NYT: A Drug Scourge Creates Its Own Form of Orphan(meth's abused children)

[DeepModem Mom]

A Drug Scourge Creates Its Own Form of Orphan
By KATE ZERNIKE
Published: July 11, 2005


....This is a problem methamphetamine has made, a scene increasingly familiar across the country as the number of foster children rises rapidly in states hit hard by the drug, the overwhelming number of them, officials say, taken from parents who were using or making methamphetamine....

***

Officials say methamphetamine's particularly potent and destructive nature and the way it is often made in the home conspire against child welfare unlike any other drug.

It has become harder to attract and keep foster parents because the children of methamphetamine arrive with so many behavioral problems; they may not get into their beds at night because they are so used to sleeping on the floor, and they may resist toilet training because they are used to wearing dirty diapers....

***

The drug produces a tremendous and long-lasting rush, with intense sexual desire. As a result of the sexual binges, some child welfare officials say, methamphetamine users are having more children. More young children are entering the foster system, often as newborns suffering from the effects of their mother's use of the drug....(T)he biggest problem, doctors who work with children say, is not with those born under the effects of the drug but with the children who grow up surrounded by methamphetamine and its attendant problems. Because users are so highly sexualized, the children are often exposed to pornography or sexual abuse, or watch their mothers prostitute themselves, the welfare workers say.

The drug binges tend to last for days or weeks, and the crash is tremendous, leaving children unwashed and unfed for days as parents fall into a deep sleep....


http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/11/national/11meth.html?hp&ex=1121054400&en=be8f2a93c560058f&ei=5094&partner=homepage

[tridim]

1. Thank gawd the Feds are arresting medicinal marijuana growers

Pot is much more dangerous than meth. :sarcasm: obviously.

[mom cat]

2. So much for the war on drugs, which seems to be mostly targeted

at cancer patients who need pot for pain control.

[grytpype]

3. Holy shit.

Meth users breed more. Damn, just what we needed.

[Voltaire99]

4. Look at what market fundamentalism does to us.

America has become so punishing and so hopeless to so many that alcohol isn't enough. Meth isn't the problem, of course. Meth is escape.

Between Reagan, Clinton and the Bushes, the retreat from a social contract into market fundamentalism has brought us to this destination: Methland. This is what a society that enriches millionaires and forces its working poor into multiple jobs at Wal-Mart and Taco Bell, all the while into deeper debt, looks like.

Read the article. Under a dog-eat-dog ethos, the children eat plaster.

[DeepModem Mom]

5. That's quite a post, Voltaire -- thanks. nt

[Eloriel]

19. You're right that meth is the escape

but I'm not so sure your take on the problem isn't just a little glib. Or perhaps simplistic.

Addictions stem from growing up in dysfunctional families and being abused as a child (including emotional abuse or neglect). Child abusers and those creating dysfunctional homes were typically abused or grew up in dysfunctional homes themselves. Things DO get worse in homes when the economy sucks, but it's not usually the CAUSE of these problems. IOW, you can grow up poor but well-loved, in a good, carying home where you're taught values and compassion, and so forth. I DO, however, consider poverty one form of (societal) child abuse, but I don't consider it the definitive form.

On another note, having worked as a volunteer CASA (Court-Appointed Special Advocate), advocating for the best interests of children removed from their homes, I can attest to much of what the article says. Meth is a very nasty drug, and it's destroying families right and left.

In my state, mothers (and fathers) typically get up to 2 years to clean up their acts and get their children back, and the time frame is so children don't spend their entire little lives in foster care -- permanent solutions are contemplated from the very beginning of their induction into foster care.

I rarely saw or heard of mothers getting their children back. Sadly, our judge thought it was because they "chose the drugs over their children," but that's more than a little harsh from an otherwise very good juvenile judge. These drugs (viz., meth) just won't let go of women, and there is some evidence they are harder -- and worse addictions -- for women than men. Too, you just can't force people to be ready for drug treatment when we say they SHOULD be, so while we as a society HAVE to make some avenue available to these mothers to help them and esp. give them an avenue toward reclaiming their children, it was too often throwing money at the wrong time and place for the problem involved.

