A reader writes:
Back in 2006, I was a staff counsel to the House subcommittee with chief oversight responsibility for federal anti-drug efforts. I have since decided that the War on Drugs is a comprehensive failure and a disaster for the rule of law. Nevertheless, your reader is wrong to say that "the GOP and 'tough on drugs' moralists still demonize all drug use as a black or gay inner-city problem that occasionally seeps into suburbia."
Pretty much all of the federal efforts against meth were initiated by the Republican Congress through earmarks, because Bush's drug czar, John Walters, was obsessed with marijuana as the "gateway drug," and he showed little enthusiasm for fighting meth. Democrats AND Republicans in Congress rightly had a very low opinion of Walters and his office, and my experience there--which included organizing field hearings on meth in white, rural locations--indicated that the congressional GOP largely understood the meth problem pretty well.
And by the way, a distinction should be made between meth and crystal meth. The latter is a much more potent and poisonous form manufactured in Mexico. Crystal meth has become a much worse problem here since the federal government made it much more difficult for "mom-n-pop" labs in the U.S. to operate, thanks to tight restrictions on the sale of pseudoephedrines. The Mexicans just picked up the slack.