Bienvenido a Los Angeles

And here I thought Canada was the land of two official languages.

The effort needed to juggle the oil 'n water mixture of dueling languages has been a humungous waste of money and resources in Canada.

The above news item paints a rosy picture about what it means for LA residents. But the net effect is something less than the happy-happy multicultural diversity we're constantly told is a Beautiful Thing(TM).

In the main, Southern California has forced to align into two separate cultures for one simple reason: Having arrived through illegal channels in the knowledge that they will join millions of well-connected fellow amigos, they feel no need to assimilate.

Period.

And they have a point. Why bother? Business phone trees are often given in Spanish with "for English, press two" prompts; Spanish FM radio dominates LA airwaves; Mexican flags and Mexican slogans adorn every other pick-up truck on LA freeways; LA mayor Antonio Villariagosa is warmly pro-illegal, conspicuously prefering the bogus term "undocumented worker;" and LA's Cardinal Mahony likens them to the hapless stranger to whom Jesus would give an unconditional hug.

Thanks go also to President Bush, who, in our Age of Terror, continues to use a hammer made of nerf on this particular nail.