It was very, very discouraging to watch, and to see the inadequacy of our laws, as well. In addition to mothers not able to rouse the will and resources to kick the drugs, I saw children returned to their parents who would have had a MUCH better life with the families willing to keep them, or adopt them. And yet, again, as a society we can't have the state deciding who is the "better" parent, or who is "not QUITE good enough," or who loves well enough, etc. The parameters for denying children their parents, and parents their children, have to be fairly strong. (And if anyone doesn't think that's true, just imagine fundamentalists running the programs, deciding who is and isn't suitable to be parents, and you'll likely get a little religion on the subject yourself. :evilrin: )

Most of these children will be in trouble with the law by their late teens, having babies of their own, alcohol and drug-addicted themselves, unable to hold a job or create and sustain close intimate relationships.

And people wonder why I'm such a Howard Dean fan. He did one thing that ALONE would have made me absolutely crazy about him: he implemented a plan in Vermont that cut child abuse by 43% and child sexual abuse by 72% -- at a cost of just $100 a year per child. The program, Success by Six, is simplicity itself: every new mother gets a visit while still in the hospital and the OFFER of a follow-up visit at home, at which point she and/or the father are provided with what services they need: job training, food stamps, parenting classes, etc. Dean did this after being FORCED to raise prison funding by 16% or so one year when he really didn't want to. So he took it on himself to fix the problem and I can tell you that the dramatic cuts in child abuse that resulted are unheard of and WILL result in a decrease in the prison populations and a lot of other dysfunctional, costly to society behavior starting in just a decade or so now. In the meantime, these kids are going to do a lot better in school, so they'll have a better chance to live up to their full potential as human beings.

[DeepModem Mom]

21. Thanks for this post, Eloriel --

and for the reminder about the Dean program in Vermont.

[Voltaire99]

24. Why meth, and why now?

I appreciate your take on the matter, Eloriel, particularly your sensitivity to family dynamics in addiction. You have impressive experience, too.

As you would probably agree, the family unit is also shaped by social conditions.

Even if we ultimately blame "dysfunction" for addiction, we've only spoken to a part of the problem. We have not begun to answer the question of why there is so much dysfunction in society.

That is what interests me. Why is America generating more and more meth addiction? From *what* are people eager to escape?

Economics gives us one answer: there is less and less mobility, opportunity, or hope for Americans to better themselves, and less chance of entering or remaining in the middle class, no, only more drudgery, peonage, hopelessness and abuse in the dark retail mills of our Wal-Mart economy. People can't earn living wages, there is precious little social safety net left, their traditional bankruptcy protection is gone, they are offered fast food jobs or prison as choices, and they're drowning in debt.

Numbers aren't the only measure. No one can fail to have missed the rich contempt heaped upon the underclasses since the Reagan era. That hostility is central to the Republican Party's control of nearly all American institutions, federal and state.

These changes represent a broader cultural shift we've undergone over the past quarter century. It's one that describes the abandonment of the social contract for the every-man-for-himself ethos that reigns today. The old America of our childhoods is gone; in its place is a new society with new rules, new rulers. In short, whether in policy or public discourse, we care less now about our fellow Americans. They aren't our problem. Elaborated through the erosion of worker's rights and the rapacious supremacy of big business, we are saying, essentially, to those most at risk: "Let them eat Krispy Kremes."

They prefer meth. Inexhorably this shift leads to those kids eating plaster in the meth house where the parents lay in stupor, having chosen the grim nirvana of fucking on crank. Unconcerned with whether the adults make it or not, society will intervene only for drug enforcement or when the family's misery becomes too great for it to ignore.

Like the portrait of Dorian Gray, those kids are mirrors. What their misery and neglect reflect aren't only family behavioral disorders. They show us the values of America.

Agree or not with my outlook, looking beyond merely the family dynamic should at least lead you to ask why your society engenders so much dysfunction and such baroque suffering. Why do you think that is, Eloriel?

[amazona]

27. meth has been around since the 30s hasn't it?

My take on it is that it's the hysteria of the day.

There's always gots to be drug hysteria, be it the "heroin babies," or the "crack babies," and now the "meth babies." Nothing new under the sun, really, in my view. Back in the day, it was the unwashed sitting on a street corner drinking a new drink called gin that caused much alarm.

