Michael said:
In a few decades, more than a quarter of the people of the USA will be Hispanic immigrants and the great majority of them will be socially conservative. I suppose they will naturally oppose abortion and homosexuality and popssibly be Catholic? All values of mainstream Republicans.
Americans of Latin American ancestry have the highest rate of assimilation of any ethnic group. Something like half of the first-generation immigrants marry Americans of other ancestry. That's compared to about ten percent of Chinese immigrants and, though the phenomenon is too new to compile statistics, probably about the same for immigrants from the Mideast.
By the third generation the rate is so high that for all practical purposes there is no fourth generation. It's hard to find a third-generation Mexican-American unless you count people like Linda Ronstadt who rediscover their "roots."
Notwithstanding the barrios and the Minutevermin, Latinos and Americans seem to get along splendidly and blend readily. Better than a lot of people from adjacent countries do, such as Turkey and Armenia just to pick an example at random.
So there's no way that such a huge fraction of Americans will be recognizably Hispanic. Their identity will dissipate as quickly as the assimilated are replaced by new immigrants.
The influx of people from other Latin American nations will only accelerate the process. They may all read the same newspapers and listen to the same music, but despite the cheerleading headlines in those newspapers there is no significant pan-Latin "community" maintaining a supranational identity. A person from Mexico may seek out and marry another person from Mexico because those particular people are still more comfortable with old familiar ways. But Mexicans who don't feel that way are not going to make a special effort to find Salvadoreños or Colombians just because they can talk to them in Spanish. They're just as likely to fall in love with an American. And how fortunate for everyone that we seem to feel the same way.
As for religion, the Reformation is just building up steam south of the border and is in full swing on this side. There are Spanish-language Protestant churches in every barrio. However, they tend to be the fundamentalist sects so they'll be even more conservative than the Catholics and way more Republican.
