ELIZONDO TRIES TO CENSOR BLOGGER, FACEBOOK REVERSES

(After Brownsville Fire Dept. Chief and Brownsville Independent School District trustee Carlos Elizondo complained to Facebook, McHale woke up to find that a story on Elizondo was removed from his popular www.themchalereport.blogspot by Facebook managers. After telling Facebook his side of the story, the post was reinserted in the blog. Below, in a show of cyber solidarity with our fellow blogger and as a show on our respect for the First Amendment, we reprint the post thin-skinned Elizondo found offensive. We would think that after all this time working for a public-funded entity that Carlos would have learned that public scrutiny comes with elected office and a public position paid by the taxpayers.)

By Dr. Gerald F. McHale-Scully

TheMcHaleReport.blog

We awoke to find early this Thursday morning that our article "Lerma Serves Elizondo Warning" had been removed from Facebook and that we had been suspended from posting on that site for three days. This incident only confirms our suspicion about the emperor of ice cream: He is a vindictive egomaniac who can't handle criticism.

We remember Elizondo many years ago when he was studying medicine across the border and driving an ambulance to make ends meet. He was a regular guy back then. In fact, he was a nobody. His critics contend that he is still a nobody but who delusionally believes that he is a somebody. In his own small mind lost in that hairless head he thinks, pathetically, that he is a big shot who believes he can cry "fire" in a movie theater and walk away with nothing more than a scolding as if he were a child playing with matches.

There is nothing more sacred than the average citizen having the right to criticize politicians, but as we have learned both nationally and locally, freedom of expression is costly. President Donald Trump threatens the national press every day for not placing him on a pedestal while Mayor Tony Martinez prohibits the filming of the public comment session during municipal meetings in order to silence criticism against arguably the most corrupt city administration in history.

At The McHale Report we have been sued on several occasions but vindicated. Angered culprits of sins against humanity have insinuated that both our lives and our jobs were on the line if we continued with our diatribes against our democratically elected dictators. Those in power will go to any extreme in order to keep the powerless, voiceless.

This isn't the first time Facebook has placed us on notice, but we have understood their motives in the past. Not every one shares our appreciation for "art" and as a result we have had both articles and photos excised. But this is the first time we have experienced Facebook's wrath regarding political commentary.

We will repost both the story and the photo featuring Elizondo after this editorial. Elizondo, in our opinion, is in over his head as both fire chief and a BISD trustee. El Rrun Rrun Publisher Juan Montoya has printed several times that according to city policy there is a conflict of interest in Elizondo serving both entities and he needs to resign from either/or.

Montoya has also written that Elizondo tried to pressure longtime educator Mary Solis into his doing his bidding. When she didn't, Solis suddenly discovered that she had been demoted from being principal at Veterans High School to a more lowly post at Lucio Middle School. Solis filed a grievance against the school district and prevailed. Solis is the sister of veteran fireman Jorge Lerma, the new president of the firefighters union.

There is much more to the conflicted Elizondo and we intend to delve into his darker side in the coming months. We wouldn't be surprised if he resorts to retaliatory tactics at the BISD where our publisher Jerry McHale has been employed for 39 years. Twice this year BISD administrators have intimated that McHale's writings could cost him his job. So much for free speech.

"We are not taking Elizondo's actions lightly," said Scott Steinbeck, The McHale Report's managing editor. "This is the United States of America. This is not Russia's Putin where journalists are literally gunned down in the shadows of the Kremlin. Elizondo, a bully, is attacking the Constitution. If he thinks he can expectorate, ejaculate, urinate and defecate on the graves of dead soldiers who have sacrificed their lives to protect our liberties, he is sadly mistaken."

"Though there is nothing we can do within the law, Elizondo has displayed by his paranoia that he is opposed to the First Amendment," stated Justo Leyes, The McHale Report's legal expert. "There are consequences for public servants who metamorphose into pubic serpents spewing their poison. Brownsville is the Third World Capital of the United States where corruption flourishes because the likes of Elizondo reject both transparency and accountability."