Memphis Sinking

If you check out the sites in the blogroll to the right, you may also have been experiencing a daily dose of abject misery via Shirley Thistlewaite over at YesBiscuit, and courtesy of the devoted public servants at the Memphis, TN municipal animal shelter.

These are the same animal-care professionals who intentionally starved dogs to death two years ago. Had to be raided by the county sheriff, they did. Cuz they are the guys who are supposed to investigate and prosecute the kind of knuckle-draggers who would abuse an animal that way. Tricksy.

One consequence of the documented criminal animal cruelty and evidence-tampering at the "shelter" was the installation of webcams in the corridors. And that's what Shirley has been posting just about every day; still images of MAS employees dragging dogs to their deaths, hoisting big dogs into small cages using choke poles, chuckling on their way to the kill room, poking caged kitties. You know. Good times.

Xeroxed poster taped up in the MAS break room: You don't have to be sociopathic to work here, but it helps!

These people know they are on camera. What happens inside the runs, in the blind spots, inside the killing room just before over 70% of the animals who cross the threshold breathe their lonely, frightened last breaths?

One thing Shirley has been doing is trying to spring some of the dogs spotted on the cameras back in the "stray hold" area.

Now, one might think that "stray" animals brought to a publicly-funded animal shelter might be made available to people who are, you know, searching for their lost pets.

Nope. No public access. No photos. Tough luck.

MAS posts about 10% of the animals in its custody on Petfinder. Or rather, they graciously permit someone else to do so on their behalf.

If you are "in back," you are SOL, goggie. The man with the snare pole has some nice juice for you down the hall.

Shirley writes to the new, improved shelter director pretty regularly, trying to find out about dogs on the webcams. By way of answer, MAS kills them.

Also by way of answer, the City of Memphis, via its city attorney, makes baseless, bullying, unconstitutional threats intended to intimidate a citizen into silence about the official conduct of public employees on the taxpayer's dime.

Just thought people should know about this. Maybe people such as the Tennessee ACLU. The Fourth Estate. At the very least, the voters of Memphis, who pay the salary of the mayor, the MAS employees, and the city attorney who billed y'all for his efforts in finding an obscure (and wholly irrelevant) law in another state with which to threaten a citizen engaged in protected speech.

This pathetic attempt at a tax-funded SLAPP on a citizen of another state is the exact kind of government misconduct that engendered the First Amendment.

If you don't give a fig about public employees abusing lost and homeless pets, or a rat's ass about lazy, venal shelter bureaucrats who rationalize and justify their choice to slaughter dogs and cats by blaming everybody but the ones who, you know, decide to kill them -- well, #1, what the hell are you doing here? and #2, you should bloody well care when a government agency responds to citizen criticism with abuse and illegal threats.

Meanwhile, for Shirley, consider this empty threat, leveled on lawyer letterhead, against a friend of mine who took the lead in exposing a fraudulent "search and rescue" product that was already being sold to public agencies.

I was threatened by officers of the law in two states for my own role in debunking the whizzboxes.

Thirteen years later, funny thing, we are still here, still standing behind our words.

Because the last thing a bloviating liar wants is to have to keep all those lies straight while up on a witness stand.

*********

Updates:

For some reason Pitt is posting a "page not found" for the threatening letter on my friend Keith's personal website. The link is here: http://www.pitt.edu/~kconover/lawyer-letter.htm and it seems to work if it is not embedded in the text. At worst, cut and paste it.

The story is blowing up the blogosphere; please circulate it as widely as possible. I figure that Shirley is best able to keep the roll of links updated. So far, nothing from the "traditional" media.

The new chipin is here.



I've thrown in a few bucks, what I can spare at the moment. I know things are tight for most everybody. But every little bit helps.

A Helpful Note for Reporters: Why I Am Not an "Animal Rights Activist" (and neither is that guy, no matter what your lazy editor let you call him)

Dear Journalists:

Activist: An especially active, vigorous proponent of a cause, especially a political cause.

Animal rights: The idea that the most basic interests of non-human animals should be afforded the same consideration as the similar interests of human beings.

Okay, are we clear here? No? I wish I could say I'm surprised. I'll expand. There will be some three-syllable words (including "syllable") so pay attention.

An animal rights activist is someone who expends substantial time and energy in the political and social arena advancing the proposition that a dog, chicken, ebola, non-human primate, cuttlefish, etc. has moral claims on human beings that are ethically indistinguishable from the moral claim that one human being has on the conduct of another human being.

