Pot Smoking Hippies Destroying Western Wilderness

At least that what the headline should have been for this story. Turns out drug cartels are using public parks and land to grow massive amounts of pot to avoid border crossings. Before 9/11, a typical bust netted a hundred plants. Now the busts are netting thousands of high grade pot plants.

"Last year alone, rangers and drug enforcement officials removed 100,000 marijuana plants from California national parks, with almost half coming out of Sequoia. Meanwhile, authorities removed half a million pot plants from national forest and federal Bureau of Land Management lands in California during 2004."

Californians sure love their pot. Environmentalists are extremely concerned, about the fact that drug cartels are operating on American soil? Not so much...

"What bothers environmentalists primarily is the effect on the health of protected public lands. The armed growers feast on poached venison, spill pesticides, divert water from streams and dump tons of trash."

Well now! Here is an opportunity for environmentalists to think globally, act locally, and knock off smoking all that weed! Right?!?

"But funding droughts in recent years have meant the slashing of law enforcement budgets for public lands. With the massive expansion of operations deep in the woods, a few agents here and there stand little chance of even making a dent in the cartels' cultivation efforts. So until more money makes its way to Sequoia and other public lands, visitors would be wise not to venture too far off trail."

So Environmentalists are calling for an expansion in drug war funding. I guess it was naive to think that they would approach the demand side and start posting bumper stickers about pot smoking leading to eco-trashing. It's much easier for them to ask for increased government spending to make pot smoking eco-guilt free. Talk about a buzz kill.