The humanoids at Fox & Friends want to know: Why is it that Germany can get so much of its power from solar, but the U.S. can’t manage without coal? It couldn’t have anything to do with Republican obstruction of green technologies and alternative power, because those are big words, but it’s not an enduring mystery, like the moon. It must be because Germany gets more sun than we do! Yes, bright summery Germany, with its pale angsty sun-worshippers lounging by the pool in their leather pants.

Cocker spaniel otherkin Gretchen Carlson kicked it off, around 2:45 on the video, by asking whether Germany has better solar because it’s a smaller country (which would mean, I guess, that the sun loses less power trying to cover the entire surface area, and therefore there is more left to collect). It was Fox News business reporter Shibani Joshi who responded: “They’re a smaller country, and they’ve got lots of sun. Right? They’ve got a lot more sun than we do. The problem is it’s a cloudy day and it’s raining, you’re not gonna have it. … In California it’s a great solution, but here on the East Coast it’s just not going to work.”

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sun_germany

National Renewable Energy Laboratory

Of course, Germany doesn’t remotely get more sun than most of the U.S. — it’s roughly on par with that sunbather’s heaven, the Pacific Northwest. But you can’t deny that it makes sense in your gut that a place with a more robust solar industry would necessarily have more sun. And understanding any other explanation requires knowing about things like politics and industry and regulation and business, and people become political commentators and business reporters to get away from that shit!