We might actually make some headway toward a renewable energy future — except for so many environmentalists standing in the way. If that sounds like a contradiction in terms, consider this story about a $600 million wind farm in Wyoming possibly going to the birds. It echoes last decade’s fiasco when protecting the snail darter — a tiny fish almost nobody even knew existed — shut down a proposed hydroelectric project in Tennessee.

Consider also the vaunted Cape Wind project, a gigantic renewable energy project that would be well under development by now except for opposition from a bunch of well-heeled citizens whose pristine view of the ocean would be tainted by windmills so far offshore they would appear less than an inch high above the horizon off of Nantucket Island.

Then let’s journey 3,000 miles across this great land to the Left Coast, home of many of our country’s most committed environmental activists. Except they’d rather protect sagebrush and lizards from being ruffled than approve a solar project that would provide megawatts of clean energy.

No wonder an American solar energy company has to look all the way to China to peddle its wares.

Don’t even get me started on our failure to develop more of the safest, cleanest form of electrical generation now in widespread use around the world.

Stuff like this is what inspired this tongue-in-cheek article last year.

When is the silliness going to end? Sheesh.