Pubdate: Wed, 16 Dec 2009 Source: El Paso Times (TX) Copyright: 2009 El Paso Times Contact: http://www.elpasotimes.com/formnewsroom Website: http://www.elpasotimes.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/829 Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/area/Mexico OLD-STYLE METH: CARTEL COOKBOOK FRUSTRATES Stopping the manufacture of illegal chemical drugs is like "squeezing mud," says one author on the subject. This comes amid reports that seizures of drugs show the Mexican cartels are back to making methamphetamine in the style of bathtub chemists some 40 years ago. Take one drug-making ingredient off the shelf and there's a recipe for another way to produce the same thing. In other words, you can burn a marijuana field, but you can't take everything off the store shelves. "Chemical restrictions are like squeezing mud, the stuff just comes out between your fingers," said Steve Preisler, author of "Secrets of Methamphetamine." This is disheartening news; but then so is it disheartening that the U.S. "War on Drugs," instituted in 1969 ... well, so many of the bad guys just keep oozing through law-enforcement's fingers. According to an Associated Press story out of Mexico City, drug cartels took a 34 percent hit on meth between 2006 and 2007. That's when Mexico began restricting sale of pseudoephedrine. Now the cartels are back to what Preisler calls "old school," the way of motorcycle gangs and home producers. It's called P2P. "I used to cook by that route circa 1980," he said. So cut the availability of pseudoephedrine? Well, there's more than one way to cook a drug-enforcement agency's goose. Head toward an accessible market and pick up some phenylacetic acid derivatives -- sodium phenylacetate and 2-phenylacetamide . It's frustrating news that you can still be a drug dealer working out of your bathtub. - --- MAP posted-by: Doug