Anti-Bill Halter Group Botches Hindi Script In Latest Mailer

The pro-business group Americans for Jobs Security made news once again on Thursday night for releasing a racially-tinged mailer attacking Arkansas Senate candidate Bill Halter for supposedly being complicit in the outsourcing of U.S. jobs to India.

The mailer, echoing an earlier, controversial ad the group put out, plays to a particular form of jingoism, with the script written in Hindi, shots of women and men in Indian garb, and repeated thanks to Lt. Gov Halter for sending jobs overseas.

The problem: the group seems to have botched the translation. A Hindi reader helped the Huffington Post decipher what, exactly, the mailer being sent to Arkansas voters says. And, it turns out, it's a mix of political hit-job and garbled nonsense.

"You thank Bill's whip [or whipper] for sending jobs to India," is how one line translates.

"You thank Bill the whip," reads another.

Considering the likely dearth of Hindi speakers in Arkansas (and the even smaller pool of Hindi speakers who received the mailers and are going to vote in the Democratic primary), the errors aren't likely to make a difference. Indeed, the mail piece was never meant to be translated. It was designed to scare the hell out of those Arkansans who think Halter might support outsourcing if he were to make his way to the Senate.

Still, the job AJS did is humorously sloppy. Here is the translation, per a Hindi speaker (with the copy of the mailers below):

PAGE 1 In Hindi the text reads: "aap bill lagam shukar banglore,bharat ko rojgar Bhejne' ke liye'."

aap - meaning you or yours
bill - obviously is the name here but in hindi it means bill like telephone bill
lagam - means a riding whip-used to train horses
shukar - means thanks
bharat - means India
ko - means to
rojgar - means jobs
Bhejne' - means sending
ke liye' - means for

So, the way the sentence reads (the sentence structure is off/verb is missing/written by non Hindi speaker,):

"You thank Bill's whip or the whipper for sending jobs to India."

PAGE 2
In Hindi: "Aap Bill ka Shukar hai lagam"

Translation: "You thank Bill the whip."

PAGE 3
Is the same as above without English translation.

A Hindi speaking person will be confused from this sentence because it is not a complete sentence - it would mean for a Hindi reading layperson "you thank bill whip" because of the way they have used his last name in translation.

Comments

[karmiczen]

01:21 AM on 05/16/2010

We need to wake up If Its okay for India to buy 8 billion dollars worth of Boeing aircraft, then we better suck up the fact that there will be trade $$ flowing the other vway as well. Global trade is not one way street . Past several decades American multinationals have been selling to India ...it has been one way . That was fine with us. Guess what , now India has made progress and wants to have a trade balance with the US. So lets not whine but get more competitive. Our trade balance with China is waaaaaaay more negative. So buy more American made goods and shun Cheaper Chinese shoes and T shirts. Remeber India always has the option to buy Airbus. We should rely more on facts and less on Fox news about Global trade .

[Mokshaman]

10:27 PM on 05/15/2010

Some interesting details related to this story, here:

http://bharatunbound.wordpress.com/2010/05/15/one-persons-racist-ad-is-another-persons-inspiration/

[Mares]

09:45 PM on 05/15/2010

Now Sam wants to impune the Hindi text being incorrect, being, again, "racist!!!" How does Sam know that a Hindi didn't incorrectly translate the language, or one of those translator programs, that are written by those "best and brightest" foreign workers, whether outsourced or H1B, and per usual, it's screwed up. Rather like that "brilliant" H1B, who stole the Tablet design before it was finished, and then tried to pass it off as his own invention, and it flopped because said "brilliant" H1B, wasn't, and only capable of conning a reputation for himself based on a sense of entitlement to do so.

Sam won't talk about how India now has more billionaires than any country in the world, yet we're told we have to provide 18 billion in foreign aid to the country, so their wealthy and middle class don't have to pay more in taxes, or how much Obama and dems like Halter are given illegally by India Body Shop owners and CEOs.

Remember, we can only complain about corruption when the party involved is NOT the one Sam supports, after all, Sam's advocacy isn't based on real issues, or concern for real human lives. No, it's all about Sam, and what Sam wants.

