Close readers of this blog my note that I have not written in a while. Sorry about that. Just busy with my day job and personal life.
I’m being prompted back to life by the helpful staff of some legislators in Ohio. As is my custom, when I can’t testify in person and instead am required to submit written testimony, I just write it up and put it here on my blog.
I also try not to just repeat the same thing in every state. I’ve seen that done, and people can really tell.
OK, here goes:
<clears throat>
Photo by Benjamin Suter on Unsplash
Dear members of the State and Local Government Committee,
Many of you were in the legislature just two years ago when Ohio passed a resolution that was essentially similar to this. And you may be asking why we are back doing this again?
Fair question. Let me answer with an analogy:
When you were a kid, did you ever ask a parent for, say, some ice cream? And they said no, but when you asked a second time they said yes?
Same kind of thing here. Congress has the power to give America some ice cream in the form of no longer needing to change the clock twice per year. They didn’t give it to us in the last session, so now we are back, and we want that ice cream.
Of course, this is ice cream that comes with a benefit of saving lives. You may remember all the stats from last time, and the research done since then makes it even more clear: The “Spring Forward” time change is deadly. Heart attacks, strokes, car accidents, the whole list. The research that has come out in the last two years is that deaths and hospitalizations for just about every cause go up as a direct result of the government stealing an hour of sleep from the whole population one weekend in March.
So, yes, this is a good thing to do. Saves lives. Makes people happy. And everyone wants it. A recent national poll shows 68 percent approval for passing a bill to #LockTheClock. Only 14 percent opposed.
And now, if I might… a quick personal appeal:
That poll showed wide approval for this change to the law, and the numbers were almost identical among people of both parties.
Also, this issue is blessedly bi-partisan. Washington and Delaware have passed bills, as have Wyoming and Arkansas. Sponsors of the current federal bill include Marco Rubio of Florida and Ed Markey of Massachusetts.
In most states, the bills that I see do well have broad bipartisan support.
This resolution, however, looks like it has only Republican cosponsors.
Really?
I want this resolution to pass, sure, but what I want even more is for our country to heal. To do that, we need to find some common ground and work from there.
This issue is that common ground. There is simply no spin that can turn this into a conservative or liberal issue. Even Donald Trump and Elizabeth Warren said they want to #LockTheClock.
So I’m directly challenging every single one of the co-sponsors to go out and recruit one Democratic co-sponsor. If you can’t work together on this, what can you work together on?