Richard Rider's blog

Much is being made of "reducing our carbon footprint." I'm in favor of that -– to a point. I look for carbon-reducing steps that also save me money and/or make my life more pleasant! As I see it, if a carbon reducing strategy costs more, then often the wisdom of selecting that option is highly suspect.

For instance, I like using energy-saving florescent bulbs. I've used the big florescent lights in my fully equipped, professional office in the home for about 30 years. I also use the newer compact florescent bulbs whenever they fit with the demand, which fortunately is most of the time.

Did you see the excellent map of gasoline taxes, state by state, across America, May 6 on the front page of the San Diego Union-Tribune? If you didn't look too closely, or read the entire story you might have missed a salient fact -– we're number one!

Yup, California has the highest total taxes on gas of any of the 50 states (not just "among the highest" as the newspaper writes). As of January, we wealthy West Coast folks paid 63.9 cents of federal and state taxes a gallon, vs. the national average of about 47.0 cents.

For two years or more, an inflammatory anti-Mexican immigrant (legal and illegal) chain letter email has circulated the Internet. It lists a series of truly disturbing statistics demonstrating that these illegal immigrants (ALL people of Mexican descent are assumed to be illegal immigrants) are the number one problem in America -– raping, pillaging and welfaring their way across the land.

The recession is upon us.

While still not official, most agree that we are in an economic downturn. Unemployment is rising, housing prices are plummeting and energy costs are soaring. As a result, in this election year, the federal government is offering tax rebates (admittedly ill-advised) to lessen the pain.

But in California, politicians think there are only two times to raise taxes -- good times and bad times. Oddly enough, this is one of those times.

1. Local College Econ Prof Parrots "Wisdom" from Internet Spammers
2. Duncan Hunter's HUGE Fund Raising a Farce
3. All of Rider's Major Lawsuits Have Been about Properly Voting for Tax Increases and Issuing Bonds
4. In This Game, God Abandoned the Methodists
5. The Insanity That Is Oakland: Illegal Affirmative Action in Firefighter Selection
6. Here's My $10 Cash Christmas Present -– from Me to YOU!
7. CraigsList Bans Our Gonzo San Diego Firefighter Ad
8. The New (Well, Recent) Multi-TRILLION Dollar GOP Spending Plan
9. End the War on LEGAL Drugs

Public vs. private salaries, California business climate, Republican Party straw poll, make a will, fire fighter jobs, beach booze ban, Second Amendment, Omaha Mall shooting

Here's an inaccurate printed rebuttal column, written by a firefighter, responding to my North County Times op-ed on "Expanding our Firefighting Options."

Six Items – Five on San Diego fires, last one on home prices.

Eight items, all related to the San Diego area fires. Interesting tales from folks affected by the blazes.

This is devoted entirely to fire fighting in general, and the San Diego County fire disaster in particular. The good news is that -- at TREMENDOUS expense and tragic loss of life -- we had an opportunity to learn from the 2003 massive Cedar fire, with four years to implement needed improvements and reforms. The bad news is that, in some critical matters, our politicians and bureaucrats didn't seem to learn a damn thing.