Well sure, but what's the point of learning another language if you're an American if you will almost without exception not ever need to speak anything other than English in the United States? Even if English wasn't the lingua franca what would the point be? Conversely in Europe you're surrounded by a ton of other languages, of course it makes sense to learn them. If they spoke French in Oregon, Spanish in California, and Dutch in Colorado Americans would be just as bil-/tri- lingual as Europeans are. It just doesn't make sense to be.
Learning a language is pointless as well as very very difficult if you have no opportunity to use it. I never got really far spending a coupple of years learning Chinese in the states, but got really far spending 6 months in china doing the same.
Learning French doesn't broaden your horizons. Using French does.
Why would an American not get a passport? That doesn't make any sense.
But to your larger point about nations speaking other languages on the doorstep of the U.S. -> keep in mind that "on your doorstep (aside from Mexico and Quebec) means a 6 hour flight to South America. Largely depends on where you are, and you'll see in the American SouthWest they do speak a lot more Spanish, but it's not like in Europe where I can live in Germany, drive to France, circle around through Italy, then through a myriad of other countries (all speaking other languages) in a relatively quick amount of time.
The U.S. is fundamentally different that Europe and I think people should just chill out about the language thing.
