Remember back when Congress decided we needed to muck about with Daylight Savings Time to "save energy"? A lot of us were skeptical about the concept at the time (including the Department of Energy) and couldn't understand how playing even more havoc with nature would help save energy any more than, say, Indiana declaring Pi to be equal to 3 made math any simpler. In both cases, we're dealing with a bunch of legislators trying to look like they're doing something useful, rather than actually attending to the matter at hand, which is more complex than "passing a law to make it look like we're doing something". I know that science is kind of out of favor in Washington these days, and treated kind of like a quaint old cult belief, but --
Well, the early results are in , and as predicted, it hasn't been saving any energy. Turns out that time that you schwerp out of one end of the day just comes back to bite you at the other end. Who woulda thunk it? Daylight really is a finite commodity, and passing laws doesn't make the days longer.
So I have a suggestion. Rather than causing havoc with the country (trust me, I had to make all these silly web sites and computers work after the time change, and I still can't convince my VCR we're in the Midwest), why doesn't congress actually pass some laws that make sense for energy conservation. Heck, a few million more efficient light bulbs and cars might have done a whole lot more good than changing the time I get up in the morning.
I have a modest suggestion. In WWII we asked citizens to sacrifice by not driving, having meatless days, etc. If we're really facing the insurmountable War On Terror issues the White House keeps telling us about, I say we do like I did this morning - Once a week - let's say Tuesday - we all have a Workless Morning. Stay in bed. Leave the furnace turned down. Leave the lights out. Snuggle with your spouse or object of your affection. I've done my bit -- earlier in the year I had a workless 3 months, so consider my carbon footprint to be microscopic. We don't need to freeze in the dark - we can snuggle in the dark under a nice warm comforter.
Now - where's that Nobel Prize?