a writes:

There is little doubt that the risk of a 'cardiovascular
accident' (stroking or MI) increases with increasing blood pressure.

So why would it increase more for a pilot who requires a medical than for a
pilot who does not? That's the issue for a light sport license. If you can't
pass the medical, then you're not fit to fly--that's what the medical is
designed to determine--and so you don't qualify for the light sport license.

The fact that some applicants engage in doublethink to avoid facing this
obvious reality doesn't mean that they are right in doing so. The fact that
the FAA chooses not to pursue this in many cases doesn't mean that it cannot
or won't do so in the future or at its discretion.

Of minor interest is in a location I am familiar with when people are
subjected to a max effort treadmill test and their blood pressure as
well as EKG is being monitored, the test will stop when (ready for
this?) the BP exceeds 260 over I forgot what. The moral of the story
may be steady state hypertension does long term damage to organs, but
the chance of something sudden happening is probably fairly remote,
even for hypertensives.

Yes. A systolic pressure of 230 increases the chance of having a heart attack
in the next decade by only a few percent. But it is true that consistently
high BP does a lot of wear and tear, especially on things like the kidneys and
eyes. These won't cause sudden incapacitation, so they aren't relevant to
aviation, but they do affect general health, and may eventually affect fitness
to fly.

The FAA thinks in terms of cut-offs, but we all know the risk increase
is gradual, not abrupt. I am not sure but wonder if the BP limit is
something for which one can get a waiver, just as I had gotten one for
vision to get a Class 2 medical instead of the Class 3 I would have
otherwise gotten.

I've never heard of a waiver for BP, but it's an interesting question. Perhaps
if you could prove that it was white-coat syndrome or something, you could get
a waiver.

Sometimes, if your BP is very high at the doctor's office, you can try
monitoring your BP several times a day at home over a period of weeks. The
results may be surprisingly normal, although that might not necessarily
satisfy the FAA (even though it should).