(Note: This column originally was written for the Scripps Howard wire. To my knowledge, no newspaper ran it. Maybe there was a reason. Or maybe America just wasn’t ready. Which is my theory. In either case, read for yourself, and enjoy.)

When it comes to drinking in a place where misdemeanor crimes are committed outside in the alley and criminals freely plot felonies atop “Rockford Files” pinball machines, nothing beats a dive bar.

Poll college students and young professionals on their political beliefs and philosophies and you’re sure to get a wide range of preferences. But the one thing they’ll almost all agree on is that there’s no better place to enjoy an adult beverage than a dive.

Why do people love dive bars? What makes them the social glue that binds a generation? And why does every one of these bars have a giant Pabst sign the size of Sammy Sosa’s forehead? Does anyone actually drink Pabst? Or are they now solely a neon-sign manufacturing company?

I headed down to my local dive bar for answers.

My dive is a sports bar.

This is an important distinction because dive bars tend to come in three varieties: sports, townie and biker. If you see a local middle school sports pennant tacked on the wall, you’re in a sports dive. If tourists and/or college students are not welcome, you’re in a townie dive. If the bar has tire marks on the ceiling, you’re in a biker dive.

There are other variations, but these are the main three and they share a host of commonalities.

For instance, all dives smell the same. This is the smell: What if a Camel cigarette drank Budweiser all day, ate nothing but jalapeno poppers, picked a fight with the bouncer and was stomped Joe Pesci “Goodfellas”-style, after which point he was left to die? That’s the smell – the drunken cigarette of death smell.

And dive bars always have pseudo-creepy names like “The Cat’s Eye” or “The Smiling Skull.” The names all have the same subtext: stay away.

The clientele? There’s a certain type of woman who swears by these bars. You’ve met her. She always says, “Me? I ONLY go to dives.” But what she’s really saying is, “I have a phony marketing job, my nails are fake and this isn’t my natural hair color, but my love of dive bars makes me authentic.”

As much as she professes to love dives, you never see her type there – or any female type. That’s because the proper male to female ratio in a dive bar is approximately 12:1. The only excuse for a tighter ratio is if several of the male patrons are jailed simultaneously.

In the grand scheme of things, dive bars are not the unhappiest places in the world. On my list of Most Depressing Places to Drink Legally In Public, dive bars would rank fifth, behind bowling alley bar, mall bar, airport bar and Applebee’s. (This is a topic that will be explored in-depth in a future column. Feel free to send me your thoughts.)

Still, the more depressing the dive bar, the more people love it. But why? Why do we while away the hours in places where you can carve your name in the wall, where fistfights are commonplace and where there is more illicit activity in the bathroom on one Tuesday night than on the average season of “The Shield?” Why do we seek out such a depressing environment in order to have a good time?

I’m not exactly sure, but I think it has something to do with how much we all miss public high school.

I just received an evite to my high school’s 10-year reunion. It’s in August. With a little luck, and just the right break in the GED testing schedule, everyone I enrolled with freshman year will graduate in time for the party. Maybe.

As a result, I’ve been giving high school much thought lately. At odd moments I think of Tater Tots, floor hockey and model U.N assemblies, where the girl who wrote non-linear, non-rhyming poetry was always France. “To be French/To shudder/To laugh like neon daisy cupcakes on the moon/Vie France/Vie.”

My final verdict on public high school ten years later? Let’s just say I’ve developed the following definition: High school is the place where I was forced to sit still in small, windowless rooms filled with people I would never have chosen to associate with if not for Johnny Law. It was like prison, except with Glee Club.

Of course, high school wasn’t all bad. I made friends. I had a few good teachers. I learned that one should drink Mad Dog in moderation and never as a McNugget aperitif.

Most important, I learned not to trust any organization that has a “spirit coordinator” or “pep rallies.” Hitler and Stalin had spirit coordinators and pep rallies, and neither of them ever fielded a football team that took conference. Bottom line: gossamer paper and sparkle paint are the devil’s playthings.

So, how can we improve the high school experience? What can we do so that the smart and dumb are not penalized for lack of mediocrity? When will we learn that you can’t sparkle-paint over failing schools?

Thankfully, one state has an answer: strip clubs.

In Texas, the Gov. Rick Perry (R-Evil) wants to pay for schools by taxing every person who enters an adult entertainment facility $5.

Think about that. What does it say when the state relies on strip clubs in order for children to receive an education? What it says is that strip clubs are much more efficient than the state.

And that gives me an idea. Instead of taking money from strip clubs, which ultimately solves nothing, what if the governor ran his schools more like the financially sound strip club industry?

Before you flame me with e-mails regarding Operation Strip Club High School, hear me out. These are merely suggestions that would have given my high school experience a happier ending. They involve very little, if any, nudity.

Start with voluntary participation. Like patrons at a strip club, let high school students decide if they want to be there. If a student does not want to be in class, why force him _ and those around him _ to suffer? No teacher likes to shake her academic groove thing for a bored audience.

Next _ merit-based pay. Good strippers make major bank. Bad strippers serve drinks. The system works. In most schools, the best veteran teachers make as much as the worst veteran teachers. Shouldn’t some of those worst teachers be serving drinks?

Add a big, burly bouncer dude. Put four of his buddies inside with pool cues. Security problem? What security problem?

Rotate the talent. Bring in a headlining teacher now and then to reward the good students. Send a bored teacher to another district for a year. Everyone wins.

Open at 1 p.m. Close at 3 a.m. That’s the average teenager’s schedule. Why not?

I’m like you. I look forward to the day when our schools are so successful we need to have a bake sale to support the local strip club. But until that day comes, I say we put a two-drink minimum in the teacher’s lounge and see what happens.

(Originally published 4/28/04.)

Click here to read the previous column - “Guide to Finding Love.”

If you have a comment, e-mail me at joedonatellicolumn@gmail.com.