Get ready folks, your trash bills will be growing soon. That doesn’t mean that the service would get any better than it already is, it just means that the cost to your local solid waste utility is going to go up significantly because the state of California will begin requiring the acquisition of fully electric […]
Opinion
Posted inOpinion
Bidenomics led to inflation, increased costs for consumers
I wonder if people realize what has brought about increased costs to every facet of our lives? It is called “Bidenomics,” the increased spending and the nonstop printing of money by the federal government is the primary cause of the “out of control” inflation America is experiencing and will continue to experience until spending is […]
Posted inOpinion
The hardest thing
Math might be the subject that confuses all of us at times. I know I’m confused by the numbers that Santa Barbara County Planning Commissioner Laura Bridley proffered during a recent meeting. During the Nov. 8 meeting, she was the sole commissioner to vote against the new cycle of the Housing Element—a state requirement to […]
Posted inOpinion
Giving unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, and leaving God out of it
Decades ago, I earned a Ph.D. in political science. Today I’m ready to toss my diploma into the trash. “Political” and “science” are two words that should no longer be connected. They form an oxymoron, at least in their application to contemporary American governmental processes. U.S. politics are becoming ever more irrational. Americans in […]
Posted inOpinion
‘No profound thinkers should be censored!’
Censorship in our schools and elsewhere must not be tolerated. Those who question authority are often censored. The most profound thinkers have traditionally been censored. Schools should not be a place for indoctrination by either the right or left, depending on who’s in power. Traditionally, classics like Huckleberry Finn, To Kill a Mockingbird, The Catcher […]
Posted inOpinion
Painful disdain
Santa Maria Planning Commissioner Robert Dickerson has such spite for the state Legislature’s attempts to facilitate housing development that he refused to vote on the city’s attempts to comply with accessory dwelling unit requirements that went into effect 10 months ago. “I cannot express any more than I have many, many times in the past […]
Posted inOpinion
The climate keeps changing no matter how many billions of dollars we spend on stopping it
Changing “climate change” that’s been around for the last 4 billion years is a tough job, but in California, which has only been around for 173 years, our politicians think they have the answer. There have been many misfires along the road to saving the Earth. First it was to stop drilling for oil and […]
Posted inOpinion
A political party problem
The American people have a political party problem. We the people can still have a functioning government if we simply follow the advice of our first president. In his farewell address to the nation, President George Washington warned against becoming involved in foreign entanglements. We have clearly failed as a nation to heed this sage […]
Posted inOpinion
War is not a solution
It’s time someone speaks out and puts the carnage happening in the Middle East in perspective. First, war is not a solution, never has been, never will be. It may end conflict, but it doesn’t resolve conflict. The “war to end all wars” didn’t do so. We stopped the carnage of the Jews but inflicted […]
Posted inOpinion
Pipeline pickle
Who’s happy that ExxonMobil pulled the plug on plans to replace its aging oil pipelines? I can tell you who! The Environmental Defense Center (EDC), for one, and lots of other nonprofit organizations dedicated to Get Oil Out. Exxon, aka Pacific Pipeline, no longer has plans to put brand new oil pipelines in where lines […]
Posted inOpinion
Common sense
People in the Santa Ynez Valley really just need to mind their own business. But they’re too entitled for that, aren’t they? After burning through several principals in a short period of time, Santa Ynez Valley Union High School still hasn’t replaced the most recent resignation, Michael Niehoff. Niehoff resigned last spring after dealing with […]
Posted inOpinion
SLO County Planning Commission should deny the project as is so supervisors can see a better alternative
The Dana Reserve development in Nipomo is one of the largest proposed developments in the history of San Luis Obispo County. Last January, we noted the local media’s failure to accurately report on the massive project and its equally massive impacts on the environment (“Local journalists overlooked an important document for Nipomo’s Dana Reserve development,” […]
