Twits?????

It was somewhat disturbing when I read yesterday that a frequent question on Twitter during the day had been, "Who is Rodney King?"

The old adage is that those who don't know history are apt to repeat it. Sometimes we all should revisit another from 20 years ago, "Can't we all just get along?"

It's sad when knowledge of people and past messages get lost over time.

And it has nothing to do with education. Younger, reasonably intelligent people with greater knowledge of more current happenings often don't have the attention span to catch to those things that happened before their birth.

In recent years, I ran into our lunchroom here at the newspaper office to inform co-workers the identity of Bob Woodward's source "Deep Throat" had finally been revealed.

"Who's Deep Throat?" asked a young journalist. This was the same young woman who said she never had watched Seinfeld because it had been "before my time," and repeats held no interest for her.

There was no use suggesting she sometime watch M*A*S*H -- which was really before my time but proved great entertainment through reruns in adolescence.

This week, the great Paul McCartney turns 70 -- and I understand there are people out there who don't know who he is. If you're one of them, I'll just tell you he's one really cool old dude.

I also read that many young people didn't realize the sinking of the Titanic was real -- that it was just a movie. That is being stupid.

I strongly encourage you if you hear of somebody or something you don't know, just Google it. Care. Pay attention. Don't be a twit.