HOW SOUND CARRIES IN HIGH-CEILINGED RESTAURANTS...

Special to El Rrun-Rrun

The wine was flowing freely – perhaps too freely – and there, at the center table at ritzy Gazpacho's Restaurant and Bar, a loud party got louder each time the cork popped and another bottle of wine was poured.

At the table was none other than newly-elected City of Brownsville commissioner Linda Macias and her hubby, local blogger Jerry McHale, and Brownsville Independent School District Rick softball coach Rick Lepre.

The bar patrons could not help but overhear them, and as the bottles of the grape kept coming, the volume of their conversation – especially Macias' and McHale's – rose in pitch as they outlined their scheme to get back at former city commission candidate Catalina "Caty" Presas-Garcia, who dared to run against Macias for City of Brownsville District 2 commissioner in the May elections.

According to several customers there that night no one needed to crane their necks to hear the conversation from that table when Macias was overheard saying she would do or had already done a public information request on Adrian Garcia, Catalina's husband and a teacher and golf coach with the BISD. Caty had been a BISD trustee and Macias said that she hoped that some of the information she might gather could be used to embarrass her former city commission opponent. 

The agreement they reached – they loudly proclaimed – was that that she would turn over any incriminating info she would receive to McHale so he could apply his venomous spin to embarrass Catalina. 

And not to worry about blogger Juan Montoya, Macias and McHale laughed. He was easy. A few beers and a $20 bill will silence him, both McHAle and Macias agreed. Montoya is easily silenced, Jerry laughed, adding that he could be easily found hanging out at bars patronized by crack heads and drunks. 

"He’s always downtown and with a few beers and $20 dollars, he’s yours," Jerry laughed, joined in raucous laughter by Linda and her husband.

"I’ll take care of Juan," Macias was overheard saying. "He’s easy."

The several patrons who reached this blog said they heard McHale then turn the conversation around toward former District 2 city commissioner Jessica Kalifa and how she had screwed Rick Lapre and warned Macias that she better better not screw around with Rick, his buddy.

Macias was overheard promising to betray neither Lepre nor McHale. Before the drunken bacchanal broke up, McHale insisted on a photo of him and Macias to show that they are bods and no one better touch her or they would be made to pay and bear the brunt of his fury and relentless torture on his Facebook page. 

Macias' husband said the couple had "a lot riding on Linda as a commissioner and we have the majority of the commissioners to do whatever we want. We’ll tell you who to attack and give you inside information in return for you to keep Linda off the blogs."

They all lifted their glasses and toasted to the new Queen of Brownsville.

But it turned out to be a kind of honor among thieves since those at neighboring tables of the high-ceilinged restaurant plainly heard McHale tell Lepre as soon as the queen and her husband left, that: "This bitch thinks I’m doing this for free," McHale roared. "She’s going to pay (one way or another) and in cash. Either way she’s paying."

"Her husband is worse than Norma Hernandez was to Ernie Hernandez," he asserted loudly. "Women love it when I tell them they are gorgeous. She thinks I don’t how they get their money. Vacations aren’t cheap. Hey, I want to go to Japan."

"The dude does therapy and she works for Idea," he told a grinning Lepre. "No way they can afford that lifestyle. Now as a city commissioner, her husband and Linda are going to make a lot of money. She’s gonna pay me one way or the other. If not she’ll find out how quick that money leaves them. I know her's and his secrets."

There is, apparently, no honor among this bunch, starting with the new commissioner.

Macias promised those attending the April 23, 2023 Cameron County Democratic Women’s forum held at the Central Public Library that if she was elected commissioner she would resign from her position on the board of the Brownsville Community Improvement Corporation within two weeks.  She was going to do that, she promised, in the interest of transparency.

The day after the forum on April 24, early voting started and election day was May 6. Here we are nine weeks later and still she hasn’t delivered on her promise to the Democratic women that she'd resign from the BCIC.

Given the characters in this play: Who will end up conning who, Macias or McHale?

The moral of this story? If you conspire, do it more discreetly.