Someone who just kind of vaguely thinks that "equal rights" for cute animals is a good idea and doesn't do much about it -- no rallying, canvassing, protesting, letter-writing, petition-circulating, Thanksgiving dinner-ruining, lobbying, campaigning, megaphone-wielding -- is not an "activist." Not eating at McDonalds is not activism.

This guy -- probably an "activist."

Someone who likes animals, loves animals, works with animals, makes a career of animals, volunteers with animals, rescues animals from adversity, is not on that basis, either a political/social activist or a believer in the political/philosophical doctrine popularly referred to as "animal rights."

Indeed, most people who work closely with animals (as careers or as part of a serious avocation) and understand the difference between the radical philosophical doctrine of "animal rights" and the mainstream proposition that people ought to treat animals humanely explicitly do not support the doctrine of animal rights. This appears to have something broadly to do with actually hands-on mastery of skills and knowledge about specific kinds of animals interfacing with an appreciation of what repercussions a gormless equivalency would have on those animals' actual lives. In other words, animal experts for the most part reject (the popular notion of) animal rights because they like animals too much and understand them too well to abandon them to the enthusiasms of knowledge-free activists who are in love with their own notions about what is good for animals.

This guy -- not an "activist"

Environmentalism -- even when the environmentalist is absolutely an activist, and is trying to do things like protect condors from DDT or wolves from Sarah Palin in a Piper Cub -- is not "animal rights." Aldo Leopold hunted his whole damned life, before and after the revelation of the fierce green fire.

A daft looney who makes her tiny dog wear tafetta dresses, insists that a clinically insane Capuchin monkey that has been ripped from his real mother's breast is her "son," or lives holed up with 80 cats (in squalor or not) is not an animal rights activist. She's just a daft looney who finds animals to be convenient as well as helpless to avoid her deranged projections.

Here's a partial list of animal-related professions and, shall we say, avocations, whose practitioners are typically not "animal rights activists," despite journalists' proclamations to the contrary:

Veterinarian -- not an animal rights activist
Horse lover -- not an animal rights activist
Search and rescue dog handler -- not an animal rights activist
Cat-show hobbyist -- not an animal rights activist
Zookeeper -- not an animal rights activist
Breed rescue volunteer -- not an animal rights activist
Humane enforcement officer -- not an animal rights activist
Wildlife rehabilitator -- not an animal rights activist
Dog trainer -- not an animal rights activist
Prosecuting attorney -- not an animal rights activist
Doting pet owner -- not an animal rights activist
Government kennel inspector -- not an animal rights activist
Neighbor who complains because you are beating your cat -- not an animal rights activist
Animal shelter employee -- not an animal rights activist
Forest ranger -- not an animal rights activist

Are you getting this down in your little reporter notebook? Too many to remember? Let me make it easier for you:

Stop calling everyone who works with animals or tries to make the world better for them an animal rights activist. Because it pisses us off.

Unless someone tells you (you can ask)* that he is an animal rights activist, he probably isn't.

Even if he does tell you that this is what he is, you should follow up with two lines of inquiry:

1) Does this person engage in sustained activism -- political or social conduct that is more than ordinarily frequent, vigorous, and intense -- in order to advance...

2) ... the notion of legal, political, and social equivalency of the interests of non-human animals relative to those of members of homo sapiens?

Unless you can answer yes and yes upon exploring those two questions, cool it with the "animal rights activist."

You should probably use a grain of salt when anyone in the entertainment industry or the Why-the-hell-is-this-idiot-famous industry gets naked on a PeTA billboard. Activist? Maybe. Whore? Definitely. Career in need of a boost? Ding ding ding ding ding ... The same whore is going to order medallions of veal for dinner tonight and will be sporting a baby panda-skin hoodie the first time the "It" designer throws one at her.

I'm not going to get into further details here. I'm not going to explain that animal "rights" is a misnomer when applied to this political/philosophical camp, because the doctrine is actually a form of unreformed radical Utilitarianism that rejects the notion of rights for anyone and substitutes a pleasure/pain calculus that does not respect individual boundaries. I'm not going to give you a condensed history of the animal welfare movement or explain the difference. I'm not going to dust off my political philosopher hat and explore what a rights-based construct of our obligations towards non-human animals might entail. (It would probably be a Rawlsian/Kantian framework, with some touchiness in the hard details.) I'm not going to lay out all the reasons why PeTA is not, in fact, an organization with any expertise about animals or a sliver of moral standing to speak for them,** or why veganism is not the same thing as eating while mindful of one's environmental impact or effect on animal welfare. I'm not going to expose HSUS and ASPCA and Best Friends Animal Sanctuary as unprincipled fund-raising mills that snatch food from the mouths of puppies and kittens in animal shelters nationwide.

