Crackpot Calling for End of Air Conditioning

Who knows, maybe this is considered satire or something. But seriously, are these climate clowns deranged enough to think while we're in the midst of a crushing heat wave that people are just going to turn the AC off?

Is he for real?

Washington didn't grind to a sweaty halt last week under triple-digit temperatures. People didn't even slow down. Instead, the three-day, 100-plus-degree, record-shattering heat wave prompted Washingtonians to crank up their favorite humidity-reducing, electricity-bill-busting, fluorocarbon-filled appliance: the air conditioner.

This isn't smart. In a country that's among the world's highest greenhouse-gas emitters, air conditioning is one of the worst power-guzzlers. The energy required to air-condition American homes and retail spaces has doubled since the early 1990s. Turning buildings into refrigerators burns fossil fuels, which emits greenhouse gases, which raises global temperatures, which creates a need for -- you guessed it -- more air-conditioning.

A.C.'s obvious public-health benefits during severe heat waves do not justify its lavish use in everyday life for months on end. Less than half a century ago, America thrived with only the spottiest use of air conditioning. It could again. While central air will always be needed in facilities such as hospitals, archives and cooling centers for those who are vulnerable to heat, what would an otherwise A.C.-free Washington look like?

In a world without air conditioning, a warmer, more flexible, more relaxed workplace helps make summer a time to slow down again. Three-digit temperatures prompt siestas. Code-orange days mean offices are closed. Shorter summer business hours and month-long closings -- common in pre-air-conditioned America -- return.

Sure, just what our ailing economy needs: To shut down for months at a time just so some kook can feel better about his pathetic existence. So if we have people jammed into a suffocating building for eight hours that will result in a more relaxed workplace?

Business suits are out, for both sexes. And with the right to open a window, office employees no longer have to carry sweaters or space heaters to work in the summer. After a long absence, ceiling fans, window fans and desk fans (and, for that matter, paperweights) take back the American office.

It appears Cox hasn't been inside an office in decades. If he was he'd notice windows no longer open in most buildings that are climate-controlled.

Now how wacky is this guy? He blames air conditioning for George W. Bush becoming President.

Yes, really.

Q You write that air-conditioning has impacted political outcomes, and may have even led to George W. Bush’s election in 2000. Explain.

A It encouraged a mass migration of mostly older and mostly white Americans to the Sunbelt states — which are mostly Republican — between 1960 and 2000. If we had people vote as they did in 2000, but we used the older population distribution from 1960, then Al Gore would have actually edged out Bush in 2000.

Q How about in 2004?
A It would have come down to recounts between Kerry and Bush, although Bush, theoretically, would not have been president in the first place.