Remember that time Gov. Reubin Askew called a special session of the Florida Legislature because we were killing our children in the dark?
Apparently nobody else does either.
It was in the winter of 1974, and America had just launched a two-year experiment of observing permanent Daylight Savings Time.
The ostensible justification being to save energy, this following the Arab oil embargo.
Within weeks of implemention, eight children making their way to school in winter morning darkness were run down and killed by sleepy-eyed drivers.
And that was just in Florida.
Any savings made as a result of year-around DST is “small indeed when compared to the life of a single child,” Askew said, demanding an immediate return to Eastern Standard Time.
Which statement put Askew firmly in the category of Last Century American Politician.
Twenty First Century America Politicians are much more accepting of the occasional ritual child sacrifice in service of the Greater Good.
How else to explain the body politic’s indifference toward school shooting after school shooting because…gun rights?
But back to those dead Florida children.
With early morning child fatalities occurring across the U.S., Congress quickly put a stop to the Permanent Daylight Savings Time Experiment.
Which was, again, a last century example of politicians owning up and saying “Oops! Never mind.”
But never mind that either. Here we are half a century later and, once again, ready to embrace permanent Daylight Savings Time and all that it entails.
Yet again in response to a national crisis.
Not an energy crisis this time, the Strait of Hormuz notwithstanding.
No, the crisis is 21st Century politicians concluding that having to reset clocks twice a year is simply too onerous a burden to impose on already fragile and stressed Americans,
And never mind that most clock resetting these days is handled by our computers.
“People are sick and tired of having to change their clocks twice a year,” decreed our Great Orange Cheeto. “It is foolish, inconvenient and, in some cases, very costly.”
The stampede back to permanent DST seems unstoppable at this point.
But let’s not fool ourselves.
We know that the sun doesn’t give a fig about how we mere mortals choose to mark the passage of time.
And we know what’s going to happen when we relieve Americans of the onerous burden of having to reset their clocks twice a year.
We know because we’ve been there and we’ve done that.
We are going to kill more of our children in the darkness.
Just like we did in 1974.
Reubin Askew was right. The convenience of never having to reset clocks again isn’t worth “the life of a even a single child.”
But Reubin Askew was a Last Century Politician.
Who simply didn’t understand that the occasional ritual child sacrifice is necessary in the service of a Greater Good.
