Haley Stevens: “No allies of industry, they have become industries themselves, dependent upon a style of salesmanship that fills…”

“No allies of industry, they have become industries themselves, dependent upon a style of salesmanship that fills mailboxes across America with a never-ending stream of environmentally unfriendly junk mail, reduces the complex world of nature to simplistic slogans, emotional appeals and counterfeit crises, and employs arcane accounting rules to camouflage fundraising as conservation. It goes on to say: Six national environmental groups spent so much on fund- raising and overhead they don't have enough left to meet the minimum benchmark for environmental spending--60 percent of annual expenses--recommended by charity watchdog organizations. Eleven of the nation's 20 largest include fund-raising bills in their tally of money spent protecting the environment, but don't make that clear to members. The direct mail costs that we have seen can go up to 74 percent of the total money received and is being reported to members as money spent to protect the environment. Are these the people the Senate ought to believe?”