Meth at least can be performance-enhancing for some people, however, after I dabbed with this, I decided for me that the being able to stay awake longer and work longer hours wasn't worth it. If someone really needs the energy to work 3 jobs or deal with 4 screaming children where there is no access to affordable child care, I can see where they could end up falling into a trap.

As for tales of people having orgies for 72 hours while the children eat plaster...well...maybe it's true. And maybe it's exaggerated. I'm going to retain some skepticism there. I guess if the real goal is to sell more drugs to the hopeless, then claims of being able to go for 72 hours straight, even if veiled in hushed tones of shock and faux concern as in this article...well, it's a pretty good sales technique, I should think.

Kind of like that ad for Cialis, "If your erection lasts 4 hours..." Ooh whoo, I bet that scared just tons of guys away, didn't it?

Crack out the tinfoil but I think we're being gamed on multiple levels.

[Voltaire99]

33. Good point...

Well said. America's Puritanism leads any concern the society has about drugs.

I expect meth's usefulness to the work-til-you-drop society will be a tough one for our worst scolds: they will appreciate its ability to concentrate effort on capital.

Perhaps they'll find a way to "enhance" Viagra one day--causing erections that later leave their owner with a strange, irresistable desire to put in some free overtime at work.

[Enraged_Ape]

40. Because it's easier than ever to make at home

The recipes are pretty much readily available over the Internet and the ingredients are very easily obtained at your local drug store and plumbing and/or auto accessories distributor. It is far, far easier to produce than, say, LSD or pot.

The central problems with meth are:

1) Just about any idiot can manufacture it, and many idiots do. Meth is not something you have to grow for months in secret out in the woods somewhere, nor does it require any particular knowledge or specialized access to suppliers in order to produce.

2) The stuff turns your house and even neighborhood into a LITERAL haz-mat area. By manufacturing it, you essentially poison your neighborhood. This is not a live-and-let-live kind of drug. It has huge negative consequences for all kinds of innocent bystanders.

3) It is simply an incredibly powerful, nasty drug that totally destroys its users and their children.

We need to fight the real enemies in society, defend and legalize those drugs that aren't heinous (like pot, which actually has practical uses) and do something to eliminate the destructive drugs that have no redeeming value to society whatsoever. METH is one of those drugs.

[Eloriel]

31. This society itself is quite sick

Dysfunctional as hell. My favorite example, proof positive of how sick we really are: what kind of culture would knowingly, willingly build energy systems which generate waste for which last for tens of thousands of years, are toxic to every living thing, and for which there is NO safe place on the whole planet to store it? Any SANE society would have said: uh, no thanks. And that's just one.

For me it all goes back to individual and collective dysfunctionality and plain ole sickness. I think the argument could be made that the things YOU believe are at fault here (economics, social immobility, the like) are simply more symptoms rather than other causes.

(I really do reject economics as a cause of addiction. You'll find addiction among the richest and among the poorest. And meth isn't the only kind -- we've got LOTS of different ways to be addicted in this society, many of which are sanctioned if not promoted by the culture.)

If you're really, really interested, here are a few books for you:

When Society Becomes an Addict, by Anne Wilson Schaef
The Addictive Organization, Anne Wilson Schaef
My Name is Chellis and I'm in Recovery from Western Civilization (book isn't handy so I don't have the author's last name)
When God Becomes a Drug by Fr. Leo Booth (nails the fundamentalists but good!)

As for why meth? I suppose because it's incredibly easy to brew your own.

BTW, I don't disagree with your take about economic issues, just their place in the addiction scheme of things.

[Zorra]

36. Also, meth is street cheap. Here in Mexico, the drug started mainly in

the border areas and is gradually working its way south, both on the mainland and the Baja. It is the drug of choice for most prostitutes and street hustlers, and the severely poverty stricken, and is available not only in cities but in very small towns also. It generally costs 50 pesos (a little less than $5) for a small bag.

I did an "investigation" of central districts in several Mexican cities of various sizes, out of curiosity and the intent to write about the experience in some context at some time. I learned a whole lot about meth, which is called "cristal" down here.