[GrumpyGrandpa]

11:41 AM on 05/15/2010

Now, if Bill Halter has the SLIGHTEST bit of political savvy, he will begin running a 30 second spot that says precisely Sam's point.

"That this outside group helping Blanche Lincoln is so inept that they couldn't even get their lying mailer right, example, they lied and said I whipped my employees, which I have never done, example, and they want you to trust them to be able to tell you what's best for Arkansas? These inept fools? Ha!"

Filled in with examples and pointing out that Blanche hasn't disavowed this! Come on, Bill. Free campaign tactical advice. Don't ignore it. It's close enough to the election that no one can counter it!

[gmorbgmibgnikgnok]

10:04 AM on 05/15/2010

The local language in Bangalore is Kannada. When I'm there, I hear Kannada most often, then ENGLISH, then Hindi or Tamil or something else. Actually, they tend to mix all the languages together while speaking.

[davidariley]

04:00 AM on 05/15/2010

wonder how many targets of the mailer thought it was written in "that al-qaeda language", and that halter supports terrorists?

[doubleaseven]

12:27 AM on 05/16/2010

David, while what you say is really funny, with the racist and xenophobic fever raging among the Palinist GOPsters -- it can indeed be deadly. I am shocked that the poison spread by the Tea-Bagging queen and her minions on the hill -- the secular and humanist culture that makes USA USA, is being gutted by right wingers led by the Head Ayatollah Palin, major Ayatollahs on the Hill and minor ones spread out through the country are literally waging a jihad on American character.

[davidariley]

12:47 PM on 05/16/2010

it already HAS been deadly. on the day after 9/11 a sihk was murdered (in arizona) because the racist xenophobe who killed him was too ignorant to know the difference between a sihk and a mulim.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3154170.stm

and it's even worse this fool thought it would be alright for him to kill ANY random muslim for the act of a terrorist.

[PlayTOE]

03:40 AM on 05/15/2010

The GOP are counting on the fact that their voters do zero homework and just accept the lies without question.

[mootown]

08:26 AM on 05/16/2010

Also, so many bloviate about incumbants and want them out--except their own incumbant. Therefore so many that should be leaving stay. My district is an example of that. Neighbor, who lost his good job in manufacturing just as kids ready for college, cheerleads the GNOP guy who has voted consistently for the GNOP policies that took his job away. This Don Manzullo--16th IL, referred to by his constituents who know the truth about him: Man-ZERO or Manzu-NO, is called Mr. Manufacturing. His district, and largest city-Rockford IL has the highest unemployment and one of the highest child poverty rate in Illinois. Who calls him Mr. Manufacturing? The companies CEO's who shipped and destroyed the good blue collar jobs in this district. Thanks alot Don. He pokes his worthless head up every two years and sends incomprehensible emails and letters. But, this red district has so many ignorant--yes, ignorant lemmings in it.

[PlayTOE]

08:46 AM on 05/16/2010

Well put mootown fanned # 59.

Republicans often claim to be making progress in the very areas they are creating destruction.
They lie, but are believed.

[davidariley]

12:49 PM on 05/16/2010

sad part: they are probably right

[hey0there]

03:07 AM on 05/15/2010

that tv ad has a really great caste

[Tommygun264]

02:51 AM on 05/15/2010

Gee, I wonder why a right-wing pub group is spending $1.5 millionn on ads for Blanche Lincoln? Could it be because she polls 4-5 points lower against every potential pub candidate than Halter?

[Rahul Kudva]

02:45 AM on 05/15/2010

Hah! They used a direct translation to Hindi. They've used the Hindi translation of "Halter" ("lagaam"). So Bill Halter becomes "Bill Lagaam".
See? You needed an Indian to proof-read your translation. Hey, I'm in Bangalore. Send over your future "messages" to your political rivals. I'll give it a look-see. Don't worry, I won't charge too much.

