Full disclosure: I do not fluently speak any foreign language. I learned to speak tourist German and Spanish in my Army days, though I never was able to wrap my arms around French when I was living in Belgium. (Those darned French have a different word for EVERYTHING!) And no, I didn’t stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night either.

Back when I lived in Los Angeles, everything seemed to be bilingual. Hearing foreign accents was a daily occurrence and it used to bug me because even back then I was hard of hearing. People with accents are often tougher for me to understand.  (I suffer from CHS.  Can’t Hear Shit.)  But the use of languages other than English wasn’t off-putting to me at all.

Today I heard on the radio the remarks from Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal regarding the assimilation of immigrants into the United States:

“It is my view that immigration can make a country stronger, or it can make a country weaker. It really depends on whether immigrants coming to your country are coming to join your culture, your mores, your laws, and become a part of your history. Or, are they coming to be set apart? Are they willing to assimilate? Do they have their own laws they want to establish? Do they fundamentally disagree with your political culture?”*

The subsequent discussion on the radio focused on the assimilation of immigrants into American culture and that such assimilation required the use of English. Required. Many local D.C. callers to the radio show were immigrants who celebrated their parents’ requirement to speak nothing but English. I get that. Learning English in the United States of America has a huge practical advantage over the alternative. It really does set one up for success.

Culture is entwined with language and I have said myself that you can’t fully understand a culture without knowing at least a little of the language. Having admitted that, I find myself thinking more and more that it’s not the be all and end all for everyday life in these here United States or anywhere else for that matter.

Hypothetically, if an immigrant embraces liberty, freedom, our representative system of government and loves this Nation just as much as I do, why is it so important that they NOT refer to us as “Estados Unidos” or “Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika?” Those words all describe the same thing. In one sense, it’s like “car” versus “automobile” or “feline” versus “cat.” Two expressions exist which describe the same concept.

Why do we accept those subtle variations in our own language yet are so intolerant of variations supplied by other languages? Isn’t it just other words for the same things?

Personally, I suppose I can sum this up by saying that I really don’t care how you talk to me as long as you treat me with respect and kindness. I totally get the practical aspects of communicating with me in English. If you want me to understand you, you will probably have to query me in English, but if you’re lucky, I may know the German or Spanish words. Or if you’re really lucky, you may stumble on the two Russian words I know. (I got a D in Russian in college — not my proudest moment.)

It’s not these practical aspects of language that perplex me. It’s the outright fear and indignance that a lot of Americans exhibit at the prospect of other languages creeping into the American culture.

So I’ll ask thusly: Why do Americans seem to fear language other than English? Should we? Can immigrants who assimilate every aspect of our culture except the use of every day English be considered truly assimilated? Does the inclusion of other languages diminish or augment American culture?

* My emphasis.  I am neither endorsing Governor Jindal’s position nor do I oppose it. I am merely using it as a jump-off point for discussion. Now jump and discuss.

I lived in Los Angeles from 1990 until 2004 when the Army permanently relocated me here to Virginia. During that period, I was trying to make a career in the entertainment industry as an actor. For a period of about 3-4 weeks smack in the middle of badly mismanaging my early life in LA, I was literally homeless, sleeping on the couches of fellow friends and other starving actors. It wasn’t fun. It wasn’t romantic. It was frightening, demeaning and humbling. But I got through it and while I never did establish myself as a working actor as I had wanted, I did build a career as a technician in the entertainment industry for much of my time in LA and loved every minute of it.

This time, my homelessness is not as a result of my own gross mismanagement. In fact, this time, my homelessness is not a physical one but an ideological one. There’s no place at all for me to hang my hat when it comes to politics.

I am politically homeless.

The Republican Party as a group doesn’t seem to want to include anyone that doesn’t adhere to its strict conservative set of ideals. Sure, there are things about which I agree with the Republicans among them defense, fiscal responsibility (though no one in politics seems to be practicing this anymore) and personal responsibility above government responsibility.

The Democrats, on the other hand, deride anyone whose ideals conflict with a generally liberal perspective. I observe the Democrats pulling out the race card for things that generally aren’t racist, but that’s their opinion, I suppose, and they have a right to it. And there are things about which I agree completely with the Democrats including broadening the definition of marriage, legalization of marijuana and the easier provision of health care, though I disagree with the approach which is the Affordable Care Act.

So you see neither party will have me. And frankly, I don’t want either of them.

Since I disagree with the ACA, there are many in the Democratic Party who will state unequivocally that I hate poor people and actively want them to be sick. I don’t, and such charges are ridiculous. No one wants people to be sick if we can make them well. I’ve seen the ups and downs of the American health care system during my former spouse’s dealings with multiple cancers and other serious maladies and I welcome health care reform. I just disagree with this particular approach.

I hear a lot of Democrats say that the Republicans want dirty water and filthy air since they don’t support the same environmental concerns they do. That’s crazy talk, too. No one WANTS dirty air and water. No one. Not even the vast majority of corporate entities who are often falsely accused of relegating environmental concerns to the basement of the priority stack. They want to be good corporate citizens because it’s good policy and it’s better for their bottom line.

Republicans often say that if you support abortion under any circumstances that you want unborn babies to die. That’s ridiculous. Do you know one person who actually WANTS unborn babies to die? Do you know anyone who thinks that’s a great idea in every case? Again, no one wants that, but to hear it told by some staunch conservatives, if you have a (D) after your name, that is precisely the belief you hold along with ALL of those with (D)’s behind their names. That’s just nuts.

You get the idea.

Life is not now nor has it ever been an “either/or” proposition. Why has politics become this way?

And it’s not like a relationship with either party can be like one of those Venn Diagrams that you did in school:

Lately, it seems to me that neither party ideologically allows you to overlap even a little bit. (Not publicly anyway.) You’re either all in or your all out. You either agree with them 100% on everything or you’re a horrible person who wishes bad things to happen to everyone else.

Yes, I am aware of the Libertarian Party.  In fact, ideologically speaking, I probably overlap with libertarians the most.  But right now, the (L)’s are not influencing the national dialogue to any significant degree and therefore, not a practical entity in my opinion.

Ok, I admit it. There are a few people – very few — on whom I’d wish bad things. And no, none of them are ex-significant others or spouses or anything petty like that. So no, I don’t wish for bad things to happen to the sick, the well, the poor, the rich, the homeless, the unemployed, the heterosexual, the homosexual, the bisexual, the trisexual (or any sexual I can imagine — and I have a vivid imagination) or the purple people eaters of the world.

I’m just me and I have my own ideas and thoughts about things. And I’m smart enough to draw conclusions from the available data for myself. I have an equally smart, terrific circle of friends and acquaintances most of whom don’t share my every perspective and I don’t hate them and they don’t hate me. Sometimes I agree and sometimes I don’t. Yes, we have been known to have heated discussions, but we have far more in common just as people then we do politically.

And herein is the lead for this essay: We ALL have far more in common as people than we do politically. The two well-established political parties have lost sight of the American populace as people FIRST. People have nuance, color and diversity of thought. Voters don’t. And that’s how the two well-established political parties now view all of us – as voters not as people. You’re either all in or your all out.

In today’s political climate, this leaves the thinking person with no place to go. This leaves me homeless.