DECLARE WAR ON 'TWEEKERS'

As the local police are being put on the carpet for busting pot
growers through use of code violations, it occurs to me they are
missing civic priorities. Methamphetamine use is at an all-time high,
and Humboldt County has more than its share of these meth users, or
so-called "tweekers."

"Tweekers" - the word sounds so innocuous, almost whimsical, but it is
evil in its effects on our community. Tweekers ruin the local parks,
leave needles in children's playgrounds, perform theft and petty
crimes or aggressive panhandling - all caused by the use of
methamphetamine.

Methamphetamine, a potent synthetically produced stimulant of the
central nervous system, is invading our community. Under federal
regulations, it is a Schedule II drug, which means that it has a high
potential for abuse with a strong likelihood to produce dependence.
The drug, like many illicit substances, may be injected, ingested,
snorted or smoked. It has a longer-lasting effect on the human body
than cocaine, however, and causes much more damage.

Tweekers is a tag I was not familiar with until recently, but even
when I was young we used to say "Speed kills." The "speed" today is
far more powerful then Dexedrine, or "bennies" as we called them.

Methamphetamine can be manufactured in homes or garages. It is readily
available and seeps into the user's life before he or she realizes it
is too late. Speed drains the moral fiber, releases the ugly side,
ruins the user's health and pushes our social net to the brink.
Tweekers relinquish all social responsibility and give themselves over
to the powerful effects of the drug; it takes over their lives and
causes users to become something less than human beings.

My wife is a student nurse and sees daily the results of the
malnutrition and psychological effects of this powerful addictive drug
on people.

This is an epidemic that has the entire nation in a grip of panic and
concern, for the popularity of methamphetamine is surpassing all other
addictive substances.

Why would any law enforcement organization spend time on pot when it
has this real enemy of mankind staring it directly in the face? I say
we need stiffer penalties for dealers and more education and awareness
of the effects of this evil substance. Intervention and education are
the only bulwarks that have some chance of positive results.

This community is under attack not by marijuana, but by the demon of
speed. We see the vast differences in the faces of the tweekers
compared to pot smokers, and it is like night and day. People who
smoke pot exclusively and do not partake in the harder substances are
usually decent citizens who work and contribute to the community, not
strip it bare as tweekers do.

It is essential that we assign a high priority to the eradication of
this evil substances called methamphetamine. We must use our law
enforcement funds effectively. Let us declare war on the one thing we
all know kills our community: methamphetamine, and the tweekers caught
up in its horrible effects.

Our department of Health and Human Services offers several methods to
raise awareness of this drug's potential for community and personal
harm, but we need more. Law enforcement must become a stronger force
for this emergency. If we do not make it so, this plague will follow
us into the future. We must face the facts and they are not pretty.

Forget the pot and concentrate on the real enemy, speed.

Robert W. Barker lives in Eureka.