If a single issue sums up the phoniness, corruption, and anti-Americanism of the liberal establishment, it is the ongoing mass slaughter of our national symbol by the coercively subsidized wind turbines that Democrats pretend benefit the environment but that actually serve primarily to launder taxpayer money on behalf of their donors.

The American Eagle Foundation raises the alarm:

A 2013 study published in The Wildlife Society Bulletin found that wind turbines killed an estimated 573,000 birds annually in the United States.

Particularly vulnerable are soaring birds of prey like eagles.

Many a wind turbine has been raised as a monument to moonbattery since 2013. Many times more would be needed to achieve the progressive goal of replacing more efficient and reliable means of generating energy like fossil fuels.

An even more alarming fact is that the data on the number of deaths is gathered by paid consultants to the wind industry. That’s the fox guarding the chicken house. At the infamous Altamont Wind Resource Area alone, more than 2,000 Golden Eagles have been killed by the wind turbines there.

Unless something changes, the body count will continue to skyrocket:

The number of birds taken annually by wind energy facilities (not including associated power lines and towers) has been estimated to exceed 1.4 million birds by 2030 if there is no change in U.S. policy toward wind energy development.

Democrats in DC appear to be okay with this:

In December, 2016, a new eagle-management plan announced a final rule by the federal government that would give wind energy developers 30-year permits to “take” or incidentally kill protected Bald and Golden Eagles, without requiring the industry to share mortality data with the public or take into consideration such critical factors as proper siting.

Anyone who does not love and admire eagles has not gotten to know them. In that regard, live eagle cams can help:

Ironically, the wind turbines erected by moonbats also kill large numbers of bats. This is a problem because it lets the population of mankind’s worst enemy — the mosquito — flourish beyond control.

Killing vast numbers of birds and bats is hardly the only deleterious effect on the environment. In addition to the problem of disposing of old turbine blades (which even NPR admits to),

During construction of a wind turbine, roads often have to be widened or built from scratch; mountain tops are sometimes blasted away to create a level area of at least 3 acres, so that the platform can be stable enough to support the enormous weight of each turbine assembly.

Wind turbines have ruined some of America’s most beautiful landscapes. They are the Democrat Party’s visual equivalent of a stray dog spurting urine on everything to mark his territory by imposing his stink.

On a tip from Varla.

When you see this in Roto-Reuters, stick a fork in net zero:

The pursuit of net zero carbon emissions has been a resounding failure. Despite trillions of dollars spent on renewable energy, hydrocarbons still account for over 80% of the world’s primary energy and a similar share of recent increases in energy consumption, according to The Energy Institute. … The financial markets were already losing confidence in the energy transition before Donald Trump returned to the White House.

Like society’s descent into leftism, the green energy transition has been presented to us by the liberal establishment as historically inevitable. Yet it is not going to happen.

Solar and wind power have grown to a mere 3.5% of primary energy production.

Massive government subsidies cannot erase the fact that these are not economically rational means of generating electricity because they are intermittent.

Germany and the United Kingdom, which get a relatively large share of their electricity from renewables, also suffer from the world’s highest electricity costs.

The damage goes beyond inflated electric bills:

High energy costs have crippled domestic manufacturing.

Even if you believe that reducing CO2 emissions will improve the weather,

Targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions are measured on territorial production. This incentivises countries to switch from domestic manufacturing to importing energy intensive goods, often from countries such as China and India, whose factories are largely powered by coal-powered electricity. Thus, the reduction in an individual country’s emissions can lead to an increase in global emissions.

There will be energy transitions in the future, just as there have been in the past. However,

Each was accomplished by market forces rather than government fiat.

It has been obvious for some time that green energy is not economically sane and that a serious attempt to impose net zero would result in economic collapse. Why is Reuters beginning to acknowledge this now? JoNova answers:

Because reality is making Reuters look stupid — it’s not the reality of high costs or blackouts, but the reality that Trump won, and set fire to the “transition” fantasy by dumping Paris, dropping subsidies, opening gas fields, and installing a corporate energy CEO as the US Energy Secretary. Chris Wright and JD Vance are dropping truth bombs in speeches that can’t be ignored. Word is spreading fast, and if Reuters don’t report this, they risk being turned into the same irrelevant wreckage the US mainstream media channels already are.

Reclaiming the MSM’s lost credibility may be as lost a cause as green energy.

On a tip from Angel. Hat tip: Watts Up With That.

Obama’s legacy isn’t limited to the racial division he stoked with his community activist tactics. He was also a pioneer in the wasting of massive amounts of money on green energy boondoggles. Fortunately, that legacy is getting rolled back. The closing of the Ivanpah Solar Plant after only 11 years is a milestone:

The Ivanpah solar power plant formally opened in 2014 on roughly 5 square miles of federal land near the California-Nevada border. Though it was hailed at the time as a breakthrough moment for clean energy, its power has been struggling to compete with cheaper solar technologies.

Leave alone cheaper non-solar technologies like nuclear and fossil fuels.

Meanwhile, environmentalists continue to blame the Mojave Desert plant for killing thousands of birds and tortoises.

The plant’s giant mirrors incinerated birds in the sky, presumably including eagles.

As noted at Watts Up With That,

Ivanpah is a shining (literally) example of what happens when ideology replaces sound economic and engineering principles. It was never about producing reliable, cost-effective energy. It was about making a grand, symbolic gesture in the fight against climate change. And as with most grand, symbolic gestures, reality eventually caught up.

