Bloombito and our Bilingual Future
by Ryan Almodovar
“Hola Newo Yorko! El stormo grande is mucho dangeroso!” tweeted Rachel Figueroa-Levin, a house wife that created the Twitter handle of ‘@MiguelBloombito’ – a fictional, Latinized version of New York City mayor, Michael Bloomberg.
During the onset of Hurricane Irene, the real Bloomberg took to the streets of his city, initiating an almost unheard of evacuation and preparedness plan. Throughout the run-up to the storm, Bloomberg did make an attempt to reach out to his Spanish speaking constituents – admittedly with much more competence than Rachel Figueroa gave him credit for. Bloomberg’s use of Spanish, even in a small way, during an emergency situation deserves credit, because it shows how the United States is transforming into a ‘bilingual’ country.
It’s no secret that Latinos are making an increased impact on the demographic distribution of our country. Current estimates place our country at having roughly a 16 percent share of the population, with that amount