The main things I learned about meth: This shit is totally evil, dangerous, and it literally makes people temporarily (possibly somewhat permanently) insane after a relatively short period chronic use. Often, some people don't sleep for days and sometimes a week at a time, and eat very little on this drug. I suspect that most chronic users don't even realize, don't understand, can't recognize, that they are losing it. Long term chronic use seems to "make the bats leave the cave permanently". Permanent loss of some cognitive ability, and often apparent emotional/psychological damage also, is something I surmised universally in long term users. Chronic long term users seemed to be reduced to basic, almost reptilian predatory sociopathic survival levels. *Yep, almost like they turned themselves into republicans.;-)*

I could go on and on, but I don't have the time right now.

IMO, one huge problem with amphetamines or cocaine is that these drugs will immediately shoot neurotransmitter levels of brain substances such as serotonin, dopamine, and endorphins, of situationally or chronically depressed persons sky high. If your life is hopeless and miserable, bam, in one second after ingesting meth or coke you feel (temporarily) great. "Should I kill myself, or smoke some crank?" Of course, the jones from coming down is a way worse hell than the original depression, so many folks just keep on getting high until their poor brain eventually fries.

And that is one of the reasons why "drug wars" are absolute failures. They treat the symptoms of the disease (very poorly), and cure nothing.

They actually prolong the diseases, which are known as alienation and hopelessness.

IMO, this relatively new industrial world/society/civilization leaves many folks alienated and with the perception that they have little or nothing to trust and believe in, particularly in these dark, gray days of worldwide poverty and growing fascism, and it is almost a miracle that we are all not stoned out of our minds daily in an effort to escape the growing horror that Bu*h and the neocons are letting loose in this world.

(rant/over)

[JNelson6563]

38. Bravo Eloriel.

The whole post was very insightful and informative. Had a special appreciation for this:

And people wonder why I'm such a Howard Dean fan. He did one thing that ALONE would have made me absolutely crazy about him: he implemented a plan in Vermont that cut child abuse by 43% and child sexual abuse by 72% -- at a cost of just $100 a year per child. The program, Success by Six, is simplicity itself: every new mother gets a visit while still in the hospital and the OFFER of a follow-up visit at home, at which point she and/or the father are provided with what services they need: job training, food stamps, parenting classes, etc. Dean did this after being FORCED to raise prison funding by 16% or so one year when he really didn't want to. So he took it on himself to fix the problem and I can tell you that the dramatic cuts in child abuse that resulted are unheard of and WILL result in a decrease in the prison populations and a lot of other dysfunctional, costly to society behavior starting in just a decade or so now. In the meantime, these kids are going to do a lot better in school, so they'll have a better chance to live up to their full potential as human beings.

The benefits to society of this program are endless, the financial among them substantial enough to appeal to the greediest of wingnuts.

Thanks for taking the time to post all of that. Well done.

Julie

[Pachamama]

6. I had no idea what an ugly drug Meth was...looks like it is the most

destructive drug there could ever be....so sad, so sick...those poor kids who are being abused and lives destroyed because of this drug...

And to think the Bush admin is more focused on Pot and medical marijuana...unbelievable...then again, everything is believable in this administration. Guess the Bush Cabal would rather bust cancer patients and the people who help them and let the Meth Heads breed and disinegrate along with our country....

[LeighAnn]

8. The worst ever, I think

Worst.Drug.Ever.

Turns people into lunatics. I'm not real big on the government taking people's kids away, but even I can't see leaving a child in a home where there's meth around.

Bush has proposed cuts to the rural law enforcement funding that is the mainstay of the county fight against meth, preferring to stop it at the border or some such (down in TX, where his contractors I mean contributors can fill their pockets with the money). If it wasn't 4 am I'd find a cite.

