Free Republic

A retired deputy turned 100 MondayOne hundred years old, and it’s the best day of his life. Retired San Diego Sheriff’s Capt. Leland McPhie turned 100 years old Monday, and his old department did not miss the chance to celebrate the remarkable birthday at the Sheriff’s Museum. In honor of the centenarian, officials declared March 10 to be “Leland McPhie Day” in San Diego County. Among many gifts presented to him, McPhie was awarded a retired badge from the sheriff’s department with a special number on it: 100. The captain started with the department in 1940, working in the old...

The lead singer of a Grammy-nominated Christian metal band pleaded guilty Tuesday to trying to hire someone to kill his estranged wife. Timothy Lambesis, 32, remains free on $2 million bond until he is sentenced May 2 on one count of solicitation of murder in Vista Superior Court, north of San Diego. He could get nine years in prison. Lambesis, of the band As I Lay Dying, was recorded telling an undercover agent that he wanted his wife killed, according to prosecutors. The investigation began last April after Lambesis allegedly told a personal trainer at his gym that he wanted...

"Take down the sign or go to jail. We do not approve of guns...or you." This is the unmistakable messages sent by progressives when they take over a city and freedom pays the price. Ares Armor is a small tactical store operating one of their stores in National City, CA, a suburb of San Diego. Nevermind that CEO Dimitri and his staff at Ares Armor are in complete compliance with all laws and ordinances. That does not matter. That's because guns are at the heart of this debate. The City Council has taken offense to their presence there and is...

Sierra Club San Diego Chapter suspended The Sierra Club’s national board voted Friday to suspend its San Diego chapter for four years, a step that leaders said was needed to curb “ongoing conflicts and divisions” among local activists. “We have one objective, having a healthy, effective, working Sierra Club chapter in San Diego,” Sierra Club President Dave Scott said after the vote, saying the board had received many complaints about strife within the chapter. The organization’s leaders have provided few details about the nature of that conflict, but San Diego members and former officials attributed it to the Sierra Club’s...

<p>SAN DIEGO – An ice cream truck driver was robbed by a boy with a handgun in the Skyline area Thursday evening, police said.</p> <p>The robbery happened near the intersection of Black Oak Road and Meadowbrook Drive, according to San Diego Police Officer James Johnson.</p>

Agent was patrolling known smuggling trail near San Diego A US Border Patrol agent who claims he feared for his life after a rock hit his head reacted by shooting and killing the man who hurled the stone. It marks the ninth fatal shooting involving rock throwing since 2010. The unnamed agent was patrolling a smuggling trail east of San Diego early Tuesday when he came upon men suspected of crossing the border illegally; rocks were thrown at him, with one hitting his head. The San Diego Union-Tribune describes one of them as being as large as a basketball, and...

A San Diego council member has become the first openly gay Republican to include his same-sex partner in a campaign advertisement. Carl DeMaio, who is currently attempting to win the Republican primary, and challenge Democrat Rep. Scott Peters, has featured footage of his partner, Johnathan Hale, and himself at a pride parade in 2012 in a campaign spot that was released on Thursday. GOP campaign officials and Elizabeth Wilner, who tracks campaign ads for the nonpartisan firm Kantar Media, told The Wall Street Journal that to their knowledge this was the first political advertisement from either party which included a...

San Diego, the eight-largest city in America, elected a Republican as mayor by a 9% margin that surprised all the "experts," 54.5% to 45.5%. Republican city councilman Kevin Faulconer defeated Democratic Councilman David Alvarez in a city that has been trending both Democratic and Hispanic. There are two hard lessons for the Democrats here in the election. Lesson one, as noted by John Fund of NRO, "..the vaunted Obama election model - flood the zone with negative attack ads and excite the base of the Democratic party - flopped. Faulconer defeated fellow City Council member David Alvarez by nine points...

Kevin Faulconer recaptured the mayor’s office in San Diego for Republicans in a special election yesterday. The polls were skin-tight leading into yesterday’s election, and unions poured in millions to keep control in the nation’s eighth-largest city. But in the end the vaunted Obama election model — flood the zone with negative attack ads and excite the base of the Democratic party — flopped. Faulconer defeated fellow City Council member David Alvarez by nine points in a city that Barack Obama carried by 63 percent to 37 percent only 15 months ago.

Kevin Faulkoner recaptured the mayor’s office in San Diego for Republicans in a special election yesterday. The polls were skin-tight leading into yesterday’s election, and unions poured in millions to keep control in the nation’s eighth-largest city. Faulkoner defeated fellow City Council member David Alvarez by nine points in a city that Barack Obama carried by 63 percent to 37 percent only 15 months ago.

