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The only way to remedy the problem, he said, is to close the language gap, which the patrol is trying to accomplish with intensive Spanish classes and recruiting of bilingual troopers. I can think of at least one other way: English as the national language. Even the 'remedy' he suggests is not a remedy. Are you going to have quinitilingual troopers? What about Chinese immigrants? Brazilians? Russians? Kazahks? Vietnamese? Our officials can't speak every language on the planet...but we can mandate they speak ours here.

Haso and Mujo are cops in a sleepy little Bosnian town. A German tourist comes along and wants to find out the right road to take to get to the coast. First he tries German, and they just shrug their shoulders, not being able to understand him. Then he tries French, Italian, and English, with the same results, and finally drives away in frustration. Haso turns to Mujo and says, "Maybe we ought to study some foreign languages for situations like that." Mujo replies, "Why should we? Look at that guy. He speaks four languages and it didn't do him a bit of good."