Talk the talk, but...

Mexico's tin-pot military faces down heavily armed Marines.

At the funeral in Mexico of Marine Lance Cpl. Juan López, killed in Iraq, the fearless tin-pot warriors of Mexico's vaunted army showed no fear whatsoever of the U.S. Marine contingent sent to honor their fallen comrade. The Marine Assault force (all two of them) were armed with ceremonial rifles (clubs) and the Marine Reserve force ( all seven of them, armed with bare hands) were in violation of the tender sensibilities of local tin-pot Mexican military forces.

The outgunned Mexicans (twelve of them) bravely fired strong words and later fearlessly blockaded the heavy-armor (a passenger van) of the Marines for some several minutes, before declaring a unilateral cease fire and withdrawing from the field. Stoically enduring the potentially deadly verbal attacks from family and friends of Lance Cpl. López, the tin-pot warriors would say that they were authorized only to interrupt the funeral service, not to explain why.

In all fairness to the Mexican forces, they do not understand the concept of "ceremonial" weapons as opposed to "real weapons that go "Bang-Bang-Bang..." because all of the Mexican Army's weapons are considered ceremonial in nature.

In epochs to come, this episode will no doubt take its rightful place in the near mythical tradition of a long line of Mexican embarrassments, such as;

Emperor Moctezuma (Montezuma in the Marine Hymn), killed by a rock thrown by a rioting subject, not by Hernan Cortez, as taught in the schools)

Emperor Iturbide, shot by firing squad after declaring himself emperor of "free" Mexico upon independence from Spain.

Gen. Santa Ana, captured wearing a woman's dress, without firing a shot, at San Jacinto by Gen. Houston.

Emperor Maximilian, shot by firing squad after being declared emperor by, then not defended by, the French (no surprise, there).

Pres. Porfirio Díaz, after declaring himself President-For-life-with-"free"-elections-every-six-years-whether-you-like-it-or-not, rounded up thousands of Mayas in the Yucatan and shipped them to Cuba as slaves for the sugar plantations, then went north to round up thousands of Yaquis and shipped them south to the Yucatan to replace the Mayas because he needed them to work in the hemp industry (hemp for ropin', not for smokin').

Gen. Victoriano Huerta, who murdered Pres. Madero (who had overthrown Pres. Díaz (President-For-Life-With-etc.-etc.-etc.)), then murdered Emiliano Zapata, then declared himself president, then was exiled to Europe by Carranza, who then murdered Pancho Villa, who was then murdered by ???? (it gets confusing with who shot whom, when, why, and who declared whom presidente, emporador, etc, etc., but they all wore tin pots).

Pres. Pedro Lascur de Paredes, president for less than an hour, who replaced the freshly shot Pres. Madero and was in turn replaced by the aforementioned Gen. Huerta, no doubt brandishing the still-smoking pistol.

Pres. Cárdenas, who nationalized (stole) all property, facilities, equipment, etc. from private oil companies with legal contracts signed by his own government, thereby creating PEMEX, the most inefficient and corrupt oil company on earth (with the possible exception of Nigeria's).

Pres. Echeverría, whose presidency was awarded in return for his ordering the 1968 pre-Olympic massacre of students, police and soldiers in Tlatelolco Plaza in Mexico City. Either 20 were killed, if you believe the government, or 300 if you believe the lying eyes of survivors. To demonstrate his sense of fair play, Echeverría had the tin-pot army round up some 300 of his own gunmen, all of those who could count higher than 20, and execute them all to preserve the government's census calculations, as well as his future presidency.

Sec'y of the Interior Manuel Bartlett Díaz, who, with a single keystroke, created the computer crash that delayed the presidential election vote count for twelve hours, resulting in the miraculous victory of his boss, Carlos Salinas, over Cuahtemoc Cardenas, son of the aforementioned founder of PEMEX.

Pres. Carlos Salinas, now living in seclusion in Europe and whose brother, Raul (known affectionately during Carlos's term as Mr. Ten Percent), a mover and shaker during the administration of Carlos, is serving a 30 year or 40 year or 50 year stretch for murder and corruption. (Every time Raul's lawyers get a judge to reduce the sentence to 30 years, the government comes back to the table with more charges and gets another judge to jack the sentence back to 50 years.) Carlos artificially propped up the flimsy peso which caused its value to finally crash down on the head of his successor.

Pres. Ernesto Zedillo, who, still reeling from the aforementioned peso crash, appoints the first Mexican Drug Czar, then ten (10) weeks later has to have him arrested after being presented by a library full of evidence by the U.S. ambassador that Gen. Jose de Jesus Gutierrez Rebollo was, truly, a drug czar. Gen. Rebollo is serving a 500 or so year stretch, as we speak.

I could go on and on, but I think you get my point.