Dean's Spanish is a major asset. He should use it.

[BurtWorm]

But he needs to get super sophisticated about latino issues, preferably with a Mexican-American adviser working very closely with him. He should start a drive to raise money for airtime on Univision, Telemundo and Spanish-language radio.

There should not be one ounce of condescension or pandering in his message. I believe he can pull it off.

PS: this post is based on one in the thread on Bush v. Dean in Spanish.

[liberalhistorian]

1. Si,

y me gusta Dean mucho! Yo quiero Dean para Presidente!

[BurtWorm]

2. There's the slogan

¡Me gusta Dean!

[buckfush2]

3. umm actually "quiero"has a sexual connotation in most dialects

You are saying you are "hot" for him

[BurtWorm]

4. That would make him a sexy candidate

I changed it on your recommendation. I hope Me gusta Dean doesn't mean "I want to eat Dean." (My Spanish is not a major asset.)

[buckfush2]

5. "Dean pleases me?"

kinda cute

[BurtWorm]

6. Me gusta Ike?

Okay, smart guy. Help me out here.

[kutastha]

7. ...

You're correct on both counts. "Te quiero" doesn't necessarily mean you want to have sex with Howard. it just means more of a want for him. Now, if you were sitting naked at your computer and thinking salacious thoughts about him, well that's a different story. "Me gusta Dean" may literally mean "Dean pleases me" but is taken to mean "I like Dean", much in the way you'd say "Me gusta jugar al futbol" or "Me gusta cerveza".

[BurtWorm]

8. Thank you.

Buck Buckfush! ;)

[phiddle]

10. To say "I like him",

Mexican Spanish uses "me cae bién"---literally, "he falls well with me". "Te quiero" in México means I desire you, whereas "me gusta Dean" means he pleases me, usually in the carnal sense, like "he pleasures me"!

[liberalhistorian]

9. Well, of course, that too,

lol! What sane red-blooded hetero woman wouldn't be?

[MisterP]

13. me gusto Dean!

:P

[BurtWorm]

11. Seriously

Do Dems want latinos to vote for them? Do they want a majority of the largest minority bloc to vote for them? Can they do this using the Lieberman approach--the American Dream strategy, the one big happy familia tack? I don't think so.

I thought last night's debate was the first serious attempt by presidential candidates to address latino voters. Of course the old style politician was alive and fairly well in all of the candidates. It was nice that they tried to pepper their points with Spanish phrases, although some of them came off sounding just the least little condescending. Even Dean read his Spanish statement from a prepared text. But he read it well.

I'm not clear about how resonant his message is for latinos, though. It sounded good, but I'm not latino. But I think it would benefit any campaign to think hard about how to get latinos to vote for them. I doubt simple translations of ads for the anglo market will work, least of all if they're of the friendly, "Hi, I'm Howard Dean" variety, with images of happy Vermonters fawning over their ex-governor. He should make a series of ads that address key latino concerns specifically, such as labor rights, immigration, even language, if he can.

And this is not just a recommendation for Howard Dean. Any Democrat should make the same serious effort to speak intelligently and respectfully to the latino community--in Spanish.

[DrGonzoLives]

12. I'm not sure

They said the same thing about Bush in 2000, that because he could speak Spanish, he would "connect" to Spanish-speaking voters. Of course, he doesn't speak it well, and maybe that had an effect.

I don't know, I think it might be good as a gimmick, but gimmicks have a way of backfiring.

[BurtWorm]

14. The point is, it should NOT be a gimmick

It should be a valuable way of connecting with latino voters on their terms. Bush's alleged Spanish, like his other "compassion" tricks, was meant to signal to "moderate" repubs that he wasn't the crazy winger he really is. Dean's Spanish--or any Democrat's Spanish--should be used to connect with latinos. He should keep his Spanish as sharp as possible so he can be interviewed extemporaneously. He can even do this sort of underground, so the Bushists don't quite know what hit them when they get smacked by the latino vote in 2004. The point is not to use this asset self-consciously, but rationally, to aggressively go after an important bloc of voters.

[theboss]

16. It was supposed to work for Dukakis too

He gave part of his speech at the convention in Spanish (Jon Lovitz did a brilliant parody of it on SNL at the time).

Latinos have supposedly been the sleeping giant in American politics for 20 years. I've yet to see them have any major impact aside from the Cubans in Miami. I assume it will eventually happen. But I wouldn't pin my hopes on it.

[BurtWorm]

17. Again, it's because the asset isn't used seriously

It's used in the lazy way most political consultants use every asset. They try to get it "out there" that their guy has this quality...like Kerry's military service or Dukakis's Spanish. (When you get right down to it, Dukakis was as stiff in Spanish as he was in English.)

