“It’s disrespectful to do it on Cinco de Mayo.  They can be a patriot on some other day.  Not that specific day.”

What is Spanish for “go to Hell”?

I’ll let others conduct arguments about student rights and school attempts to keep the peace as well as the boiling cultural battles between Mexican-Americans and American-Americans. The real issue I had with this whole sad fiasco is the fact that there are young people in this country who have the audacity to suggest that there is such a thing as a day where allegiance to another nation outranks allegiance to this one.

As Americans, let’s all come to this understanding:  there is no day, no event, no annual festivities, no foreign triumphs…that makes American patriotism a backseat expression.  There is no “some other day” when it comes to the American flag.  If America gave patriotism a day off every time some other nation celebrated a victory over the French, we would have to mothball our flags for much of the year.

The local Morgan Hill Times described Hispanic students who felt that the presence of an American flag was “disrespecting the Mexican-American students” on “the only day that they celebrate their Mexican heritage”.

I propose a compromise:  students who display or wear the colors of the American flag on Cinco de Mayo can be sent home and students who display or wear the colors of the Mexican flag can be sent home the other 364 days of the year.  That shouldn’t be a problem since Cinco de Mayo is the only day that they celebrate their Mexican heritage.

Which begs the question – if these people are so proud and so connected to their Mexican heritage, then why don’t they celebrate that on a full-time basis by…residing in Mexico?  Maybe it’s because Cinco de Mayo isn’t even really celebrated in Mexico like it is in the United States.  It’s not even a Mexican holiday, yet in the United States, we’re expected to hide our American flags so Mexican-Americans and illegal immigrants can fantasize for a day that they are actually devoted to Mexico without having to subject themselves on a permanent basis to the poverty and corruption that is in fact the contemporary byproduct of “Mexican heritage”.  It’s like spending your wedding anniversary telling everyone how wonderful your wife is and how much you love and adore her and then spending the rest of the year living with your mistress, who coincidentally has a better home and a job.  And no one had better dare mention your mistress on your wedding anniversary!

These are merely efforts by hyphenated Americans, leftist groups and illegal immigration activists to further divide America by race and ethnicity.  The American flag is a symbol that embodies a little bit of everyone, regardless of background or skin color or religion.  Unlike virtually all other nation flags on mother Earth, it is by its existence an inclusive symbol.  There is no reason for any ethnic group in America to be offended by the American flag.

If this school and these students who champion segregation for phony transnational holidays had any brains and any sense of their ‘American heritage’, they would have recognized this and defused any potential conflict by proudly including the American flag in their celebrations with the appreciation that this flag represents their freedom to fly another nation’s flag in this country.

The light at the end of the tunnel turned out to be other young people responding to this idiotic decision by school leaders by showing up to the school dressed in red, white and blue.

Cinco de Mayo bullies may want to keep this in mind – one sure way to galvanize the American spirit is to try and silence American patriotism so as not to interfere with the flying of foreign flags.

If Mexican-Americans don’t understand this, then they should spend less time worrying about their Mexican heritage and more time getting acquainted with their American heritage.