Jon points to a speech given by Bill Moyers, one of the nastiest of pseudo-green posers, approvingly.

Whatever one thinks about his politics, his journalism, and the political storms he has weathered in his career, and especially in recent years, this speech is a story of a journey worth taking with Moyers. He walks through the valley of the shadow of death and up the mountain to see the other side. Whether one abides with Moyers or parts ways somewhere along the path, his vision of journalism resounds.

The speech is a revealing look at the diseases of the environmental movement.

Yes, I know: the environmental community has stumbled on many fronts. All of us in this room have heard and reported the charges: that the rhetoric is alarmist and the ideology polarizing; that command-and-control regulation produces bureaucratic bungles, slows economic growth, and delays technological advances that save lives; that what began as a grassroots movement has now become an entrenched green bureaucracy precariously hanging on in occupied Washington while passionate citizens across the country are starved for financial resources. There is some truth in these charges; all movements flounder and must periodically regroup.

Before we consider the case closed, however, let me urge you to take a hard look at the backlash. I didn’t reckon on the backlash. If the Green Revolution is a bloody pulp today, it is not just because the environmental movement mugged itself. It is because the corporate, political, and religious right ganged up on it in the back alleys of power. Big companies fund a relentless assault on green values and policies. Political ideologues launch countless campaigns to strip from government all its functions except those that reward their rich benefactors. And homegrown ayatollahs are more set on savaging gay people than saving the green earth.

The reluctance to admit the gross blunders of those pie-eyed movement types, such as Moyers, only partially admitting any wrong doing at all, is pretty amazing at this late date when so much has been revealed. It is intellectually, ethically and aesthetically dishonest. That has been the basic problem of the movement since day one. It will lie, cheat and steal to achieve its ill considered objectives because it is a movement, a belief system, rather than evidence based good governance.

The real backlash isn't the doing of any of Moyers' old enemies - the ones he lied to, cheated and stole from - the most potent backlash is from those who care about the issues and see that Moyers' and his ilk have done great damage in the past and are the chief impediment to improvement now. They never admit their defects and never learn.

So if the environmental movement is pronounced dead, it won’t be from selfinflicted wounds. We don’t blame slavery on the slaves, the Trail of Tears on the Cherokees, or the Srebrenica massacre on the bodies in the grave. No, the lethal threat to the environmental movement comes from the predatory power of money and the pathological enmity of rightwing ideology.

Crocodile tears. What an arrogant SOB, trying to equate his tawdry life and history with slavery, Indian massacres and genocide. Pathetic. Is it any wonder that those who are not enraged by the movement point and laugh at them?

Environmentalism is pan-ideological, not left wing ideology. It is quite literally insane to think that you can govern a nation in environmentally beneficial ways while demonizing a major segment of that nation. This is what killed the environmental movement; association with the Democratic party and swallowing leftist ideology. What is needed now is to purge the rabid ideologues and adopt a more mature and sane approach that recognizes that all of society must be served and included. All citizens must have a place at the table and an ownership interest in the processes.

Environmentalism did not begin when it was hijacked in the 60s by political hacks like Carson and Nelson, or third tier wannabes like Moyers. It will not end because their predations are revealed and disowned. It was an ugly period in environmentalism and we need to see it as just that - a bad patch, a mistake and something we can put behind us. Environmentalism isn't dead, can't be dead, but the environmental movement is dead. Good riddance. Now we can get on with some honest environmentalism, the kind that is actually good for the environment and that all can be proud of.