I'm not even going to promise to find the next "journalist" who invokes "Fluffy and Fido" in his next pet-related article and beat him until his liver turns black.

Another day, another savage mauling. For today, just knock it the hell off with the "animal rights activist."

______________

* Our former neighbor Larry actually introduced himself that way. Swear to Dog, his first words to us when we moved in to Baldwin were, "Hi, I'm Larry, I'm an animal rights activist."

Seriously, how does one respond to that?

He was walking his nice little shepherd mix, Duchess, at the time. Duchess was wearing an improperly-fitted chain collar that Larry didn't know how to use, so it was a true "choke collar." And remained so. Poor Duchess. PeTA didn't approve of training her. She never got off that leash.

** And thus, why any reporter who quotes PeTA about any animal welfare issue is a lazy sack of shite who should have his space-bar thumbs cut off and fed to the ferrets.

A Profane Open Letter to the Leader of the Free World, and an Apology to My Readers

Dear President Obama,

You know I love you.* Now shut the fuck up.

Okay, I gave this some time to cool, so I've now read that you did not actually call up the Philly Eagles in order to congratulate them on guessing right about the profit potential of a paroled sociopath.

Nevertheless.

When you call up an executive in the corporate entertainment world -- which, I might point out, as the POTUS you should not be wasting time doing -- you stay on your goddamn message. No frills. I understand your message was supposed to be "Good job making your stadium less of an environmental catastrophe."

But that's not what Jeff Lurie went running to the media to crow about, is it?

No, Lurie spun your phone call into a Presidential endorsement of loving† the puppy-hanger while maybe hating the puppy-hanging faster than a Kensington whore flips a BJ into a crack hit.

Are you surprised?

The White House hasn't denied that you talked about this parolee, or that you used tired cliches such as "second chance" and "level playing field" in referring to the hiring of a creature with bloody hands to catch the ball, run with the ball, throw the ball.** For far more money than you make.

So I reckon you did say that bullshit. Dumbass.‡

It's less clear whether you used the hackneyed language of "redemption," in your boy-talk with Lurie. If so, let's be perfectly clear about something.

Catching the ball, throwing the ball, running with the ball -- done well, done poorly, not done at all -- is not a morally relevant activity.

Jebus doesn't endorse men who play boys' games, or the mega-corporations who own employ them.

But more important, catching the ball, throwing the ball, running with the ball does not and cannot "redeem" anyone as a moral agent.

I'm going to repeat that with smaller words for you sports fans: Good at football not same as good man.

The usual sequence in, for the sake of argument, the "Christian" formulation is sincere repentance -- meaning that one is sorry one did wrong, not sorry that one got caught or suffered consequences -- followed by penance -- that is, working hard for the benefit of others (often the victims of one's misdeeds, or their proxies) for no personal gain and under no extrinsic compulsion in order to make things right -- leading to personal transformation into the kind of moral agent who is no longer capable of the kind of wrongdoing that led to the need for redemption.

Just, you know, ferinstance.

As for "comebacks," these are noteworthy -- not necessarily morally, but of interest -- when the "setback" that provides the stage is extrinsic, or at least not a direct and easily avoidable result of the staggering moral perversity of the one who has "suffered" the setback.

One can perhaps be inspired when an athlete comes back after blowing out a knee. It is not morally relevant in the way that sports writers like to sell, but it may speak to character traits such as perseverance that we generally favor and to which we aspire.

From what has Vick "come back?" Merely the cushioned, mitigated, kid-gloved semi-consequences of his own freely-chosen, focused and sustained moral depravity. From a token prison sentence for a few of his crimes, and unconscionable legal and media gloss over the worst of them.

Also, just saying, court-ordered community service is not a mitzvah. It's part of the goddamn sentence. Completing it is not optional, so you don't get extra credit points. It is not intended to "clean up your image" on the way to lucrative endorsement contracts.

There is, likewise, no "heroism" in apparently discontinuing ongoing acts of violent atrocity after being stopped by force of law. Most of us manage to refrain on a daily basis without threat of prison. Our "self-restraint" is not praiseworthy, even in these grade-inflated times. It's not even self-restraint, because normal people do not ever fucking want to electrocute dogs in our swimming pools.

I am quite certain, Mr. President, that as the doting father of two daughters, you would not go out of your way to praise an employer who hires an unrepentant serial child torture-murderer to perform any job -- and because he's good at it, to pay him $5.2 million. You wouldn't justify the crime because the murderer had served time, even if he'd served time for the actual crime. (It bears repeating, Vick has not).

