On Loving Animals...

On principle, I do not visit zoos and I do not watch circuses or any show featuring animal performers. It's very easy to discern my objection to these places, and I hope that you will avoid any place that imprisons or uses animals for forced labor. Horse carriages and Ringling Bros. Barnum and Bailey Circus are just two examples of animal enslavement. Your local zoo is not the " nice, little place where children can see and learn about the animals. " It is a prison for animals, and the placards are a pitiful source of education. My son is nearly 29 yrs old now, and I have never taken him to the zoo or the circus. Does that mean he was ignorant about the animals? No. In fact, not too long ago, he did the right thing. Last Monday was simply a good day to be out in nature. It was hot but not muggy. The high humidity hasn't come yet in our parts, and it won't be for a while. So, I went to the Flat Rock Brook Nature Center and hiked a trail that I would grade as easy...

It was a hot Sunday, but I wasn't complaining. I am just glad that those wintry days are behind us now. On the bus today, I noticed that not one person had a light jacket on. I am grateful for this series of hot days that began last Saturday. Anyway, people and their rescued dogs came in support of Council Member Tony Avella who held a press conference calling for a complete revamp of the ACC. This change includes dismissing Charlene Pedrolie , Executive Director with no shelter and medical experience at all. She is a business woman and a good example that success in business management does not necessarily mean success in shelter management. The ACC Board of Directors chose her after a long search, and so they share in the blame for the mess at ACC. What mess? Well, there is unbridled killing at ACC. The stats are skewed not to include healthy animals turned sick in counting cases of euthanasia. ACC counts only adoptable dogs that are put down. The result is a misleading impress...

Cross-posting a message from the New Jersey Animal Rights Alliance ============================================================= Dear Members and Supporters: Thank you to everyone who wrote, called, e-mailed, faxed and spoke out on behalf of animals and people regarding the Sunday bowhunting bill (S802/A1669). The Office of Legislative Services told us today that the bill is still on the Governor's desk and he has not contacted them for a signing. If the Governor does not sign this bill by April 30, he will be given an extension until the Senate comes back on May 4, 2009. If he does not sign it at all, it automatically becomes law. He MUST veto it. ALL of our members, supporters, friends, and associates need to call the governor's office every day to make sure our voices are heard loud and clear. CALL GOVERNOR CORZINE'S OFFICE: 609-777-2500 1. Ask him to veto the Sunday bowhunting bill (S802/A1669). Ask him to say NO to Sunday hunting! 2. Ask everyone you know to call...

Cross-posting a message from the Brooklyn Animal Foster Network ================================================== Please join us as we voice our opposition to continuing the City contract with Animal Care & Control (ACC) unless the disinterested and inexperienced Board of Directors including Executive Director, Charlene Pedrolie are replaced with forward thinking, humane shelter professionals and animal rights advocates!Attention everyone who cares about the hideous numbers of animals being killed in our shelters. Please sign the petition below so that we can put an end to AC&C's dismal record of mistakes and animals killed for want of a home. Send letters to the Board members (info below) protesting their failure to closely monitor and oversee what is happening in our shelters and for their failure to hire someone who can implement the mandate of a NO KILL NEW YORK! New York City's taxpayers and the animals in our shelters deserve nothing but the best: experienced, co...

My routine in the morning, right off the bed, is to turn on my laptop and check for emails that have come in overnight. And there's the weather forecast to check after which off I go into the shower. Walking the dog is the last thing I do at home before I leave for work, and the walk could take as long as thirty minutes depending on how soon my Fidelma can " deploy the troops. " I don't even think of coffee until I am almost at work, stopping at the Pret A Manger across the street for a medium sized cup, to go. Sipping hot coffee and surfing the web at my desk before the work day begins is probably the best time of the day for me. I am fresh, open-minded, and usually still unspoiled by the rudeness of other people in spite of the commute to work. That first cup of hot java goes a long way in defining the course of my attitude in the coming day. I hate paying for flat, watered down coffee and I hate it more if I had to drink it. Which brings me to the very point I...

No rest for the weary, but the Defenders of Wildlife (DOW) would have it another way---no rest for the cruel. Hey, I have no problems with that. Gov. Sarah Palin went to Evansville, Indiana on April 16th to attend the Vanderburgh County Right to Life fundraising dinner where she was hailed by Republican National Chairman Michael Steele as one of the GOP's current standard bearers. Well, sir, watch your step. That standard is dripping with blood. We don't want you slipping and sliding and end up with your foot in your mouth. The DOW anticipated Palin's presence in Indiana and sent out a call for donations to which I responded, but evidently so did hundreds of people. The response was great enough that the DOW was able to afford both print and television ads reminding the citizens of that state about the hideously cruel anti-wolf campaign that the governor is running. The governor obviously has a double standard when it comes to the right to life. Both PRINT and TELEVISION...

Life became a little hectic for me in the last week, having to drive up to Boston and spend some quality time with my son plus I followed an extremely cruel case of cat abuse in the Philippines which I intend to blog about very soon. But let me first tell you about Michigan. Did you know that approximately twelve animal shelters in that state still gas animals to death? Whoa, did we not put a man on the moon in 1969? Don't we now use little personal electronic gadgets to send and receive email on the go, to browse the web, and to give us directions to our destination via satellite? What happened in Michigan that they are still stuck with euthanasia via gas chamber? There's an oxymoron right there, but the government officials with superannuated thinking who are comfortable with superannuated technology are the ones we should be concerned about. Death via gas chamber means that dogs try to scratch their way out of the little enclosure, rolling and tumbling as their life is gass...

