Good Morning Gentle Readers,
The Los Angeles Times asked: Daylight saving time: What if it's all a big fat waste of time?
There isn't any question that DST *is* absolutely a big fat waste of time. Americans do not use electricity in the same way they did when I was a kid. Flat screen TV's have replaced low energy AM radios, and televisions never rest, blaring day and night, often competing for our attention from several different rooms in the house.
In 1950, windows were kept open, or closed, as a hedge against the oppressive summer heat and humidity. Today, air conditioning use is connected to temperature and controlled by thermostat, and it doesn't shut off because it's still daylight at 8:00 at night. Incandescent bulbs, radio tubes, and electric fans are orders of magnitude less energy intensive than a/c and plasma screens. Whatever time the sun sets on modern America is only nominally related to energy consumption.
SIDEBAR: This is TWC's favorite antique clock. In the days of my vagrant yoot there was one just like this hanging on the wall of the Yucca Cafe (incorporated December 2, 1954), just east of the railroad tracks, in Lungcancer, Ca. Though it served a lot of cheeseburgers (dill pickle on the side with a bag of chips), the last I looked it was a dirt bike shop specializing in Kawasakis.
Seven years ago, GWB and the GOP CONgress inflicted DST upon us for several additional weeks, which begins this morning and stretches until early November. Come Monday morning, it will be pitch black when I drag my kids off to school at 6:45 AM. If one needs a flashlight to find the truck, will the sun ever come up in Seattle?
Like everything else about DC, the illusion of doing *something* about any given problem is the entire point. Whether the problem is resolved, or not, is immaterial. And so it is that we are stuck with a dinosaur, the albatross of DST, which outlived its usefulness many decades ago, yet it affects a greater portion of our lives than it ever has. That is how politcos think, my friends.
As Ever,
TWC
Tip of the glass to Steve V