Drinking Age Creating Lack of Respect for Law

I believe the federal drinking age of 21 is damaging to the morality of young people because unreasonable laws cause disrespect for the law in general. My suspicions of this were confirmed by the revelation of the large-scale use of fake IDs (“Cat-and-Mouse Game Gets Tougher,” Nov. 21).

The drinking age should be lowered to 18--the same age when kids can leave home, vote, join the military, etc. It’s ironic that, despite having such a low drinking age, we suffer from more teenage drinking problems than other countries where teenage drinking is legal. I have two sons, 11 and 14, and I have difficulty explaining why 18-year-olds can drink in Mexico and Europe but not here. I am not sure what I am going to tell them to do when they reach 18--perhaps they should move to Europe for greater freedom.

JOHN RETTIE

Santa Barbara