In America this attitude (of seeing successful drug lords as talented entrepreneurs) has a long history, going back to early English colonization efforts. The E

In America this attitude (of seeing successful drug lords as talented entrepreneurs) has a long history, going back to early English colonization efforts. The English "settlers" in what is now Virginia were aspirational freebooters, hoping to follow in the footsteps of Cortez. When that failed hard, they eventually became what we would now call 'drug lords', with tobacco as their product of choice.