Op-Ed: Bush`s Plan to Help Fight Meth is Hogwash

In February, the Bush/Cheney team released its proposed budget for the 2007 fiscal year, which cut more than $1.1 billion from core local law enforcement programs, eliminating any chance of helping the meth problem, is anyone still buying this?

(SALEM) - Ask any Oregon cop who works in drug enforcement how much the federal government has been helping them out in the last few years in their fight against meth. There have been some grants, but instead of helping, the administration has stripped away the funding from local police and that is the last thing they need.

Until recently, the administration paid little heed to the growing meth epidemic that for too long, has grown by the minute. Don`t think that federal apathy didn`t make things harder for police, families and a long list of others who deal with the fallout of meth on a daily basis.

The Bush administration`s reductions in law enforcement funding sits badly with Oregon State Police Superintendent Ronald C. Ruecker, who visited Washington D.C. in March 2006 with 100 other police chiefs from around the nation to protest the cuts. "The administration gutted funding for tried and true programs that I count on to keep our communities safe," said Ruecker. "These cuts really affect Oregon communities."

It isn`t just police who are working at double time with diminishing federal support.

Last year, the Bush administration decided to start taxing volunteer firefighters, who barely make enough to purchase a new set of boots every year, and that is no joke. The people who lay their life on the line in rural communities like Silverton and Dallas now have to pay to give. It is nothing new, Bush and Cheney have been gutting and reducing funding for local and state law enforcement for years, and that stripping of essential money accelerated under `Homeland Security" right here in Oregon.

The irony of it all is Bush creating more federal agencies while taking away from established local programs.

Last week a suicidal man from California was speeding in southern Oregon. Motorists called him in; and the nearest troopers were 75 miles and 40 miles away in opposite directions. Sleeping small town policemen were rose from bed to aid the troopers and the man was brought in alive. This is the reality of your state.

`Me, mine, and more" should be the credo of Bush`s team as they bring America to its very knees, claiming to help as they use their ultimate power to take through deceit and corruption. It would not have taken that much from this pair of supreme-court elected leaders to improve things for us in some measurable way.

Then there are those days in the backwoods of east Marion County when it would seem Bonnie and Clyde were in town; deputies everywhere chasing suspects through farm fields and down country roads, the suspects getting away more often than not simply because they know the back roads better than the officers chasing them.

If the federal government wanted to help us fight crime, they would provide the tools for our police to do so. Military helicopters wouldn`t sit by the thousand in mothball status; they would be refurbished and provided to agencies that could use them effectively in a post military role.

What they want to do is take your rights away, and Bush`s idea of fighting meth is random drug testing in schools. Their false ambitions may be nearing the end, because people are finally figuring it out. We now must prepare for all the years ahead when we try, if we are lucky, to fix and repair the damage here and abroad caused by the years Bush has been in office.

The drug epidemic is naturally stimulated by the social and political unrest. Poor people seek cheap thrills because their options are limited. Electing a cabinet that truly cares about helping people and saving them from financial despair and ruin is the only hope.

It is a shame that they have gotten this far, double speaking every step of the way, waving flags and yanking on people`s emotions and chains to gain or falsify in some cases, support and elections that have taken them to the farthest mark in their political rampage through a once peaceful nation and world.

They have your country on a destruction course on a number of levels and more people need to start paying attention to it.

The seeming insanity of this war, oil and money driven administration is not a fair reflection of political conservatives and that is evidenced all over American as Republicans place distance between themselves and the current administration`s loyalties, the least of which seem to benefit the people of our great nation.

In fact, let`s back up a couple of decades and trace the actual source of the methamphetamine problem. Meth used to be a product that made certain motorcycle clubs large amounts of capital, it used to be a pharmaceutical product that had ingredients approved by the FDA. Often called crank because bikers used to actually split the engines on their Harleys and put their stash inside the crankcase, hence the nickname.

One of the ingredients in the Methamphetamine that was used for dieting purposes by housewives in the 1960`s was Phenol 2 Propane, and the FDA banned that ingredient in 1983. That is when meth went underground and then re-emerged as a toxic chemical containing lovely ingredients like Drano, lye and Red Phosphorous. Thanks Uncle Sam, great move. Lawmakers like Darlene Hooley who has already voiced concerns over the lack of money tied to the new federal anti-meth plan, need to do what they can to stop this nonsense in its tracks. Taking law enforcement money while claiming they will help the problem equates to more distractions and more lies.

As a nation, we have many problems related to meth that are not addressed adequately in spite of the best efforts. Meth is rolling up and down the Interstate and if traffic crossing the borders north and south was checked adequately, and that is time intensive, the problem could be controlled.

But our nation is apparently more worried about stopping people from crossing the border, than stopping meth. Dogs can smell marijuana, a natural plant that the feds aggressively arrest and convict people for possessing. Why on earth aren`t they developing newer methamphetamine detection equipment to stop it from entering in the first place?

In Bush`s new plan, they want to increase random drug testing of our children in school. Then the kids can be busted, receive a record, and never receive a college loan from the government.

Then those kids can all turn to meth and be a real joy for all of us to deal with some day. Our national policies have never been so far off track.

OSP`s Ronald Ruecker says these cuts continue a disturbing trend by both the administration and Congress of significantly slashing funding for state and local enforcement programs while at the same time demanding that they play a larger role in protecting the homeland. The budget cuts bring the funding for these programs to a 10-year low.