that's based on my meager history classes, so who knows what I'll think when I learn more!)
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Goose-stepping in a review before Benito Mussolini's prettier descendant? Though actually I don't know if her political platform is that ambitious ...
And yes, I know about the treaty of Trianon and one day soon you will find my opinion why everything about the end of WWI was wrong and why Woodrow Wilson was a villain ...
No argument from me on that. I know bad things about Wilson's domestic policy you may not be aware of, including his imposition of segregation in the Federal civil service and his role in the Red Scare of 1918-20. And yes, given that Italy specifically joined the Allies to get territory from Austria-Hungary, denying Italy those territories was both dishonest and stupid -- it helped bring Italy into the Second World War on the other side.
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If it had been gin, now...
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"Some Mexicans use the term "Reconquista" (reconquest) to refer to the growing presence in California of Mexican migrants and their descendants."
Given the delicacy of Muslim-American relations right now, I wonder how well that would go over if more Americans knew enough history to remember what the original "Reconquista" was about.
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