James K Polk had it right

I believe I have the solution to three major issues that have been plaguing us; the price of gas, the high cost medicine for old people, and of course illegal immigration.

My answer to America’s major problems is nothing new, in fact it is over 160 years old. The answer, my friends, is Manifest Destiny.

Manifest Destiny means that it is once again coming clear that the United States is destined to occupy the entire continent of North America. Seriously, there’s always only been room for one country here, why tolerate three?

Some people argue that we need some kind of a route to citizenship for undocumented migrant workers from Mexico, others staunchly support deporting all illegal immigrants and strengthening the security on our borders to keep people out.

Manifest Destiny eliminates the disagreement between these groups. They wouldn’t have to sneak into our country in search of a better way of life, because they’d already be here right where they are down there.

What’s better is that Mexico is the world’s fifth largest producer of oil, therefore, WE will become BOTH the third AND the fifth largest producer of oil. That would make us like the…. Second-ish largest producer. Currently Russia is number two (Saudi Arabia is number one and that darned IRAN is number four). So my point is that if we would just annex Mexico, the price of gas would drop to like 7 pesos per litre, and since there are like 11 pesos per 1 dollar, that would be a lot less than $4 per litre. Of course, we would force them to use the English system instead of that darned Euro-socialistic metric system, so that would be like only 7 pesos per gallon or something like that.

I know what you’re thinking, “will they speak Spanish or English.” Let me let you in on a dirty little secret that the government doesn’t want you to know. When Alexander the Great conquered places all over the Mediterranean, he spread the Greek language, philosophy and culture. They called this Hellenism, after some Hellen of Troy, some beauty queen in some Greek tragedy that was very popular. The best way to spread the English language and American culture is through TV and video games.

AS everyone knows, Mexicans love TV, especially soap operas and game shows. All we have to do is to not allow any TV programs to be broadcast in Spanish. Within a few years, no problema, nosotros hablamos Engeles.

That’s why we speak English in America after all. There’s a successful TV sitcom or game show in England, like Simon Cowell’s “Brittains Got Tallent” and they export it to us and we call it “American Idol.”

Way back before Columbus (an Italian working for Spain) discovered America (named after another Italian guy, Amerigo Vespucci, by some German guy who turned the “g” into a “c”), the ancient Aztecs (Mexicans) used to have an empire. Only, unlike the Greeks and Romans, they never bothered sharing their culture, or expanding their territory. Here’s why; that way they could keep their own people afraid of their neighboring tribes and blame all their problems on the outsiders. This way they could also have plenty of people that they could use as slaves, to lower their overhead on labor costs, thereby maintaining their profit margins. After all, native Aztecs were always petitioning for a higher minimum wage and for pensions and dental care. And best of all, so long as they kept their empire small and didn’t spread their culture to the other tribes, they could always harvest their neighbors for ritual sacrifice to Quetzalquatal, their angry, neighbor eating dragon god.

But America isn’t like that. We don’t believe in taking advantage of less fortunate people as a permanent underclass of cheap workers or labeling people as somehow subhuman and racially inferior so that they can be used as political scapegoats, preventing us from discovering the true causes of our problems. That’s why we should just take over Mexico and make them all American citizens.

What about out friendly, white, hockey playing friends to the north? Sure, Manifest Destiny means that we annex Canada too, eh. They have pretty decent beer and way cheaper medicine for senior citizens.

¡Celebre el eith de la victoria de Zaragoza yo!

Happy Cinco de Mayo. Do you know what Cinco de Mayo is all about? Many gringos assume that it’s “their Fourth of July.” Actually, Mexican Independence Day is September 16, 1810, that’s the day when a lowly priest rang his church bell calling for Mexicans to fight for their liberty from Spain. Their war for Independence lasted 10 years.

In 1861, Benito Juarez became president of Mexico. He inherited a financial mess. Mexico defaulted on their debts to European countries. France sent naval forces to demand payment. France’s Napoleon III, thought he’d take the opportunity to carve an empire out of Mexican.

