Senate Vote Unanimous, But Michigan’s History With Daylight Saving Is Ridiculous
There's a quote that's attributed to several people, but it goes “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”. Looking around us we see that everywhere. While many places we do see that playing out are life and death examples, one that isn't directly is what the United State Senate did on Tuesday. They voted unanimously to put the United State all on Daylight Saving Time.
The Senate doesn't agree on anything. There's always at least one vote against for just about anything that comes before that august body. But here's something else that make little sense: They did the same thing some fifty years ago, and when it was deemed a failure, they repealed it. The dirty little secret is, many of those legislators have been around long enough to have live through that, if not already be seated in the Senate.
Every time we do it, we end up repealing it
Ben Franklin gets credit for inventing it, but he was only joking. The first use of daylight saving time was in 1916 by the Germans in World War I, but the United States picked up on it in 1918, and it promptly lasted....wait for it: Seven months.
We did it again during WWII as "War Time". Time regulation picked up in 1966, but we got it again in January 1974 during the Arab Oil Embargo. The idea was more daylight would save energy. It failed miserably and Grand Rapid's own Gerald Ford signed the repeal just ten months after it started.
And here's something I didn't know: Michigan rebelled against the country and didn't do DST when Congress voted it in, in 1966, but then a public referendum finally gave us DST in 1972.
In the spirit of we can't agree on anything, it appears 28 states want to get rid of Daylight Saving Time.
There is no bigger fan of Daylight Saving Time than me, but the current system seems to work pretty good and why are we trying to screw it up? The daylight is much more precious in the summer months and Standard Time gives us a little more daylight in the winter months, which is a nice compromise. It give some extra daylight for kids standing at bus stops in the morning, and makes them a little more visible to drivers
The argument about losing an hour of sleep seems self-indulgent at best. Most people recover in a day or two. If it would help, do the time change early Saturday morning, and then you have two days to adjust, unless you work weekends.
If you're are tired that we can't agree on anything, maybe this is an example of "careful what you wish for".