Throwing the "BS Flag"
Your knowledge should be based on things that you have personally witnessed, experimented with, or tested, and NOT off of what others have said "can/will happen."
I agree that using the cigarette lighter is not a great idea. For everyone saying they power their radios like this and have no issues, I'm sure that's true. But you're creating a situation that can really do some damage to your vehicle. Most cigarette lighter outlets in a car are on a circuit that is also powering other accessory outlets, convenience lights, and other accessories. And while your CB radio probably won't draw more than a few amps, if something were to short or the ground becomes poor and there's a power spike, you risk damaging all the wiring and everything on that circuit.
So yes, 99.9% of the time, you should be fine powering that CB on the cigarette lighter outlet. But if for some reason you draw too many amps, you could destroy the very thin gauge accessory circuit wiring behind the dash. The fuse in the cig plug for the CB may protect the CB itself, but it's not going to prevent damage to anything else on that circuit.
As is often repeated in these forums, the best way (and I would argue, the right way) is to run a dedicated circuit for your radios, right from the battery, using the correct gauge wire for your application. And it won't look ugly.
For all you and I know, the "0.1%," that may have had this happen to them, may have over-amped the replacement inline/blade fuse, and then put too much draw on the wire/circuit, instead of figuring out why it was "popping," let alone finding the correct fuse to replace the blown one. If you blow a 2A inline fuse, REPLACE IT WITH A 2A INLINE FUSE!!! Same goes for blade fuses, replace a "5" with a "5."
All of you "NAH-sayers," out there, need to show me absolute, solid, physical proof of these "bad things" happening.
I agree with call_sign_null. A useful page/site to bookmark is:
Wiring & Grounding
Why should I bookmark something that the author obviously did NOT feel comfortable/confident enough to put his/her name to?
All of you "connect directly to the battery" types will get blood from a stone, before you can convince me to connect directly to the battery. That "0.1%" will not convince me, either. Besides, when I get to wherever I'm going, I want to turn off the key, and NOT have to remember to turn off my CB, my scanner, etc, especially when I'm running behind/late for work, or whatever.