No, this is not Mexican Independence Day – that’s on the ides of September.
Having lived 7 years in San Diego, I know there will be big parties down in the border areas to celebrate Cinco de Mayo, with Mexican flags and Pacifo beers with limes (Coronas, Dos Equis, etc. as well – and Tecate if you like crappy beer). And of course, most of us don’t need much arm twisting to join in the celebration.
However, I would like to note that even if you don’t enjoy Mexican food or beers, you really should join in the celebration of one of the most embarrassing defeats in French military history:
With so many defeats to chose from, this may seem to be quite a claim, but the French force was actually militarily superior in this case, but still managed to lose soundly. So toast one to the Mexican Army – Happy Cinco de Mayo!
Thanks for that link. This is my first May 5th in the south and I was wondering what was going on -as you can imagine, this is not a big holiday in Canada, where today is actually a semi-national day of mourning.
I’ve read a good argument that the defeat of the French at Puebla help prevent France from supplying the Confederate Army, therefore the Battle of Puebla had a significant effect on the U.S. Civil War. The French Army was otherwise occupied in Mexico onger than they anticipated, so France couldn’t aid the Confederacy and the U.S. was eventually reunified.
Cinco de Mayo is stupid. The Mexicans won a minor battle, way to go. It’s just an excuse for a bunch of Latinos to cruise their stupid cars with ridiculous modifications and Mexican flags tapes to the hood all around and clog up traffic and cause trouble for businesses on their route. It’s also good for drunken knife fights and shootings. Hooray!