However, local sports talk host Mike Taylor may have gone way over the line of decency and taste when he laid into Michael Jackson on the very afternoon the pop icon died.

In fact, e-mailer Carlos Rodriguez vowed never to listen to KTKR Ticket 760 AM as long as Taylor remained on the air.

"He said . . . may he (Jackson) burn in hell, he was a pedophile," Rodriguez wrote of comments made by the "Sports Talk San Antonio" host. Jackson was never convicted of child molestation, as Rodriguez pointed out, "but in Mike's court, he was. Again, if you didn't hear it live at the time, the tone in his voice was crazy."

People protested through calls and texts, but Taylor just got worse, took it to another level, Rodriguez recalled.

Told of the e-mail, Taylor confirmed what Rodriguez heard. Saying he was a big fan of Jackson's music in the '80s, even saw Jackson perform in Texas Stadium, he added: "I was soured on the guy" when the child molestation charges hit. "There was too much smoke around him."

Didn't he agree he acted insensitively considering Jackson had just died? Taylor said; "I don't think so," adding: "If it were the mayor of the city who died, that would be different." But Jackson transcended the rules. "The fact that he was so big," Taylor reasoned, made him fair game.

As for how people reacted, Taylor said some agreed with him, others wanted him fired. "My mom even got pissed at me."

I can't say I blame her. It's understandable that if Taylor didn't like Jackson, he'd want to say why on the air, to balance the all-out love being expressed for the iconic performer.

There are sensitive ways of accomplishing this, however, and announcing Jackson should "burn in hell" isn't one of them.