Doesn't the same consideration extend, in its way, to your dog?

While the tradition of political-pet-as-prop is too longstanding to ignore (nearly as venerable as the political wife/accessory), you seem to be genuinely fond of that hairy beastie Ted Kennedy gave your kids. It's hard not to be, right? That's the thing about dogs, isn't it? Like children, they disarm you; even despite yourself, they bring out some of the best core parts of the real person in there. For most of us, that's the open, trusting, innocent, unselfconscious giver and receiver of love. And with a dog as a catalyst, we might even bring a little bit more of that creamy center out into the rest of our lives, where the people around us can enjoy it.

It is that part of ourselves that bleeds when we hear of a child or a dog who is tortured. And that blood that rises into primal outrage when we see that the abuser will not be held accountable.

Cogitate on what Michael Vick's dogs -- loving, trusting, loyal dogs no different from the "cuter" fluffier kind -- brought out from the inside of their owner, what they revealed to the world about what occupies that center. And then tell me what the prize is for redeeming that ticket.

Sincerely,

An American

_________________________

* This is by no means unconditional.

† Or at least exploiting for execrable profits, as long as that keeps working out.

** Good thing Vick can do all three. No dog in his right mind would fetch it back to him.

‡ If Bush had done the same thing, the world would have found out what a really profane open letter looks like. And you know, that's not fair. So thanks for reminding me of that about myself. I'm going to pay attention to that.

* * *

An Apology to my Readers

Yesterday I published this post.

When I arrived home last night, I found a backlog of comments. (Comments are now moderated, as the spammers have honored this blog with their love). Almost every single comment expressed sincere white-hot outrage at the British judicial system and the RSPCA for this obvious miscarriage of justice. If you think the post above is profane ...

A more careful reader -- or perhaps just a person who has read more of my work and can see it coming -- catches the conceit of the post.

Because the "news article" is a fabrication, and was meant to be recognized as such.

It began with a friend's musing about what the general public would think of Michael Vick if he had gleefully tortured and killed animals other than pit bulls -- something fluffy and "cute." Kittens, perhaps.

Because people get caught up in the dog fighting aspect of his crime, and fail to stay focused on the psychopathic torture-killing of the dogs who disappointed their "master."

I took it further. What if Vick wasn't any good at football?

In other words, what if someone non-famous was treated as Vick has been?

It is too implausible that someone non-rich would be dealt with thusly, so I kept that part, and set the stage in a foreign land.

I asked a British friend with an eye for written nuance to edit the thought-experiment; she made it read more authentically British, and further, British second-rate newspaper.

I'm not going to name these co-conspirators, because the end result is all my fault.

I became rather pleased with the result as a piece of collaborative writing, and lost track of its likely effect on readers. Having constructed something that was too convincing, I thoughtlessly set a trap for them. That was never my intention. I honestly thought that this would play out like many articles in The Onion*; that is, initial outrage or astonishment, followed by "Oh, it's the bloody Onion. Got me again you jerks." But of course, this blog doesn't provide the context that an Onion header does.

I honestly figured that "Victoria Michaels" would jump out at people and cue them. I was wrong. Too subtle when someone is RWA. (Reading While Angry.)

The names of her co-defendants and mother -- also derived from the Vick case. The name of the judge and kennel, invented whole-cloth. The RSPCA, a real organizations that, as far as I know, has never made such a deal with the Devil, unlike its US "analogue." Swindon and District Animal Haven, a real charity that, as far as I know, is worthy. Holloway prison, Swindon, Wiltshire, Goatacre -- real places, where Victoria Michaels has never lived.

After sleeping on it, I've decided not to release the many comments posted yesterday. A big thanks to the spammers who set me up to have this time to consider things. It would be terribly disrespectful to "trap" readers -- many of whom I know to be thoughtful people -- and then leave them hanging out in public to look foolish to people who already know "the answer."

I'll release any comments made after a link to this post is active at the top of yesterday's.

I'm sincerely sorry.

________________

* Without being, you know, funny in any way.

Falling Through When the Whole Damned Thing is Cracks

The USDA has released a report on its own puppy-mill inspection results and practices.

You can download the PDF here.

From the report's executive summary:

In this audit, one objective was to review AC’s (Animal Care's) enforcement process against dealers that violated AWA (Animal Welfare Act). Accordingly, we focused on dealers with a history of violations in the past 3 years.

