It may seem like the Biden administration’s Consumer Product Safety Commission suddenly decided to come out and float the idea of a national gas-stove ban, igniting a firestorm of backlash and making it the hot topic of the week. But this has been a cause of the far-left Green New Deal and simmering on the back burner for quite some time.
That’s usually how these things happen. Pet causes of the radical left gain traction, and then cities and communities run by far-left Democratic Party politicians take up the cause, inflicting it on the community with the help of their allies in the media, and before anyone knows why the thing that wasn’t a problem yesterday is now a problem today, it’s being unnecessarily regulated and even outright banned.
California used this bunk logic, citing flawed science and research, to ban plastic straws.
The “Electrify Everything” movement has been gaining steam ever since President Biden came into office and buried several climate initiatives in both his $500 billion infrastructure bill and the supposed Inflation Reduction Act, which both the administration and the media have dubbed a climate bill.
Walking it back
CPSC Commissioner Richard Trumka Jr. said last month a ban on future gas-stove installations in homes and high-rises is on the table. “We need to be talking about regulating gas stoves, whether that’s drastically improving emissions or banning gas stoves entirely,” Trumka said. “And I think we ought to keep that possibility of a ban in mind because it’s a powerful tool in our tool belt, and it’s a real possibility here.”
The CPSC chair was forced to issue a clarification, and after the backlash, the White House press secretary stated Biden is not interested in pursuing this goal. But there’s not much reading between the lines to see where this is headed, and it’s important to note why — and who is pushing it and why they won’t stop with gas stoves.
The study Trumka cites, and the national media have picked up, says gas stoves are possibly responsible for 12% of all childhood asthma cases, giving activists and advocates the cover of public health. The Rocky Mountain Institute, whose stated goal is to decarbonize everything, commissioned the study. That’s correct, “Electrify Everything,” including water and space heating. Anything that involves the usage of natural gas in the home.
RMI’s donors include billionaire Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos-linked charities; the push to ban gas stoves was floated at the World Economic Forum in Davos in February 2022. The CEO of Rocky Mountain Institute, Jon Creyts, is speaking at Davos next week.
The research about asthma and gas stoves’ possible effects on cognitive abilities due to carcinogens leaking into the air is largely based on observational analysis, which largely also admits there’s no way to factually link a scientific correlation between the two.
Observational studies
A Harvard Medical School study by Wynne Armand published Sept. 7, 2022, stated, “Gas stoves affect air quality inside and outside your home, circulating pollutants that raise risk for asthma and other illnesses.” But further in the same study, Armand wrote that “observational studies can’t prove that cooking with gas is the direct cause of asthma.” That detail is of course being ignored by the national media and radical green groups.
As for the media themselves, they have taken up the usual mantle of blaming Republicans and conservatives of starting a new culture war to rouse the rabble, simply by noticing what the Biden administration stated and tried to walk back.
Conservatives were minding their own business as both Biden and now Gov. Hochul floated the idea of a national gas-stove ban; when the pols were pushed back, their loyal media allies accused conservatives of starting a culture war.
If only there were a specific term to describe this form of psychological manipulation in which the aggressor, in this case the media and the Biden administration, attempts to sow self-doubt and confusion in their target’s mind.
Stephen L. Miller has written for National Review, the New York Post and Fox News and hosts the Versus Media podcast. Twitter: @redsteeze
