Your column was cosmically wrong 

Shredder, I’m a fan, but you are way off the mark with this COLAB hit piece (“No—just no,” March 3).

Steve Bridges imitated Bush in all of his foolish splendor at the annual COLAB Buellton event a number of years ago, and all us allegedly privileged white folks laughed our asses off at the expense of that bumbling commander-in-chief. We had originally lined up Paul Rodriquez this year, a Latino Republican, but Bridges was highly entertaining the first go round, so we opted to give him another try. His relative blackness, as well as Obama’s, was hardly a factor.

Public figures are generally lampooned. That’s part of free speech, as is your right not to fact check the background of Mike Brown, who is far from smarmy. His knowledge of just about anything clearly far exceeds yours, and he has held highly credible municipal positions, including city manager of Berkeley.

Brown was not paid the sum you stated; in fact, it was paid into the county’s pension pool along with 6 million other dollars to cover his potential draw down, as well as the future payments to the other 100 employees who left when offered early retirement (and at 68, one could hardly say that he retired early).

You might wanna attend these events to find out how cosmically wrong you are.