As the day approaches, John Miller has a righteous rant against the stupidity that is Daylight "Saving" Time.

It's actually only "Saving", not "Savings".

I don't have too many strong opinions on it one way or t'other, but I must admit that I'm not sure that I'd be too keen on the sun coming up at 4:30 in the morning as June 21 approaches, either. I guess the farther North you are, the more it makes a difference, but for Central American countries, you always have 11-13 hours of sun per day, no matter the time of year, so DST makes no functional sense whatsoever.

I like DST/BST(as it is here) - I would rather, in this age of electric lights we stuck with one though. The problem isn't Daylights Savings Time, it's, as the NRO author points out, the change that's the problem.

It drives my wife insane as she comes from a sub-tropical lattitude where the sun rises and sets within an hour of 6 all year round. In summer I like the long long evenings and watching the sun finally set over a cold drink around 10ish suits me perfectly.

In winter I'm going to be heading to work in the dark and heading home in the dark and the complaints of a small number of mostly Scottish farmers doesn't really worry me.

John Miller cites Stanley Coren.

I can heartily recommend Coren's book "Sleep Thieves." It describes in detail the consequences of sleep deprivation. One of the first things to go is clear, rational, independent thinking.

I don't care much for DST either. I can schedule my major outdoor activity -- a six mile run -- almost anytime.

In the UK, it does actually seem to do something. Many decades ago now, they tried staying on summer time year round.

That had the unexpected effect that most people commuting to work never got to see the sun the whole day (it came up after they arrived at work, and went down before they went home.) That helped screw peoples body clocks up, and I think the accident rate measurably went up.

Admittedly, the UK is a lot further north than even a lot of Canadian cities, and there are some geographical complications (the country leans NW/SE, so covers a significant fraction of a timezone- contrary to what you would expect from most maps.)

Still, as ridiculous as it seems, the far northern parts of America doubtless benefit greatly from the practice- even in the UK, some parts of the country benefit more than others.