In Puerto Rico, Rick Santorum Is Lost in Translation

The Commonwealth of Puerto Rico (Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico) is an unincorporated territory of the United States. It does not vote in U.S. Presidential elections, but is invited to send delegates to the national political party conventions.

Puerto Rico is considering on the ballot next November whether to keep its commonwealth status, apply for full statehood, or seek independence from the United States. Into that fray jumped Rick Santorum.



Can you be any more condescending than to say things like this:

"The people of the island are given the gift of English, it is the language of success in the United States, it is the language of commerce in the largest economy in the world, and we are not doing anybody any favors in not following the law, which is that this is a society that will speak English in addition to speaking Spanish."

"E Pluribus Unum" means you have to learn English, candidate Rick Santorum lectured Puerto Rico last week. That Latin phrase along with the Spanish phrase "Isla de Encanto" appears on the back of the U.S. quarter for Puerto Rico.

I guess Rick Santorum wants to recall and recast all those Puerto Rican quarters with the phrase "the island of enchantment". In fact, he should recall and recast all U.S. coinage to replace "E Pluribus Unum" with "Out of Many, One". Or is it "One Out of Many"? Certainly any particular coin is just one of out the many minted, but I thought the phrase celebrated the union of differences not sameness. I know what "E Pluribus Unum" means, I don't know what it means in English.

We'll see what the Associated Free State of Rich Port decides in November. If I were them, I'd be asking the question, "What is wrong with the status quo?" That's the question you should always ask before passing any laws.

I would never give the English the satisfaction of making English the official language of the United States of America. Our language is American, OK. If you don't capisce then, oy, hasta la vista, baby. I'll give you to the count of three Mississippi.


Update: Cero para Santorum en Puerto Rico knocks out the ding he put in Romney last week. Here's the scoreboard:

# of delegates secured so far	NYT	WSJ	CNN	CBS	MSNBC	RCP
Mitt Romney	521	521	518	493	423	516
Rick Santorum	253	253	239	218	184	236
Newt Gingrich	136	136	139	120	137	141
Ron Paul	50	50	69	42	34	66
Jon Huntsman	2	2	0	2	0	0
Total	962	962	965	875	778	959
% of delegates secured so far
Mitt Romney	54%	54%	54%	56%	54%	54%
Rick Santorum	26%	26%	25%	25%	24%	25%
Newt Gingrich	14%	14%	14%	14%	18%	15%
Ron Paul	5%	5%	7%	5%	4%	7%
% of remaining needed to clinch:
Mitt Romney	47%	47%	47%	46%	48%	47%
Rick Santorum	67%	67%	69%	66%	64%	68%
Newt Gingrich	76%	76%	76%	73%	67%	76%
Ron Paul	83%	83%	81%	78%	74%	81%

Update: A further analysis indicates that Santorum's earliest elimination date is April 24 and Romney's earliest clinch date is May 15. May 15 is also the earliest date Romney could be eliminated whereas Santorum can't clinch until June 5.