The important thing is that moonbats meant well and signaled virtue. No doubt the climate appreciates the gesture.

On tips from Wiggins and WDS 2.0.

Remember when Clinton staffers reportedly removed the W keys from White House keyboards before George W. Bush took office? If only Biden were that petty. The damage he is inflicting on his way out the door is more significant:

Biden will ban new offshore oil and gas drilling in more than 625 million acres of federal waters, the White House announced Monday, striking a final blow against domestic energy production…

The outgoing president is set to use his authority under the 1953 Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act to protect offshore areas along the East Coast, West Coast, eastern Gulf of Mexico, and additional portions of the Northern Bering Sea in Alaska from future oil and gas leasing.

As justification, Biden referenced the imaginary “climate crisis.” If we make do without the energy required to put food on the table, that will improve the allegedly problematic weather, according to leftist ideology.

Given Biden’s character, spite may be the actual motive:

The move comes on the same day that Trump’s victory over Vice President Kamala Harris is set to be certified by Congress. Trump has vowed to increase oil and gas production on a simple three-word energy policy: “Drill, baby, drill.” Biden’s latest action, however, poses an obstacle to the incoming president’s energy plans.

Democrats would love for the economy to flounder under Trump. Higher energy prices would make that more likely.

Then again, Biden has been at war with the energy industry from the beginning. He threw Americans out of work by crushing the Keystone XL pipeline on his first day in office.

Surely Trump can undo any malicious decrees issued by the conspicuously unfit Biden. Or maybe not:

Established 72 years ago, the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act governs energy leasing activities in submerged lands under U.S. jurisdiction that extend three miles beyond the shoreline. An open-ended provision in federal law gives a president the authority to permanently withdraw portions of the Outer Continental Shelf without providing a way for a succeeding president to reverse course.

By attacking our capacity to generate energy, Democrats attack our economy. By attacking our economy, they attack us, as surely as any other enemy America has ever faced.

On a tip from Bluto.

If moonbattery-compliant energy sources like wind and solar made sense economically, Big Government would not need to impose them through regulations and subsidies. Yet we are told that green energy is abundant and cheap relative to politically disfavored fossil fuels. Bjorn Lomborg debunks this lie:

The claim that green energy is cheaper relies on bogus math that measures the cost of electricity only when the sun is shining and the wind is blowing. Modern societies need around-the-clock power, requiring backup, often powered by fossil fuels. That means we’re paying for two power systems: renewables and backup. Moreover, as fossil fuels are used less, those power sources need to earn their capital costs back in fewer hours, leading to even more expensive power.

Woke energy is not cheap:

One study shows that in China the real cost of solar power on average is twice as high as that of coal. Similarly, a peer-reviewed study of Germany and Texas shows that solar and wind are many times more expensive than fossil fuels.

Liberals often bleat piously about their sympathy for the poor. Just as often, their foolish policies harm the poor — who are least able to afford more expensive energy.

The canary in the coalmine of green energy moonbattery is Germany, where electricity costs…

…more than twice the U.S. cost and more than three times the Chinese price. Germany has installed so much solar and wind that, on sunny and windy days, renewable energy satisfies close to 70% of Germany’s needs—a fact the press eagerly reports. But the press hardly mentions dark and still days, when these renewables deliver almost nothing.

A nation cannot compete economically without affordable and reliable energy. This ranks prominently among the ways moonbattery is causing Germany to slide into decline.

Democrats would have the USA following close behind:

Solar and wind credits cost the federal government more than $20 billion in 2024, supplemented by state subsidies. Texas received about $2 billion in federal subsidies last year, and state government subsidies at least tripled that cost. This suggests a total hidden cost for the entire U.S. that perhaps runs more than $60 billion annually, implying that the actual cost of electricity with solar and wind is far higher than stated prices.

What do we get for our money? Unless you believe this nonsense will perceptibly improve the weather (it won’t), the answer is absolutely nothing.

Imagine if a strange religious sect took control and devoted a large and ever-increasing percentage of our wealth to the construction of a golden staircase into the heavens so that Jesus could descend. Many would object, including Christians. Yet we submit to the ecomoonbat equivalent — namely, the green energy “transition,” whereby true believers aspire to perfect the weather.

On a tip from Varla.

Football players aren’t the only ones doing the Trump dance. Oil workers have even more reason to celebrate, now that the Democrat War on Energy could be drawing to a close:

Those who benefit from what these guys produce should also be doing a happy dance — namely, all of us.

On a tip from WDS 2.0.

One day, scientists will develop a means of generating energy that can be stored efficiently, that is not exorbitantly expensive, and that does not rely on the wind to be blowing or the sun to be shining. In the meantime, we are menaced by “wind drought” — or as dementedly green Germans call it, Dunkelflaute:

Dunkelflaute typically occurs during winter months, particularly in November, December, and January. And it appears that the projection is for slowing wind speeds over the next few decades…

Now a 12-day dunkelflaute that began in early November has German energy executives deeply concerned. …

In 2021, there was a lengthy dunkelflaute in Northern Europe and energy utility profits plummeted.

Reliable energy would be especially nice to have in the wintertime, despite the planet supposedly having a fever:

The Global Burden of Disease study attributed 1.9 million deaths globally to non-optimal temperatures in 2021, with cold-related deaths being about four times higher than heat-related ones. If there is not access to light and heat, the conditions for humans becomes suboptimal.

Conditions for humans become optimal where moonbattery is kept in check. This would allow dumping wind and solar in favor of more sensible nuclear and fossil fuels.

On a tip from Steve T.