Check it out...

http://www.skeletonpeople.com

[DeepModem Mom]

17. Very interesting site, LeighAnn -- thanks. nt

[Pachamama]

32. Whoa! These people look transformed to skeletons & scary in less than 4

months! I had no idea....a whole other world from the one I know...I am in an area where the drug of choice amongst "elite" would be some good coke and great pot....(Bob Weir and other retired rockers are in the area). But this Meth...wow, I'm speechless and so sickened by what it is clearly doing to the poor and underclass in this country...Tell me if I'm wrong, but it seems its the poor white man's crack? But it seems worse than crack in its effects....scary and so sad...:cry:

[anitar1]

9. Breed is the word. why should theybe allowed to breed?

Someone tell me.

[tenshi816]

7. What a heartbreaking article.

We don't seem to have a meth problem like this in the UK. Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of drugs here, but there doesn't seem to be a problem with meth on the same scale as in the US.

Can somebody tell me the difference between meth and the "plain old speed" that used to be around when I still lived in the States? I used to know lots of people who took speed in college (usually diet pills), especially around exam times, but I never knew anyone who got addicted to the extent I'm reading about these days. Is today's meth more powerful or something? I'm hopelessly out of the loop on this.

[anitar1]

10. It is mre horibble than you ever dreamed of. n/t

[SouthernDem2004]

12. Well the difference is the makeup of street Meth.

Meth is speed but today's Meth is made by individuals using toxic substances like brake fluid. Methamphetamine is still often refered to as "speed" but its not the same old stuff.

Here is a good link to Meth:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methamphetamine

[tenshi816]

14. The Wikipedia info was a real eye-opener.

Thanks for the link.

Like I said in my previous post, I knew plenty of people who did speed in college, but it was usually linked to a desire to lose weight or pull all-nighters studying at exam time. It seemed to be used mostly in a short-term and goal-oriented way (like "after I lose 10 pounds I'll stop" or "just till exams are over", that kind of thing). It didn't seem to take over people's lives to the extent it does now, that or maybe I was missing something (I have a tendency to be naive sometimes).

What bothers me most about stuff like this is how it doesn't affect just the users, it spreads out and destroys the lives of everyone close to them.

I can't understand why police are going after pot smokers instead of concentrating their efforts on this problem.

[iverglas]

15. that's the perceived problem with decriminalization ...

What bothers me most about stuff like this is how it doesn't affect just the users, it spreads out and destroys the lives of everyone close to them.

People who use drugs like today's meth really are very likely to harm someone else, and not only as a by-product of criminalization (property offences to fund the high prices caused by prohibition, violent offences involved in conducting and competing for control of the illicit drug trade, fires at clandestine labs ...).

It wouldn't matter whether parents using meth were breaking drug laws or not -- they'd still be neglecting their children, just for starters.

There are arguments against decriminalization -- like the need to protect the children of users ... if not the users themselves, who are as deserving of protection from the people who exploit them as anyone else.

The problem is that criminalization doesn't do any of the good things it is supposed to do in that regard. At least, not the way prohibition operates now, and not any way it has ever operated. It may be that it just plain can't work, given the human element involved.

Decriminalization, of possession/use, in any event, might at least mean that it was possible to reach these people. If they weren't in fear of prosecution and punishment, at least some of them might be amenable to prevention and treatment efforts. Or even to accepting interventions of other kinds, such as intervention in their children's interests, even if they themselves did not want help.

(This is the biggest argument against criminalizing the use of drugs by pregnant women in particular, i.e. charging pregnant women with delivering drugs to a minor or some such bullshit. Laying charges -- which, quelle bizarre coincidence, are almost always laid against minority women and women of colour -- makes it highly unlikely that any such women will ever come forward voluntarily for treatment when they are pregnant.)

Of course, what is really needed by many of the people at risk of this kind of exploitation -- exploitation by people who sell them poison for profit -- is a society in which they have a hope of a job, for starters.

In the meantime, it's pretty hard to see how decriminalizing possession/use could possibly make things any worse than they are.

That's why so many people who actually know what they're doing in this respect focus on harm reduction strategies.

Needle exchanges, the provision of safer equipment to crack users (to prevent burned lips, which facilitate the spread of disease, e.g.), safe injection sites -- those are examples of some things being done, albeit not in the US. But decriminalization of possession/use is arguably the best harm reduction strategy of all.

[Voltaire99]

34. Yes. A humane and pragmatic approach.

Excellent post.

