Reply #71: Because more individual countries speak Spanish as a first language

[IntravenousDemilo]

than, say, Mandarin Chinese, especially in this hemisphere. More actual people speak Spanish in this world than, say, French -- and I say this as a Canadian who had to take French for six years, but ended up taking it for ten years (as well as German and Latin at university). If Spanish had been offered, I'd have taken it, too. Now I'm teaching myself Hungarian, which is tough as well as more or less useless, just for the intellectual exercise.

Hell, I probably would have studied Mandarin, too, had it been offered, but then I just like languages.