[eno_]

Of course, if the Drug War were ended, it would be cheaper than soda pop, and there would be no meth-related property crime.

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[waxhaw]

You have to read through most of this article to get to the root of the problem - "... the dealers are often Mexican migrant workers, many of them illegal immigrants...". Of course, the article listed by name those relatively few non-illegal-immigrant meth users/dealers. This problem is growing across rural America - everywhere there are large numbers of settled illegal immigrant Hispanics. But I'm not surprised the NYT wrote the article in such a way as to avoid mentioning the huge role illegal immigrants have played in the drug trade.

[farmfriend]

Rights, farms, environment ping.

Let me know if you wish to be added or removed from this list.
I don't get offended if you want to be removed.

[woofer]

and one of the drug's main ingredients — anhydrous ammonia — is an agricultural fertilizer that lies about in abundant supply in bags on isolated farm fields,

Actually, Anhydrous Ammonia is a low grade refrigerant and is applied in a semi-liquid/gaseous form from a pressure tank, not from bags as a solid. There is a BIG problem with the meth "chemist" trying to collect some by stealing it from the tank wagons. The lucky ones don't get frostbit hands.

Just before Christmas, I worked at a anhydrous ammonia compressing terminus in central Iowa. The maintenance guy related how the product shipped in a pipeline from the Gulf to Iowa and their station was the end of the line. The pressure on the pipeline is about 200 psi. Some meth geniuses decided to put a spigot on the pipeline down the road a ways. He said they found four bodies, a hammer and a punch at the line puncture site when they responded to leak in the morning.

[IronJack]

I've been hearing this same story for 25 years. The Midwest is to meth what the Golden Triangle is to opium. The story gets resurrected about every 5 to 10 years, I suspect in an effort to get more federal drug suppression money or to prove to the coastal sophisticates that we here in flyover country are urbane enough to have our own drug problems.

[RonHolzwarth]

re: "Meth is the single most serious law enforcement issue that North Dakota is facing, and has ever faced," said Wayne Stenehjem, the state attorney general.

To the experts, methamphetamine is both a symptom of rural decline, as people give up on faltering farms and factories, and a cause that makes the decline worse."

---

I think that the ONLY solution to the drug problem is to discover WHY people are looking for ways to escape the distasteful reality of their daily lives by self medicating with harmful drugs.

If the money now spent on law enforcement were INSTEAD spent on psychiatric studies to determine the WHY, and to provide opportunities for people who chose to use such harmful substances, the price of drugs would drop, and hopefully demand would also decline.

There are those in the medical field who believe that for many drug users, self medication is a symptom of other problems. Around this core group, are others who do it also, because they think it's fun, they have nothing else to do, and they want to fit in.

Chasing rats is an endless game!

To get rid of rats, you need to discover the WHY!

Is it food? Remove the food, and the rats will no longer be around.

Is it because there is nothing else to do? Then, subsidize exciting and healthy opportunities for young people.

Paying the law enforcement industry to chase the rats away is just not gonna work.

The rats will just run somewhere else.

[oceanperch]

It has reared it's ugley face here in Lincoln County Oregon. The lil town of Siletz is just about all tweakers.

I saw what crystal meth did in Cali back in the 80's.

Now it is here and it is not the same stuff from the 80's this stuff is cold tabs and poisons mixed.

Pure crap. Burglaries are almost nightly in our town of 10,000.

Just tonight a stolen car was found trashed in Siletz and last week there was a stand off between a tweak and the Police. They took him down non lethal.

I have had to control my Manic brain for most of my life I cannot for the life of me understand why the hell someone would induce this illness with drugs. The druggies are worse as in they are criminal and get psychotic.

My friend owns a RV/Store down the road and says the last year they stop in the store all the time.

They think no one can tell they are druggies. Oily Hair, sores all over their face and odd behaviour.

Ticks me off I work so hard to not be hyper and compulsive and lead good lives and then these idiots choose to live with their brains all screwed up and become drains on society.

What do you see in the headlines, health concerns over fat folks and smokers. Meanwhile the self induced nuts are running free to steal from others and commit violent act.

Thanks for posting this sarcasm the word needs to get out.

The police can't do a thing either untill a crime is committed.

[uglybiker]

You sure Wyoming's such a great place? ;-)

[oceanperch]

This article deserves a day shift bump.

For all those who have had to deal with these creeps or had to deal with unknown theivery.

I use to go grocery shopping in town (been here 14yrs.) and shop at 2:00 in the morning usaully after being out on a road trip and going home since KV would be up and in his wheelchair and knowing he would be to worn out the next day. Or if I had been working hard and tired not in the mood to socialize with the day people which usaully includes kids crying and running into folks who want to chit chat with my undivided attention.

Well no more will I shop at night as the nuts come out and I just get this creepy feeling. Give me the chit chatters and crying babies anytime over tweakers.