The thing about environmentalists is they always say what they mean. Except when they weren’t supposed to say it in which case they say something else, only it’s the same thing.

Confused? So are we.

One fractivist is trying to change her tune after making a grandstand spectacle during the oil and gas task force hearing earlier in the week, where she demanded that fracking be banned, or most assuredly, it would happen through a ballot initiative.

Karen Dike of “Our Longmont” along with Sam Schabacker of Food and Water Watch both said it, but only Dike is claiming to have misquoted herself.

“We need to have a ban in this state … that would be a ballot initiative in 2016,” Dike was quoted as saying in the Denver Business Journal.

But then Dike called the paper to say she had misspoken, as the Journal explains:

Wednesday, Dike called the Denver Business Journal and said she had been nervous on Tuesday and misspoke about the group’s intent regarding a ballot proposal.

“I was very nervous during the press conference and I made some confusing remarks about the ballot initiative,” she said. “Our primary goal is to convince Hickenlooper to ban fracking, he can do that with an executive order. We’re not currently planning for a ballot initiative to ban fracking.”

“I misspoke and I apologize,” Dike said.

Dike didn’t rule out a statewide ballot issue banning fracking, but said that the current primary goal is to get an executive order achieving that goal.

On Tuesday, Sam Schabacker, the western region director of Food & Water Watch, which has been involved in several anti-fracking efforts across the Front Range in recent years, said pretty much the same thing regarding how the group might achieve its goals.

“All options are on the table,” Schabacker said, listing legislation, local or statewide ballot initiatives, following up with the task force, and legal action.

Talk about the gang who couldn’t shoot straight. We’re not sure to whom Dike was apologizing, but we suspect it was Schabacker, and a conversation like this prompted the call to the Journal:

Sam: You don’t get to say ‘ballot initiative,’ only I get to say that!

Karen: I can say it if I want to! You can’t stop me! Ballot! Ballot!

Sam: You better not, or I’ll take away your Washington funding!

Then it devolved into this:

Greenies are so cute when they’re angry and confused. And as harmless as a rattlesnake.