Not too long ago, I featured two television ads that portrayed homeless dogs and cats in the Philippines. Homeless but not worthless, as they said. Those ads got people talking and thinking in the old country, and my blog certainly received many visits from web surfers who typed in " paws purina " as their search parameters. Purina , of course, is the company who joined forces with the Philippine Animal Welfare Society in this effort to enlighten the public on the plight of stray animals. Well, here are two posters that are part of that campaign: If you haven't done so, click on the posters to enlarge them. These are very powerful, moving images and they are not stylistic nor abstract representations of stray animals. These images are accurate representations of the lives of stray animals. Situations like these will confront you not only in the Philippines but in many other countries. I recognize these scenes from my childhood, and they are happening as you read these l...

Just a noteworthy article on Yahoo today, David Zinczenko and Matt Goulding have written about the 8 Worst Sandwiches in America . Scary, but we need to know this stuff. You don't want to be blindsided by a foot-long sandwich. Some of them are over one thousand calories. I am singling out one from Blimpie called " Blimpie Special Vegetarian 12 Inch . " I sense a contradiction there already. Vegetarian for good health but twelve inches of any food couldn't be good. I'll pass on the 5-pound tofu burger if ever that was offered. This wolf in sheep's clothing has a whopping 1,186 calories and 19 grams of saturated fat. As the writer's prudently pointed out, vegetarian doesn't necessarily mean healthy. Furthermore, there are 131 g of carbs and 3,532 mg of sodium in this sandwich. As my father used to tell me, " don't do this to yourself ; you still have a future." Avoid this sandwich unless, as the writers suggested, you intend to share it wi...

I am surprised that my postman has not complained about the amount of mail coming to my address, usually newsletters, magazines, and promotional items from animal welfare organizations I have joined or donated to. His bag must be considerably heavier because of me. To be frank, I don’t have the time to read all the material and I cannot always give when asked for donations. I’d quickly run out of time and money, and then end up unable to give anyway. I hope that there is a cyclical phenomenon in giving, that other animal lovers take up the slack when some are unable to give or support. There was one piece of mail that pricked my interest more than the others. It was from the people at Last Chance for Animals ( Los Angeles ), touting their success at convincing a local animal store to turn away from puppy mills and instead showcase animals from local shelters. The store is OrangeBone on Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles. Of course, the idea is worth a try but some questions linger. Anythi...

Governor Jon Corzine hasn't signed S802 into law yet, but he hasn't vetoed it either. S802 will allow bowhunting on Sundays. The hunters already have six out of seven days to kill animals, and now they want all seven. There is increased traffic in the woods during Sundays with bikers, hikers, horseback riders, and citizens who just want to enjoy the natural setting. Just three weeks ago, a Bronx woman was shot with an arrow in a park setting. Bowhunting on Sundays is not good for anybody except for those who want another day to kill animals. I found this website that exposed what really goes on during a " hunt. " Watch the videos, and decide if bowhunting is a sport or just legalized blood lust. Hunters have always made the lame excuse that they are conservationists too. Watch the videos. http://www.sharkonline.org/?P=0000000418 TAKE ACTION Please make a brief, polite phone call to Governor Corzine at (609) 292-6000 to urge him to veto S. 802. The Governor's sta...

Not withstanding the natural acrimony that accompanies any political office, the governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin, seems to be the most hated governor in the United States. Can you name another governor who has greater infamy or notoriety than Palin? Hands down, Palin was the laughingstock of the 2008 elections. Lord, did she make us laugh and cry at the same time--- dinosaurs in Egypt 4,000 years ago, reading all newspapers, what does a VP actually do, it’s all about job creation, the Bush Doctrine, Russia through her kitchen window, and other earth-shaking gaffes. Senator McCain intended Gov. Palin to be his Hail Mary pass against the Obama juggernaut but she quickly turned out to be his extreme unction. The elections, like her national aspirations, are over but that doesn’t mean that she’s stopped stirring the pot and casting spells. The governor is still very much alive, riding on her broom over the Alaskan moon as wolves cry out to her for mercy. There have been 232 wolves killed t...

This is an alert from the New Jersey Animal Rights Alliance that I am cross posting here. ============================================================ The NJ Division of Fish & Wildlife (DFW) and the Stanhope Police need help trying to locate the deer who has a bowl stuck on her head (see article below). If you see the deer, please call and report her whereabouts to the DFW's 24 hour Hotline dispatcher so they can send out help (they are looking to tranquilize her and remove the bowl). Call 877-927-6337 . New Jersey Animal Rights Alliance (NJARA) Upholding and Advancing the Rights of Animals since 1983 through advocacy, public education and legislationTo financially support NJARA's work, please click here: www.nj-ara.org/donation.htm Phone: 732-446-6808 / Web: http://www.nj-ara.org/ Be Green! Visit http://www.chooseveg.com/ and explore a plant-based diet.Searching the web? Don't "google", use http://www.goodsearch.com/ and NJARA will receive a donation for...

We have long suspected it, and now we have proof of it. Preparing and eating dog and cat meat can be very harmful, even deadly, to humans. Dr. Heiman Wertheim and colleagues from the National Institute of Infectious and Tropical Diseases and the National Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology in Hanoi, Viet Nam reported on two cases where rabies infection occurred not through bites but through the handling of infected animals and the consumption of their meat. Their REPORT was published in PLoS Medicine last month. Roughly 30,000 people in Asia die every year from rabies infection. If you are ever infected with rabies, you will experience a state of agitation, suffer from severe spasms, become feverish, become afraid of water and unable to drink liquids. You will eventually die. You don't want to be in that picture. The animal rights group, It's Their Destiny , reported that China and Vietnam have increasing cases of rabies infection. Why not? It is said that the only t...