[davidariley]

12:49 PM on 05/16/2010

isn't that what got this whole mess started in the first place? LOL

[TimWest]

02:26 AM on 05/15/2010

That was an exact Google Translation of "Thank you Bill Halter for sending jobs to Bangalore, India"

Link: http://translate.google.com/?hl=en&tab=wT#auto|hi|Thank%20you%20Bill%20Halter%20for%20sending%20jobs%20to%20Bangalore%2C%20India

[TimWest]

02:33 AM on 05/15/2010

... and translating that script back to English:

"Mind you bill Fri Bangalore, India to send jobs"

[choot]

01:17 AM on 05/15/2010

I wonder what would happen if someone tried to translate Palinspeak into Hindi?

On the meantime, prease to enjoy http://www.engrish.com/

[AntigoneRisen]

01:33 AM on 05/15/2010

Mei eek pagal kutiya hun.

You'll have to ask for the translation.

[ThoughtShaman]

01:38 AM on 05/15/2010

I'll give it. That says "I am a mad dog."

[kdallas999]

12:53 AM on 05/15/2010

When are people going to get that you can't legislate keeping a job in the U.S..? It's like telling the local drugstore they shouldn't sell to people who live too far away because they are supposed to be local. Not gonna happen.

You keep jobs in your country by making the companies want to hire your citizens - because they are so smart, so hard working, so committed... whatever. We overcame the whole "Hong Kong is stealing our manufacturing jobs" by being better, smarter and more advanced. Let them have the piece work - we'll take the tech, development, innovation, efficiency, quality, etc..

But now, we're so fixated on NOT spending to develop our country's workforce - we're practically giving away the jobs. While we've been trying to figure out how we can NOT compete in the world, countries like India have had country wide efforts to increase education and technology.

Of course, doing something similar in the US would mean we'd actually have to invest in our people... and we don't want to have a country of people expecting hand outs! We could leverage far more money than India has spent and get our jobs back the old fashioned way - by being better than the competition.

...but we're convincing the masses now is the time to focus on reducing the deficit. Don't want to burden the kids with debt, but who cares if we set them up to be beholden to the next super power!

[jagrmeister721]

02:44 AM on 05/15/2010

You almost make too much sense in an otherwise overheated, illogical exchange of insults between "free-market" types and protectionists.

[AmyInNH]

03:10 AM on 05/15/2010

The IBM CEO is asking Obama for tax breaks to build his new plant here because the US does have the best workers. France is offering better tax rates but then he'll have French employment laws to deal with. As for a developed tech. workforce, Americans are qualified to do the work sent to India, so you're off the mark on that one too. What they are in other countries is cheap. And so as India becomes less cheap, it's moved to China. America's only cheap labor is illegal, along with illegal wages and work conditions. The dysfunction in the logic of NAFTA is that our marketplace is only attractive/useful to other countries if we're spending and we can't spend if we're not employed. And we're not employed if significant amounts of work is moved away. This is just logic. It has nothing to do with handouts.

[kdallas999]

12:04 PM on 05/15/2010

Yes, Americans are qualified to do the work sent to India. So are people from India AND they are cheaper. And so are the people from China.

So, the US needs to come up with something better than just be qualified enough...

It used to be that we were innovative. You'd pay more for American workers because we were the ones that would find a way to revolutionize the whole processes - you'd pay more in the beginning but you'd get the added benefit of advancing the technology/process while the initial work was being done.

You'd pay more to have your business in the US because the overall business climate in the US was better - better schools producing more graduates for you to pick from, more inventions and innovations coming from potential vendors/employees, better access to capital, support from the local communities...

Now, we don't want to have to compete...we want laws to say you have to hire people from the U.S..

[picaman]

12:29 AM on 05/15/2010

Oh For a second I thought it was Bill Hader...

[SmolderingRuin]

12:18 AM on 05/15/2010

It doesn't have to be an accurate translation. It's Arkansas, do you think they care? It only has to look foreign and mention jobs. The message is clear enough.

[AntigoneRisen]

01:34 AM on 05/15/2010

It doesn't even have to be a real language. No one is going to check or care.