Mayhaps a bit early in the day to post this? Here are a few quote nibbles in case the taglines alone (which are verbatim, btw) aren’t enough lure to read the articles.
The “al-Queda Mexican Drug Cartel” angle is an interesting twist to the old CAMP party line, and I find it all a bit :dubious:. They’ve been distributing flyers and posters for many years, warning hikers of booby traps and armed gunmen haunting the forest. I can buy the idea that there are migrant farm workers who are willing to take jobs guarding gardens, but Mexican terrorist drug lords reigning over the forested hills of Northern California? Smells a bit like inflated budget rationalization to me, and I’m not alone as far as some local (and signifigantly more conservative) viewpoints go:
Someone, I’ve got no cite for this, proposed a while back that rather trying to suppress marijuana farmers and consumers form doing what they want to do, it should be legalized and taxed like liquor and tobacco instead. This probably is too logical to a government that thinks in narrow terms of booze=good and pot=bad. Why not convert a losing struggle and a black hole in the federal budget into a revenue generator instead? I’d happily pay taxes to get a readily available supply and some quality control.
I’m from near Honeydew, (didn’t see that one coming did you?) which is about 30 miles upriver from Petrolia. I attended elementary school from pre-school through 8th grade in Petrolia, including the 45 minute (one way) bumpy, winding mountain road schoolbus ride. Though I had to “move away” when I was 12 (1987) to go to High School in Ferndale back in the day (there is now a tiny elementary school in Honeydew, as well as a tiny credited High School that serves the greater Mattole Valley), my family all still lives there. So yeah…I, by extension of my mom, brother, and sister-in-law (who works at the Petrolia General Store), know all of the residents of the Petrolia area. All 200 or so of them.
How are you familiar with such an obscure corner of the world, Max?
