A Fond Farewell to the Incandescent Light Bulb (and the jobs it created)

What is the quintessential symbol for a great idea? Or enlightenment? Or discovery?
It's the light bulb that flashes on above someone's head! Now, thanks to the Nanny Staters in Congress, that symbol may be short lived.

WINCHESTER, VA. - The last major GE factory making ordinary incandescent light bulbs in the United States is closing this month, marking a small, sad exit for a product and company that can trace their roots to Thomas Alva Edison's innovations in the 1870s.
The remaining 200 workers at the plant here will lose their jobs

What ever happened to being "pro choice"? When the Compact Fluorescent Lamps first came out, I bought a number of them, buoyed by the promise of long life and energy savings. It was my choice. I didn't need the government to make the cost/benefit decision for me, I made my own. Later, after having witnessed the built in ballast of one of these lamps short out, (you could tell that a lot of the "magic smoke" had gotten out) I decided that these were not the sort of bulbs I wanted to put in lamps on timers that might come on (and possibly short out) while I was away.

I still use a mixture of incandescent and CFLs, but it's my choice. Thanks to the Nanny State Congress, in just a few short years we will no longer have that choice.

The government that apparently knows best how many gallons of water (but not how many times) it takes to flush your toilets, has decided what consumer products you ought to buy. In the above scenario, if Mr. Edison's invention malfunctioned while I was away, I simply unscrew it, replace it with another and throw the old one in the trash. But, at least it was not as likely to burn my house down!

Disposal of these toxic marvels is a wonder to behold. Maybe the government could issue everyone a Hazmat suit for changing and disposing of old CFLs?

In the meantime, I'm with Rush on this one. I have a small stockpile of incandescent bulbs which they will have to pry from my "cold dead fingers"!

My sympathies to the 200 who are losing their jobs. Obama promised you "change". Welcome to Obama's new "Hooverville". Two hundred more jobs lost because of the actions of a Democrat controlled Congress.

Cross posted at Left Coast Rebel, Lady Cincinnatus, Say Anything