Oklahoma Permanent Daylight Savings Vote Moves to US Senate

Every March and every November, everyone on Facebook becomes an expert on the subject of time.

Half the country is pressing for more daylight. The other half wants to stop changing the clocks altogether. The old Standard Time vs Daylight Saving Time debate that somehow never dies.

And, here we go again.

The U.S. House of Representatives quickly passed the measure to allow states to opt for permanent Daylight Saving Time late yesterday. It now heads ot the Senate, where, if passed and signed into law by POTUS, it could finally put an end to the twice-a-year clock change in Oklahoma.

If this sounds familiar, it should. We've been here before, and it always gets locked up between the two options.

The problem is that nobody can seem to agree on which clock we should stick to.

Permanent DST, or year-round Standard Time, but here's the funny thing... We've already tried this once.

Why does nobody remember this?

Back in 1974, during the great American energy crisis, the US adopted year-round Daylight Saving Time. Just the same as now, it sounded like a great idea. More wintertime daylight after work. Less energy usage. Everybody wins, right?

Not at all.

The reality of it was that kids were waiting for school buses in complete darkness. Morning commutes happened before sunrise. Every parent hated it, and public opinion flipped around in the first full week. Permanent Daylight Saving Time didn't even last a full year.

While people still loved those longer summer evenings, they weren't nearly as excited about 9 AM sunrises in the middle of winter.

The fact that nobody seems to remember it is our own great American Mandela effect. Why are the Boomers leading the fight for permanent DST? They've done this already.

Personally, I think permanent Standard Time sounds better.

Does that mean sunrise at 4:30 in June and July? Yep... But you're an adult. You can buy shades and curtains.

Then again, it would be a bummer to lose those late summer evenings. Permanent Standard Time would mean summer sunset around 8 PM for most of Oklahoma.

This whole debate proves that people don't actually know what they want, which brings me to my completely unofficial "Everybody Wins" proposal.

Forget picking one side of time, just split the difference.

Let the clock fall back 30 minutes in November and leave it there forever.

I know it sounds ridiculous, but it works.

Best of both worlds.

Nobody gets everything they want, but everybody gets a little. A literal give and take.

How is that not the most reasonable compromise in a debate where both sides have pretty legitimate arguments?

Will it ever happen? No. The half-hour idea is a very North Korean thing, and I'd be willing to be both sides would push back using words like "communists" and "anti-American" like weapons. Still, six of one, half dozen of the other.

After the Senate gets around to passing this DST option for the states, the moment POTUS signs it into law, our friendly ST vs DST conversations will suddenly become debates to the death... Metaphorically speaking.

The fighting has only just begun.