During the French-Mexican War, a poorly supplied and outnumbered Mexican army defeated a French army attempting to capture a small town, or “puebla” in east-central Mexico. Winning the “Battle of Puebla” was a great moral victory for the Mexican government, proving their country's ability to defend its sovereignty against a major world power.

6,000 French troops attacked 2,000 rag-tag rebels. 500 French soldiers were killed, but Texas-born Mexican General Zaragoza lost only 100 men. On the fifth of May, 1862, the French retreated, although it was another six years until the French withdrew completely.

Pretty cool, huh? Reminds you of our own American Revolution. Except, France was our ally, but that was pre-Napoleon. And of course we attacked Mexico in the 1840’s and took half their country (California, Arizona, Colorado, etc.) I’m sure that war added to their debt and cut into their gross national product a little too.

Much has been said about “all the Mexicans” in Denison in the last 5-10 years. As a high school teacher, I certainly overhear a fair share of disparaging and ignorant, sometimes even racist remarks that kids make about the changing demographics of our area.

When I was growing up in Phoenix, I just assumed that anyone who wasn’t African-American was “White.” My best friend when I was five was a kid named Juaquin. Everybody thought he was Mexican, but actually his dad was a Maracopia Indian and his mom was Italian.

Bob Lopez, our barber used to get frustrated with the Mexican nationals who’d come north for work, but wouldn’t speak English. He said they knew how to speak it, they were just embarrassed by their accents. Sounds like stories I’ve heard around here from the old timers about speaking German before WWII.

One thing I learned teaching in Los Angeles, is that, like with my childhood friend Juaquin, you can’t assume you know someone’s ethnicity. Guatamalan and Cuban kids would actually make fun of Mexican kids because they spoke so slowly. I guess it’sort of like the difference between a Chicago accent and an Alabama one. El Salvadorans could be very offended if you thought they were Mexican.

Most of all, when you’re talking about the western half of the U.S. there’s a real question of did you cross the border, or did the border cross you? Some peoples families were here before here was “here.”

There’s no such thing as “Hispanic.” Seriously, it’s not a race or a nationality- the term was actually made up in the 1970s by the Census Bureau as an all-inclusive label to define people who’s family origins are in Mexico, the Caribbean or Central and South America. But let’s face it, most people you’d think of as Hispanic are even less Spanish than I am Irish- although many of them do at least speak Spanish. I have no idea how to say anything in Gaelic.

The term “Latino” comes from the Spanish “latinoamericano.” It’s supposed to refer to people who are from former Spanish and Portuguese colonies of Latin America. But see, that doesn’t just cover South America, the Caribbean, and Mexico. It also means territory that the United States acquired from Mexico, like Texas, New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada, California and Arizona. So therefore, having been born in Arizona, I am a Latino.

I think that the best thing to call people sir or ma’am or for that matter, call them by their first name. Better yet, call them “friend.” In my experience, folks of Mexican decent are warm, friendly, generous, hard working, fair, devoutly faithful Christians who value their families above all else. But of course, these may be overgeneralizations.

While I don’t really commemorate Zaragoza’s victory, I do think that today is not just an excuse to party. Although, I enjoy Mexican beer, Mexican food, Tejano music, and margaritas as much as the next Gingo.

By the way- Gringo is derived from “griego” which means “Greek,” suggesting a stranger or foreigner- as in someone confused by Spanish, who’s apt to give up and say “it’s all Greek to me.”

Of course it may have been derived from the Spanish pronunciation of a slang word meaning "fast spender,"

But it’s more likely that it came out of the Mexican War. The Yankee soldiers sang a marching song called “Green Grow the Rushes.” The Mexicans heard it and started calling the Yankees “Gringos” because of the repeating lyrics “Green Grow.”

FYI: “¡Celebre el eith de la victoria de Zaragoza yo!” translates to “Clebrate Zaragoza’s victory with me!”