Free Republic

A woman in her 40s reported being tied to a tree at gunpoint in the Pebble Beach area of Monterey County on Wednesday before being later freed by passersby, according to a press release from the Monterey County Sheriff's Office. The woman told sheriff's deputies that she was walking on a trail at 7:30 a.m. in a wooded area between Haul Road and state Highway 68 when she noticed a man following her. The man allegedly approached her with a gun and led her to a tree, where he allegedly tied her up and then left without injuring, assaulting or...

San Francisco would become the first city in the nation to charge drivers just for driving in its chronically congested downtown under a sure-to-be controversial proposal being aired today. Supervisor Jake McGoldrick, chair of the San Francisco Transportation Authority, will ask the agency to study a downtown toll zone -- whereby drivers would need to purchase a daily pass to drive in The City's most congested streets -- as a potential solution to the Municipal Transportation Agency's woeful budget problems. "The key issue here is if we can kill three birds with one stone -- relieve congestion, clean up the...