Publication: Economic Times of The India Times (Heavy H1B supporters)

Obama dismisses language criticism

WASHINGTON: Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama batted away criticism from some conservatives for suggesting that American children should learn a foreign language, as his Republican rival John McCain reached out to women voters with promises that he is the better candidate to help them economically.

Some conservatives have painted Obama as an elitist. His remarks earlier in the week that Americans should learn more foreign languages, including Spanish, drew ridicule from groups advocating English as the official US language and started a buzz on some conservative Web sites.

Obama used the opportunity Friday to slam his opponents before a cheering rally in Dayton, Ohio, and said

``This is an example of some of the problems we get into when somebody attacks you for saying the truth, which is: We should want our children with more knowledge. We should want our children to have more skills,'' he said. ``I know, because I don't speak a foreign language. It's embarrassing,'' Obama said, chuckling.

The Americans for Legal Immigration said in a statement, ``Barack Obama has stepped on a political land mine by stating Americans should be forced to learn to speak Spanish.'' But that is not what Obama said.

Obama was answering a question on education when he said he does not understand people who say ``we need English only.''

``I agree that immigrants should learn English,'' Obama said. ``But instead of worrying about whether immigrants can learn English _ they'll learn English _ you need to make sure your child can speak Spanish. You should be thinking about how can your child become bilingual. We should have every child speaking more than one language.''

On Friday, McCain was speaking to a mostly female audience, a day after Obama teamed up with his former rival Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton to speak to women voters.

McCain told several hundred women in western Wisconsin that his tax cut plans would be particularly helpful to women because so many of them own or work for small businesses.

``Yesterday in New York, Senator Obama went on at great length about how much he cares about women's issues,'' McCain said at a town-hall forum in Hudson, where women vastly outnumbered men. ``I believe him. But when you cut through all the smooth rhetoric, Senator Obama's policies would make it harder for women to start new businesses, harder for women to create or find new jobs, harder for women to manage the family budget, and harder for women and their families to meet their tax burden.''

Obama's campaign disputed the claims and noted that McCain opposed a Senate measure to lengthen the time that workers have to file pay discrimination lawsuits, a priority for some women's groups.

Republicans believe McCain has a chance to pick up Democratic and independent women who are angry or disappointed that Clinton lost her bid to become the first female president. But Friday's event in Wisconsin seemed geared to hard-core conservatives.

Meanwhile, comedian Bernie Mac was greeted with some heckling and a campaign rebuke as a result of a comedy routine he performed during an Obama fundraiser in Chicago Friday night.

The 50-year-old star of ``The Bernie Mac Show'' joked about menopause, sexual infidelity and promiscuity, and used occasional crude language during his performance, prompting one person in the audience to say the joke was offensive to women.

``It's not funny. Let's get Barack on,'' a man shouted from the crowd.

Obama, speaking about 15 minutes later, tried to smooth things over with a joke of his own. The incident also drew a response from Obama's campaign, which criticized Mac for his choice of material.

``Senator Obama told that he doesn't condone these statements and believes what was said was inappropriate,'' spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in a statement after the event.

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