Sequoia Pot Growers’ Links to Terrorists

The May 14 expose about Sequoia National Park pot-growing by thugs with ties to illegal aliens and terrorists was scary and very necessary to wake up California citizens. We have a horrid problem with illegal border crossings and drugs, and now we find out that the thugs have ties with Middle Eastern terrorists.

If any proof was needed, it is now obvious that we need a state and federal apparatus to police our borders and rout out any illegal aliens who could threaten our friends, families and institutions. We need military and police protection on our borders and surely now in our forests and beaches where illegal drugs are being grown, used and traded to enemies of every American.

No more excuses. No more appeasement to foreign nations that could not care less about our safety and the sovereignty of America and its borders.

Glenn Koons

Long Beach

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The idea that Hezbollah is involved in pot-growing in this country is ludicrous. I can’t stop laughing. Anything the right wing doesn’t like gets equated to Al Qaeda. We are becoming a Nazi state. Make pot legal and stop all this buffoonery. In the Netherlands, where there are hashish and pot cafes, the incidence of marijuana usage among young people is down because it’s no big deal. In our country, we make it a big dark terror and therefore encourage experimentation. We are way backward in our thinking.

We live in a country that points us all day long toward drugs. Got a backache, try Advil; headache, try Tylenol; can’t get an erection, Viagra; acid reflux, the purple pill. If someone wants to just feel good, it’s illegal. Unless you are a 60-year-old lawmaker slamming double martinis. Young people look at this hypocrisy and it widens the gulf between them and their parents.

Steve Orton

Woodland Hills

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I have never smoked pot, but I would be very happy never to see another dollar of my taxes spent on enforcing its ridiculous prohibition. The fact is that, by chasing marijuana growers with M-16s, we drive the street price up. This funds an industry composed of bad-guy growers and good-guy law enforcers who unwittingly work hand in hand.

Decriminalization would eliminate the need to grow pot in national forests and pull at least one economic rug out from under drug cartels. It would also free up law enforcement to go after real killers -- like Oreo cookies!

Stu O’Guinn

Huntington Beach

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It is puzzling to me why it is so difficult to spot those pot plantations in Sequoia National Park, given the many technological advances of today. Aerial mapping can fly over vast plots of land and show all manner of surface presence. Surely some smart person can find a way to detect marijuana.

For instance, is there a difference in moisture content in certain areas? Is there a difference in density? Is there a difference in temperature? Is there a difference in the way radar is reflected?

Hiram H. Swallow

Newhall