We don’t want no stinking assimilation…we are special!

“As President Bush and others call for assimilation of Latino immigrants, some Hispanics in La Villita and other parts of the country, including North Texas, are on what could be a collision course, pushing to be fully binational, with equal rights in Mexico and the United States and grounded in both societies.”

“We’re never giving up our Mexican roots,” said Maria Cantu-Dougala, assistant vice president of Second Federal Savings and an American citizen. “I still consider myself Mexican. That’s where we’re so different from other immigrants. We just can’t give it up.

“Lots of people who come here have been in this country 20, 30, 40 years and are not interested in giving up their Mexican citizenship,” she said. “Even a lot of the kids that were born here want to speak Spanish and keep that Mexican-ness.”

There is more here… from the Dallas Morning News and The State.com, in South Carolina.