You describe the approach needed--one derived from compassion and understanding, with the goal of actually helping those at risk or in need, rather than the misguided and wasteful "war on drugs."

That wretched military metaphor is apt: our drugs policy is the violent suppression of minorities, who become effectively POWs in the abysmal human warehouses of our prisons.

Much as we should, I don't like our chances of reforming the drug war any time soon. Too profitable, too entrenched, and too fundamentally appealing to the mean-spirited Puritan instinct.

From the pork barrel spending to prison tax revenue for communities to the recycling of enforcement imagery as entertainment on TV, the drug war has become inseperable from our much-vaunted "way of life."

We need to kick that bloody habit.

[amazona]

30. they had better precursors in the 70s

I used to be friends with a manufacturer in the 70s and they really had access to better quality precursors then. Some of his product was actually manufactured in the science lab of a well-known university but I won't say where.

When the feds got on a roll of making the good quality precursors illegal and chemists had to look for alternative methods to create product, then yeah OK they did have to start looking around for what chemicals they could actually buy without getting arrested.

So making precursors illegal ended up making the process of manufacturing meth a more difficult process with more steps and forcing them to start with crap like brake fluid. I don't think the intent of the manufacturer is to make people sick. Hell, many manufacturers use the drug themselves. A bit unfair to scold people for using brake fluid when the feds created the situation themselves in their war on chemicals.

Now they even want to put allergy medicine users on a damn list and subject us to harassment, all in the name of fighting meth. It's an endless circle. You can't put the toothpaste back in the tube. There will always be some demand for a drug that lets you get by on less sleep.

[WCGreen]

11. I had posted this article over in the lounge....

Thinking to get a rise out of people about the draconian way they go after pot vs. the helpless war that is being waged against Meth....

I'm glas you posted it here. I was going to when I got up later and now I see I don't have to...

One poster over there XMAS74, pointed out that the job market is so sparce in the Rural areas that these folks wind into doing crank, at first, to keep up with the two or three min wage jobs they need just to keep from going under.....

[fasttense]

13. Very good point WCGreen.

I live in a rural area and most people have two jobs (that means a family of two adults will have four jobs) to make ends meet. I never thought they would use drugs to get them through but I can understand it. We have a very bad meth lab problem with people's houses blowing up and catching fire because of them. I wonder if the illicit and destructive drug usage goes up when the economy is worse? Of course the bogus economy numbers being published by this administration makes it difficult to judge.

[DeepModem Mom]

18. Post #4 expresses similar, WCGreen -- I think it's very likely...

that there is a connection between economics and the use of this drug.

[NicoleM]

16. People suck.

Those poor kids. :(

[MadHound]

20. Another arguement as to why we should legalize meth and all other drugs

Meth users are cooking up meth in their houses, around their children. Legalize the shit, and leave the manufacturing to those who have the knowledge and facilities to do it safely.

In addition, as it has been shown time and again, after the initial euphoric rise in usage, when you legalize a drug, any drug, the usage and abuse rates drop significantly. Again, legalize the shit, and the children will be the benaficiaries.

If we legalize meth will child abuse occur? Sure, just like child abuse happens with alcoholic parents and any other group of substance abusers. But with the labs and toxic chemicals out of the house, and with fewer meth heads getting into the life, overall children will benefit greatly if meth is legalized. For those children that will still be abused under legalized meth, we will still have the same tools that we use with the abused children of alcoholic parents.

This War on Drugs is doing more harm than good. It is time to legalize all drugs, and stop the wave of secondary side effects that are plaguing our society.

[Enraged_Ape]

41. So if you legalize it, how will you stop "home manufacture"?

Didn't really think that one through, did you?

[MissB]

22. Apparently, more than half of the kids in this state's

foster system are directly linked to parental meth abuse. More than half.

A sixteen month old child was found wandering by a busy street last week. Not surprisingly, both parents were found sleeping off a meth binge.

[DS1]

23. Meth-heads are the scum of the earth

If you're snorting cooked drano and other household cleaners you need to be locked up and rehabilitated.

[Gregorian]

26. Bush supporters are scum of the earth.

Meth freaks are immature, addicted, needy people who don't fully realize what they're doing. Bush supporters are greedy, selfish, and aware of the damage they cause, but have just convinced themselves that it's ok. Meth freaks probably care. Bush supporters don't give a rat's ass.

