One thing I see in all of this is a slight misue or miunderstanding of some terms.

DRAG- This funny named thing comes in 2 forms!

1. Surface Drag, aka Form Drag is the drag caused by the resistance of the airplane by the air while in flight. Think of it as trying to push a stop sign in heavy wind. If you stand it up with the STOP logo to the wind the air pushes on a larger surface and tries to push it backwards. If you turn the sign on its side, the drag decreases signifigantly due to less surface area. A simple and rough formula is that as speed doubles, surface drag quadruples.

2 INDUCED DRAG - This type of drag is a BYPRODUCT of lift!! Imagine an aerofoil in level flight. Now most wings in LEVEL flight will have a small degree of what is known as an ANGLE OF ATTACK. This roughly means the difference between the chord line of the wing and the actual flight of the aircraft. If you have ever seen an f-16 do a REALLY slow flyby you see an airplane traveling FORWARD but with its wings pointed in a VERY HIGH Angle! That angle is called the angle of attack!
NOW, let us use that F16 example. The Actual LIFT on the wing is NOT Directly Vertical!! The wing is creating enough lift in an upward moment to keep the airplane airborne. BUT, LIFT IS ALWAYS MADE PERPINDICULAR TO THE CHORD OF THE WING! With this in mind the High Angle of Attack the F16 is using has a LARGE amount of the Lift Actually going BACKWARDS to the Direction of flight. That amount of lift that is causing the wing to generate a motion OPPOSITE to the forward motion of flight is called INDUCED DRAG!

If you don't believe me try this, take your airplane up to altitude and SLOW the airplane down. You will reach a point to where if you PITCH the airplane to a higher angle, all you will do is to slow the airplane more! In this area POWER is needed to maintain altitude!
Ask ANY full scale pilot if this true and EVERY one will tell you YES!!! This is trained to ALL full scale pilots from hour 1!!!

Lift and drag, and the relation of the 2 can be a VERY complicated matter indeed! Lift can create drag, just as speed can create drag. Confusing, yes. Should it be, No! Because with models these two or important, but not life threatening for the most part.
So relax, and enjoy building and flying models. THERE IS NO WRONG WAY TO DO IT!!! Just have fun and enjoy it!! Even, a TERRIBLE designed airplane should give you an idea of how to make your next one better!!!

Thanks,

Reg