SAN DIEGO — Republican City Councilman Kevin Faulconer defeated Democratic Councilman David Alvarez in the San Diego mayor’s race Tuesday night. Faulconer had 55.2 percent compared to Alvarez’s 44.8 percent with 86 percent of the city's precincts counted. A jubilant Faulconer gave a speech to his supporters about 10:40 p.m. but stopped short of declaring victory. “We know that this city has gone through a lot in the last year, but we knew that as San Diegans that we were better than that and that we were going to come together when we had the opportunity to do that and...

Though San Diego is no longer considered the "math capital," the drug continues to be a huge problem in the region, health officials and county leaders said TuesdayThough the use of methamphetamine continues to pose a major problem in San Diego, county health officials and leaders say the city is no longer considered the “meth capital” of the United States, according to the latest statistics. “San Diego County may no longer be the meth capital, but meth continues to take its deadly toll. The statistics are very disturbing,” County of San Diego Board of Supervisors Chairwoman Dianne Jacobs said Tuesday...

I have marveled over the years at the kind of fear and anger the Christian Faith generates in some sectors of our society. Even the suggestion that there might a a small nativity scene in a park, or Christmas tree near City Hall, or a display of the Ten Commandments often elicits a hew and cry and brings forth camera crews and elicits lawsuits. But the venom seems especially reserved  for symbols of the Christian faith in particular and to some extent the wider Judeo-Christian heritage. A reference from the Q’ran in school is seen by many of this same...

The National Institutes of Health is spending over $224,000 to study how to introduce healthy child menus in an effort to alter the “ordering behavior” of kids in restaurants. A research project awarded on Nov. 26 to San Diego State University will attempt a “restaurant-based intervention,” coupled with a marketing campaign aimed at children to fight obesity. The school has been given $224,250 for an “exploratory intervention” study that will specifically target Latino children, which the researchers say have the highest rates of obesity. The project will first observe children’s “menu ordering and consumption behaviors” in 12 restaurants, followed by...

SAN DIEGO -- After two decades of legal and political wrangling, a federal judge Thursday ordered the cross atop Mt. Soledad removed within 90 days as a violation of the separation of church and state. But U.S. District Judge Larry Burns stayed the removal order so that those defending the cross have time to appeal. Built in 1954, the 43-foot cross is one of the most visible landmarks in San Diego. Starting in the early 1990s, plaques honoring military veterans have been placed on walls surrounding the base of the cross.

SAN DIEGO (AP) — Bob Filner has almost vanished from public view since a defiant resignation speech as San Diego mayor amid widespread allegations that he sexually harassed women. He returns to the spotlight at least once more. The former 10-term congressman will be sentenced Monday for one felony and two misdemeanors for placing a woman in a headlock, kissing another woman and grabbing the buttocks of a third. He pleaded guilty in October in an agreement with prosecutors, who will recommend that he get three months of home confinement and three years of probation.

A drug-smuggling tunnel equipped with electricity, ventilation and a rail system has been found connecting San Diego, California, and Tijuana, Mexico. Authorities seized more than eight tons of marijuana and 325lb (147kg) of cocaine in the discovery. Officials have not revealed the exact length or location of the recently finished tunnel, but Mexican media report it is near Tijuana's airport. More than 75 such secret tunnels have been discovered since 2008.

Thanks to the wonder that is the Internet, you don’t have to actually live in San Diego to watch a 30-minute special that aired in that city last Sunday that gives a thorough debunking of the climate scare. At this link you will see what the lucky residents of San Diego enjoyed via the great KUSI-TV and the Founding Father of The Weather Channel, John Coleman … without the other benefits of living in one of the most pleasant cities on the planet. You’ll just have to count all your other blessings. Coleman interviewed two of the lead authors of...

The masked man robbed a 7-Eleven store in La Mesa while wearing the creepy Halloween gearPolice are searching for a man who allegedly wore a “bloody clown face” mask during an armed robbery at a 7-Eleven in San Diego’s La Mesa area. According to police, the Halloween-themed heist happened just after 4:30 a.m. Thursday at a 7-Eleven store located at 5746 Amaya Drive. The suspect walked into the convenience store wearing what La Mesa police describe as a “Halloween mask of a bloody clown face” and pointed a handgun and mace at the clerk. The man allegedly ordered the clerk...

Twofer: MAIG Mayors going to prison (Don’t drop the soap, boys) October 15, 2013 It’s been a busy week for Mayor Michael Bloomberg and his Mayors Against Illegal Guns (MAIG) group of gun-grabbing mayors. First up, Filthy Filner, the San Diego Mayor who had a reputation for sexually harassing lots of lots of ladies, pled guilty to some reduced charges. Rumor had it his plea was to avoid convictions with the word “sexual” in them.