THE GROWING METH PROBLEM

While the Bush Administration targets its drug fighting efforts on
marijuana, methamphetamine is ruining lives, families, and
communities. Yes, marijuana use among teenagers is a problem. But
officials nationwide say methamphetamine is the foremost law
enforcement plague, and the only way to decrease its impact is to
give it the aggressive attention it deserves.

Anyone unfamiliar with the drug need only picture what crack cocaine
did as it tightened its grip on American communities in the 1980s and
1990s. Many who used crack abandoned their families, lost their jobs
and homes, and became criminals. Neighborhoods became strongholds
for drug lords, and prisons and jails quickly filled to
overflowing. Methamphetamine has hit rural areas hard and now is
wreaking the same havoc in cities.

Drug enforcement agencies don't stand guard at the borders to try to
keep out methamphetamine. Its ingredients can be found in cold
medicines or on farms, which explains why the problem is so
widespread in rural communities. The chemicals involved can be mixed
almost anywhere, and they are toxic and flammable. The drug, which
is extremely addictive, is injected, smoked, or inhaled.

One reason drug control efforts have suffered is because the
government has redirected resources to domestic security and the war
on terrorism. The administration proposes cutting $804 million in
drug-fighting money from the 2006 federal budget. That would be a
dangerous mistake.

Community officials want federal legislators to restore that funding,
much of which can be used to fight methamphetamine and to treat the
growing numbers of its users.

Societal problems caused by this drug already have reached epidemic
proportions and, unless federal officials pay closer attention and
restore much-needed funding, they will get worse. If so, Washington
will have to take a big share of the blame.