MSNBC host Chris Hayes criticized Fox News and the right-wing media for falsely blaming wind turbines as the root cause of the debilitating power outages that plagued Texas, accusing “these charlatans” on Tuesday of pushing the “idiomatic idiot of cultural war” in an effort to demonize cleansing energy.
With much of Texas shrouded in darkness as historic winter storms sink, demand for electricity has skyrocketed and right-wing media have blamed most of the blame on the state’s wind farms. Pointing to images of frozen wind turbines, Fox News has linked Joe Biden’s green energy push to the Texas catastrophe, even though the state gets the vast majority of its energy from fossil fuels.
Launching his MSNBC program in the early hours of recovering from the devastation of the Lone Star State, Hayes noted that more than four million jeans were trapped without electricity amid freezing temperatures on Tuesday.
He then turned his attention to those who wanted to exploit the issue for political gain.
“It simply came to our notice then. It is driven by a complex confluence of factors, from the extreme climate to an electrical infrastructure that has unfortunately been underdeveloped to the idiosyncrasy of the independently deregulated and independent energy market in Texas, ”he said.
“But of course, Fox News and other Republicans saw some kind of suffering, some kind of problem somewhere, and immediately, without losing pace, they immediately tried to turn it into a cultural war, in this case against those damn liberal hippies and their clean energy, ”added the MSNBC progressive host.
Interpreting a montage of Fox stars blaming only the deadly disruptions on windmills while claiming that wind power doesn’t work at low-freezing temperatures, Hayes pointed out how completely foolish those claims were.
“Imagine how stupid you should think your audience is, the contempt you have to maintain, look at the camera and try to sell them with the idea that windmills don’t work when it’s cold,” he exclaimed. “After Texas, Iowa is the state with the most wind energy in the country. If you’ve ever been to Iowa in the winter, I can tell you from personal experience: it’s pretty cold in Iowa. ”
Adding that Denmark, a country with very cold winters, receives half of its wind energy Everything in The host then quoted the senior director of the Texas Electrical Reliability Council, who said Tuesday earlier that the ice that forced some wind turbines to shut down was the “least significant factor” in Texas shutdowns.
“It’s a lie that wind turbines, green energy, are the root causes of the problems in Texas right now,” Hayes said, comparing the claim to the “Big Lie” that the election was “stolen” from the former president. Donald Trump.
“Let’s be clear, it’s probably as consistent a lie as anything else about elections, as the energy and the way we produce it is the only major problem this country will face in the medium term,” he continued.
Observing that power grids are “complicated things” and “arcane things,” Hayes said that from time to time a disaster occurs that reminds us that the grid is the foundation of modern civilization, and is also the key to overcoming climate change “.
“Republicans and right-wing media want to take all the issues out of politics and turn them into some painful cultural war idiot,” Hayes said. “And there is interest in doing so. Fossil fuel companies want it too. They want to become a cultural war, as if freedoms don’t want you to have power. “
Although he said there is no reason why we cannot “create a modern energy infrastructure that is more resilient to climate change and also cheaper and that serves people better,” Hayes concluded that ” the main obstacle will be these charlatans who will take every opportunity to lie to people for profit and power ”.