You might have caught me early this morning on the Enrique Santos Show on 98.3 La Kalle. The "King of All Spanglish Media" graciously invited me on air to berate me over my story about Tomas Regalado raising boatloads of cash for a convicted terrorist.
You see, Santos -- along with a lot of other TR supporters out there, based on our comments section -- doesn't much like "facts" to get in the way of his Regalado-love.
I thought my story was pretty straightforward.
I reported that, according to a 1983 Miami Herald story, Regalado helped raise more than $21,000 for a defense fund for Eduardo Arocena, a charming guy who set off 32 bombs from Miami to NYC in the '70s. One time, he even ordered a political activist machine-gunned to death in front of his little kid.
Even worse, Regalado didn't return multiple calls I made to his cell phone and had a spokesman deny he ever raised any cash for Arocena. Say whaaaa'?
Santos didn't have any real quibbles with my facts. He thought I should have talked about how many people thought Arocena was a "freedom-fighter" and not a terrorist. OK. They say the same thing in Pakistan about Al-Qaeda, my friend. Just because you agree with the guy's politics doesn't make it right to set off bombs and kill people.
Bizarrely, he also criticized me for digging into Regalado's record at all. "Why is this coming up now, when he's running for mayor?" he demanded.
Well, Enrique, that's what real journalists do. They check out the records of the people who want to run the entire city.
Santos also thought we didn't try hard enough to get Regalado's side of the story. So I suggested an easy fix: Call up Commissioner Regalado on the air. Ask him yourself what role he played in the fundraiser. Ask him if he still thinks Arocena should go free.
Guess what? Regalado didn't answer when Santos called on air, either.
If Regalado isn't even going to clear things up with Santos soft-pedaling him on the issue, there's only one conclusion I can draw: Regalado knows he fucked up. And he doesn't want you to know about it.