Meth Podcast

I just listened to the podcast of Justice Talking's episode, "Is Crystal Meth the New Crack? (released Nov. 20, 2006). A summary of the different segments is on the show's webpage, so you don't have to commit to the whole program (but I thought the whole thing was interesting).

Methamphetamine has a wide impact: health, violence, identity theft, ordinary theft, children in foster care (someone cited an amazingly high percentage of cases where a parent was a meth user).

In one segment, two speakers debated whether meth is a national epidemic. Joe Dunn, the legislative director from the National Association of Counties (NACo) said yes. Ryan King, a policy analyst for the Sentencing Project said that characterizing it that way skews national drug policy.

Mr. King is the author of The Next Big Thing? Methamphetamine in the United States (June 2006). NACo has a Meth Action Clearinghouse.