I didn’t launch Cubillos.com because I needed a hobby.
I launched it because I couldn’t stay quiet anymore.
When you’ve spent decades in newsrooms, city halls, barrios, and alongside military grunts, you learn to recognize the sound of history circling back—only this time with sharper teeth.
And as I watched executive orders dressed up like salvation while rights, institutions, and hard-earned protections were quietly stripped down to the studs, I knew it was time to stop waiting for permission.
Time to write in my own voice.
On my own terms.
Not with corporate filters.
Not with consultant-approved language.
Not to chase clicks, trends, or algorithms.
Just me—unsponsored, unfiltered, and seasoned by decades of doing the damn job.
I didn’t go to journalism school.
I fell into journalism almost by accident.
I started out writing obituaries at The Daily Californian. Then came a front-page story on the eve of the first Gulf War, and something clicked. The ink. The pressure. The responsibility. From that moment on, journalism stopped being work.
It became part of me.
Later, at La Prensa San Diego, my editor Dan Muñoz Sr. read one of my early stories and told me:
“You wrote this with blue glasses. Try using the brown eyes you were born with.”
That moment rewired me.
I stopped reporting from posture and started reporting from purpose.
I sat with builders of the Chicano Movement—Herman Baca, Reies Tijerina, Rodolfo Gonzales, José Ángel Gutiérrez, Bert Corona, Armando Navarro, Dolores Huerta, Lalo Guerrero—and learned how to cover communities mainstream outlets barely noticed unless something burned down.
I had the honor of interviewing John Lewis and other Freedom Fighters who didn’t just talk about justice. They marched it. Took beatings for it. Risked their lives for it.
I became a regular voice on a weekly PBS radio program alongside editors from the major dailies. And I rattled cages.
I rattled politicians.
I rattled the establishment.
I rattled parts of the media itself.
Because journalism was never supposed to make powerful people comfortable.
It was supposed to keep them honest.
Years later, an editor at a Scripps-Howard newspaper told me:
“You know how to connect the dots.”
That stayed with me.
Because that’s the job.
Not stenography.
Not access journalism.
Not rewriting press releases and calling it reporting.
The job is seeing patterns early.
Seeing consequences before they arrive.
Seeing how today’s speeches become tomorrow’s policies—and how those policies eventually land on real people.
So when I see history echoing again—in crackdowns on the press, political intimidation, tariffs sold as patriotism, and the steady erosion of institutions—I don’t wait for someone in a Manhattan newsroom or a Washington think tank to tell me what it means.
I pick up the pen.
Because my perspective doesn’t come from studio lights or donor conferences.
It comes from the street.
From neighborhoods.
From military bases and Navy ships.
From late-night conversations with people who live with the consequences long after the cameras leave.
This voice isn’t polished for television.
It’s earned.
Cubillos.com is where I connect the dots between past and present.
Where I call out the quiet wrongs before they become permanent ones.
Where I say the things too many people are afraid to say out loud.
This is why I write.
Because I’ve seen this show before.
And this time, I brought my notebook.