Keep the government out of my light

One of my very best friends from high school sent me an interesting, though a bit long,
article about light pollution. I definitely agree with their idea of encouraging people/institutions to adjust their outdoor lighting to promote less light pollution, particularly after taking an astronomy class my freshman year at Brown and having to strain our eyes to find the big dipper through the Providence lights... but do they really need the government to become more involved? It seems to be clear that the benefits are for us scientists and star-enjoyers as well as the light-fixture "up-keepers", as these improved lights use much less energy and perform just as well, if not better than the old alternatives. I think their money would be better spent simply educating people who install outdoor light fixtures rather than letting our government, who has already shown themselves incompetent in oh-so-many-ways (no child left behind as only one recent example), stick another foot into our business. If it really saves money, light providers should need no government enforcement, it's just a smarter solution!

It seems funny to me that so often when the government screws up, people seem to be right ready to let them do something else to "fix" their mistakes. I say, if they can't fly the plane, quit riding with them!

On an unrelated note, there is a quite interesting correlation pointed out between breast-cancer and employees who take night-shifts. Apparently, messing with ones' (is that wrong to pluralize one?) circadian rhythm can affect amounts of what is normally produced during sleep- in this case, melatonin. However, could there also be a confounding variable of lower-income employees who are willing to take night shifts?

I can't help but point out, though, that if their findings are correct, this is just one more example of how amazing and ahead of his time Joseph Smith was. (Doctrine & Covenants 88:124) I guess he did have quite a bit of help from above though, eh?