DRUNKEN DRIVING

Kudos to the president for taking on the alcohol and restuarant
industries, killers of the dream of a national 0.08% blood-alcohol
concentration to determine drunken driving. "Clinton Calls for
Stricter Law on Drunken Driving" (Dec. 27) correctly focused on "the
most frequently committed violent crime in America," an observation
long made by impaired-driving preventionists.

But now that Dr. Ricardo Martinez, administrator of the National
Highway Traffic Safety Administration, is calling driving under the
influence a "violent crime," perhaps the House of Representatives will
stop taking the side of the booze merchants and pass the 0.08% limit,
a moderate standard that is now law in 16 states and the District of
Columbia, including California.

It is high time our federal representatives took the high ground on
the No. 1 killer of young Americans in the 15-to-24 age category:
traffic crashes involving alcoholic beverages, chiefly beer.

RAY CHAVIRA, Member, L.A. County Commission on Alcoholism, Palmdale