The worst drunks on the road aren't drinking a little; they're drinking a lot. As Fairfax's Commonwealth's Attorney Robert Horan says, On the grand scale of things, (lowering the blood-alcohol level to .08) is monumentally unimportant. It has no effect on the big drinkers, because they are going to keep drinking. It does affect the social drinker.

If drinking under 21 in Virginia is illegal, then why not suspend the driver's license of any under-21er who breathalyzes any alcohol in his (or her) blood? It would make sense. It would get his/her attention about liquor. And (dare one say it?) like parental notification (or consent) for under-18ers getting abortions, it might compel between parent and child a useful dialogue on the matter at hand.

The Assembly should pass drunk-driving laws that will be effective (as opposed to lowering the blood-alcohol level) and will not limit constitutional rights (such as "administrative revocation"). And it should be categorical in punishing under-age drinking -- especially those under-21ers who drink and then get behind the wheel.