At least that's my experience with it.

edit- In fact, I'd go so far as to say that meth freaks might be freaks because of Republican agendas, whereas Republicans (god I hate capitalizing that word. haha) aren't suffering at all.

[Kraklen]

29. I disagree.

Meth addicts are sick. The scum of the earth are the people who refuse to reevaluate terrible drug policies. If people had access to clean meth there would be a fraction of these problems.

Did you really think before you posted that?

[Gregorian]

25. This sounds so tame compared to what Iraqi kids must be going through.

Why not focus on them. No, they don't count. But let's count- how many meth-kids are there? Now how many Iraqi kids died or have suffered severely due to deplete uranium, or just sanctions, or maybe cluster bombs? And what about Darfur? Or kids that are in Mugabe's "training camps"? Why does America have it's head up it's own butt? Why can't America see beyond it's own selfish borders? No, meth-kids isn't acceptable. But can we focus on the world, not just American trailer trash?

[BronxBoy]

39. OK I'll bite........

This is sarcasm right? Do you have any idea how many kids in this country are having their lives destroyed or inexorably altered because of parents with addiction? And not just because of so-called "illegal drugs either. Why can't we worry about ALL children? While your point about the plight of children of other children around the world has merit, your racist comment about American trailer trash sort of undermines it for me. And this is coming from a Black man who probably has very little in common with the subjects of the OP except one. During Reagan's tenure in the eighties when crack was decimating minority neighborhoods, was your attitude, "let's worry more about the children in San Salvador and Nicaragua and less on those dumb American niggers"?

I would suggest that maybe it's you who should pull said head out of said ass. Talk to some of the people on this thread who quite evidently know something about the ravages of addiction and ask them about the horrors they have seen innocent children go through.

And then answer this question, Why should the circumstances of a child born to drug addicted parents be minimized because he is the child of fucked up parents who happen to lived in a fucked up country?

I happen to think that it's precisely because this country doesn't care about our own kids that there is so much apathy regarding the horrors faced by children who don't live on our shores

Peace

[sweetheart]

28. More casualties of the drugs laws

For every death and child abused, they should try the legislators
in the congress for negligent criminality in conspiring to create
a law to kill someone. The kids are a sad fact of the drugs laws,
and meth is just the latest in a long line of cheap powerful drugs
to circumvent prohibition.

"Prohibition favours more concentrated drugs." They are easier to
smuggle and manage when they are more concentrated... so the laws
themselves make it easier to traffic meth than cannabis, as by weight,
one is a much more serious profit.

How tragic, that a bunch of wankers in government are so incredibly
incredibly stupid. They make laws to kill and destroy people and
then expect to be PAID for it... it defies comprehension these
drugs warrior scum.

[Vuem]

35. Don't be fooled by the whole 'IT'S THE NEW CRACK! AHHHH" Bullshit

Speaking from personal experience, I know meth users who've done so for well over 10 years, maintaining employment and otherwise productive lives, not binging, not exhibiting wild, unpredictable behavior. Some get busted, some don't.

Then again, I've seen people as described in the links given above, and people effected in a relatively short time in a very bad way. These people tended to show tendencies towards this before they ever took up the drug.

All in all, rather like any other addictive drug ever encountered by man. This comes from on-the-street, up close and personal observations over several years in and around the Bay Area in CA, from a patrolman's pespective, so your mileage may vary, but likely not by much.

I see this as another attempt by those looking to keep their jobs at creating a new Tarbaby, something that suckers people in and keeps the money flowing until the next scare can come along.

IOW, a waste of everyone's time.

[ernstbass]

37. And we keep incarcerating people for pot

what a crazy country we live in.

[Enraged_Ape]

42. In my opinion, crystal meth is like child porn

One of those things that's so hideous, so absolutely disgusting that it needs to be stamped out wherever it should appear. It is easily as destructive to society.

It never fails to amaze me how many people on this board will stick up for, of all things, crystal freaking meth. But then, there will always be some a*holes who will go to bat for child porn, too, I guess.