Yeah, I did go overboard with signs. Thanks for pointing that out. However, I think we can run into problems if all of LA turns into an ethnic enclave.

My take on diversity: E pluribus unum. From many, one. We must provide the necessary measures to make sure that we are indeed one nation. If a whole region begins to speak Spanish, instead of English, the soveriegnty of the US over that region is threatened. Have we reached that point? No. Yet illegal immigration from Mexico and Latin America has been high, and shows no sign of abating unless we close our borders.

If all storesigns were required to be in English, the varied charms of New York’s Chinatown, San Francisco’s Mission District, LA’s Koreatown, Brighton Beach’s Little Odessa (where the signage is in Cyrillic), Chicago’s Polish downtown, Detroit’s Arabic communities, etc. ad infinitum … the charms of those locales would be utterly decimated.

One of America’s most profound virtues is its diversity, full stop. Said diversity is manifested in the various ethnic villages and enclaves to be found anywhere in this great land, starting with that most basic element of capitalism, the community store. Requiring all store signs to be in one Language would be Orwellian. Not to mention undemocratic.

Recant. ;p

(I’ve found the bilingual streetsigns in SF and NY’s Chinatowns to be quite charming, indeed. And yes, VERY American.)