President Reagan is now at rest. We mourn his passing, but we are grateful for the gifts he gave us: a safer world, strong economic base, and a renewed belief in America's greatness.

It's been argued that of all the animals humans have domesticated, the horse is the most important to our history. For thousands of years, horses were our most reliable mode of transportation.

As a former mayor, I know that local governments must have control over land use decisions.

More than 65,000 horses were slaughtered in the United States in 2004, a 50 percent increase since 2002.

Consular cards were not designed to be identification and no treaty recognizes them as such. Legal travelers, visitors and long-term residents carried passports, visas or green cards for that purpose.

In addition, California spends nearly $1 billion a year in Medi-Cal services for an average of 780,000 illegal immigrants a month, over and above emergency health services.

President Reagan achieved such successes because when you sat in a room with him, there could be over 1,000 people in the room, yet you felt like there was only the two of you, and his wonderful wit would put you at ease. That was a tremendous gift.