The really striking thing about Mark Krikorian's bizarre screeds about Sonia Sotomayor's name isn't that Krikorian can't be bothered to learn how Sotomayor pronounces her name. Krikorian knows how she pronounces it. And it isn't that he refuses to make a little effort to pronounce her name the way she does. It's that he doesn't want anyone else to do so, either.

That's really a huge difference. Most people mispronounce names from time to time. But most people don't petulantly insist that everyone mispronounce names that sound “unnatural” to us. That's what Krikorian is doing.

And he comes right out and admits that annoyance at having to hear correctly-pronounced names is at the basis of his opposition to immigration and bilingual education:

here's what I was trying to get across: While in the past there may well have been too much social pressure for what sociologists call Anglo-conformity, now there isn't enough. I think that's a concern that most Americans share at some level, which is the root of the angst over excessive immigration, bilingual education, official English, etc.

Wow.