But what I'm talking about has never been tried in American presidential politics. It's done all the time in Canada, however. When the candidates want to get votes in Quebec, they better know how to speak French.

[theboss]

18. Not sure your strategy can work

If I were a consultant, I would want to know two things before I advised my candidate to take this approach:

1. Do Latinos vote in a bloc if they vote at all? And if they don't vote, what is the likelihood of getting them to the polls in November. I've honestly never seen data on Latinos that is very useful. And I'm wary of any "wake up the disinterested voter" strategy, since it seems to only work for third-party candidates like Perot or Ventura.

2. Is this going to scare white people? Okay, I stated that rather crudely, but there is a growing concern about the assimilation of Latin immigrants into this country. Granted, a lot of this is expressed as racism by right-wingers, but there is concern among all elements of society. How many voters will he drive away by doing this?

[BurtWorm]

24. 1. There is not a monolithic latino bloc

But there is a bloc of voters who have in common the fact that Spanish is their primary language. To get any of them to vote for you, it's not enough to pepper your speeches with Spanish. That's what I'm arguing against. If Dean doesn't speak as well as I thought he did, he shouldn't try. But if he does speak well, he should use the language in a sophisticated way--not pandering or showing off, but communicating about his campaign's ideas, especially they pertain to latinos. If he speaks half as well as I thought he did, he should work on communicating in Spanish to latino voters.

2. Fuck the white people who are scared by this. We don't want them anyway.

[RogueTrooper]

15. A Question

What is "You have the power" in Spanish?

[nannygoat]

19. tú mismo tienes el poder, I think, RT.

You also see, "¡Si, se puede!" Yes, we can!

[charlie]

20. Dailykos deemed his Spanish skillz cringe-worthy

Since I'm in a "eat our own" mode, let me continue: I just saw Dean try to pass a line about health care in Spanish. Earlier on, Lieberman tried his hand at Spanish as well. Both efforts were ghastly.

Stop it! It doesn't work. Latinos are not impressed. If you speak fluent Spanish, like Jeb Bush or Bill Richardson, then great. Use it. If you don't, like George Bush, Al Gore, and just about every other politician "wooing" Latinos, then it's painful.

So throw that in with the weeping, the silly family photo ops, and the gratuitous references to God.

Eating our own? Hardly. It's calling out horrid campaign tactics, and I don't apologize for it. Republicans don't have a monopoly on the gag reflex.

http://www.dailykos.com/archives/004051.html#004051

I agree that Dean should mount a full-bore campaign in the Latino media markets, if he hasn't already. But if his Spanish sucks, then his Spanish sucks, and he oughta lay off using it unless he wants to be ridiculed as an unserious panderer.

[BurtWorm]

21. How does dailykos.com know his Spanish sucks?

Do we have Spanish experts here who can judge? Clearly Kucinich's Spanish sucks. Clearly Bush's does. But Dean's? I don't know. My Spanish sucks too.

If his Spanish is as bad as dailykos says, then I agree, don't even try it. Or get a surrogate.

[charlie]

22. Dailykos bio

It's the weblog of Markos Moulitsas Zúniga, who spent his first 8 or so years in El Salvador:

http://www.dailykos.com/about.html

[BurtWorm]

25. Okay. There goes that theory out the window.

But I would like to hear a second opinion.

[July]

27. Here you go

It's a little late to post on this thread, but in case you come back to it:

Although I haven't heard Dean use much Spanish, what I heard sounded good. My creds: Lived 7 years in Spain, spouse is Spanish, hear Spanish at home every day. My Spanish is pretty good, though I do make mistakes and could improve my accent (although my father-in-law says I'm doing well). Anyway, I know "real" Spanish when I hear it. Bush's Spanish is painful to listen to, and Spanish friends laugh at it (he mispronounced Aznar's name, properly pronounced ahth-NAR, as AN-sar, to give one small example). The snippet of Dean that I heard from the debate sounded grammatical and well-pronounced. He seemed to be using idiomatic expressions rather than direct translations from English. Of course, I'd need to hear more to give a good opinion, and I'm not the last word on it. But I think he sounded fine.

[BurtWorm]

26. Dupe

[UTUSN]

23. Agreed, It's Usually a Gimmick

The language gimmick worked for JFK, the Berliner line. It's been downhill ever since. And when it works, it's just a little tag line, a grace note - not an attempt at extended policy discussion in the other language. Stereotypes aside, people who are sophisticated enough to register and VOTE, are more than likely to be very good in ENGLISH. Extended use of another language is condescending to the target audience and the candidate BETTER BE GOOD in that language. President GORE's was not too good. I don't remember that Prez CLINTON ever tried it. And despite the Hispanic population's having been SOLID in supporting him just about as much as the African-American pop., he never seemed to warm up much to the former, certainly not so much as to the latter by far.