Another objective was to review the impact of recent changes the agency made to the penalty
assessment process. We identified the following major deficiencies with APHIS’ (Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service) administration of AWA:

• AC’s Enforcement Process Was Ineffective Against Problematic Dealers. AC’s enforcement process was ineffective in achieving dealer compliance with AWA and regulations, which are intended to ensure the humane care and treatment of animals. The agency believed that compliance achieved through education and cooperation would result in long-term dealer compliance and, accordingly, it chose to take little or no enforcement action against most violators.

However, the agency’s education efforts have not always been successful in deterring problematic dealers from violating AWA. During FYs 2006-2008, at the re-inspection of 4,250 violators, inspectors found that 2,416 repeatedly violated AWA, including some that ignored minimum care standards. Therefore, relying heavily on education for serious or repeat violators—without an appropriate level of enforcement—weakened the agency’s ability to protect the animals.

• AC Inspectors Did Not Cite or Document Violations Properly To Support Enforcement Actions.

Many inspectors were highly committed, conducting timely and thorough inspections and making significant efforts to improve the humane treatment of covered animals. However, we noted that 6 of 19 inspectors did not correctly report all repeat or direct violations (those that are generally more serious and affect the animals’ health). Consequently, some problematic dealers were inspected less frequently. In addition, some inspectors did not always adequately describe violations in their inspection reports or support violations with photos. Between 2000 and 2009, this lack of documentary evidence weakened AC’s case in 7 of the 16 administrative hearings involving dealers. In discussing these problems with regional management, they
explained that some inspectors appeared to need additional training in identifying violations and collecting evidence.

• APHIS’ New Penalty Worksheet Calculated Minimal Penalties. Although APHIS previously agreed to revise its penalty worksheet to produce “significantly higher” penalties for violators of AWA, the agency continued to assess minimal penalties that did not deter violators. This occurred because the new worksheet allowed reductions up to 145 percent of the maximum penalty. While we are not advocating that APHIS assess the maximum penalty, we found that at a time when Congress tripled the authorized maximum penalty to “strengthen fines for violations,” the actual penalties were 20 percent less using the new worksheet as compared to the worksheet APHIS previously used.

• APHIS Misused Guidelines to Lower Penalties for AWA Violators. In completing penalty worksheets, APHIS misused its guidelines in 32 of the 94 cases we reviewed to lower the penalties for AWA violators. Specifically, it (1) inconsistently counted violations; (2) applied “good faith” reductions without merit; (3) allowed a “no history of violations” reduction when the violators had a prior history; and (4) arbitrarily changed the gravity of some violations and the business size. AC told us that it assessed lower penalties as an incentive to encourage violators to pay a stipulated amount rather than exercise their right to a hearing.

I'm not going to have a chance to read the whole thing tonight.

However, I have one question.

In what universe does the person who kept this dog in this condition for at least a week:

Not get arrested on the spot for felony animal cruelty?

I'm serious. If your neighbor's pet was chained in the yard suffering from this festering, untreated injury, would he not get a visit from the law? Would you not make this happen? Are federal employees conducting licensing inspections not mandated reporters when they observe a felony in progress?

Not the Big Bad inspector who can write you up. The big bad policeman with the gun on his hip who takes you to jail. Where the bikers and potheads and bar-fighters take a dim view of people who hurt children and animals.

This willful act of cruelty took place in Oklahoma, which does have a first-offense felony animal cruelty law. The federal inspector -- our tax dollars at work -- did not trouble himself to notify the appropriate local law enforcement officials. And at the time the report was written, the puppymiller had not even been fined for the license violation.


This willful act of cruelty, also in Oklahoma, similarly resulted in no criminal charges, no write-up for a "direct violation," and no documentation by the inspector that would allow the agency, "to identify the animals during re-inspection to determine if they were treated or just disposed of. "

What's wrong with this little dog? I thought she had an untreated suite of tumors or cysts, or some exotic skin condition, until I read the caption.

Her face is covered with engorged ticks. So many that the inspector who didn't see fit to cite the puppymill operator for the violation was, "concerned about their hematocrit [a red blood cell ratio indicating anemic conditions].”

Concerned, but not concerned enough to, you know, do her goddamned job.

I'll be going over this report thoroughly tomorrow. For an internal agency document, it appears to be blunt and honest about the shortcomings in the current inspection system. It correctly identifies, as well, the enormous loophole presented by direct-to-consumer internet sales of puppies. I'm hopeful that it represents a commitment to agency reform, to requiring inspectors to do the job the taxpayers pay them to perform.

If federal and state inspectors did their jobs, if police and humane enforcement officers, prosecutors, and mandated reporters did their jobs and enforced the cruelty laws, if citizens reported violators and ensured that law enforcement followed through, we'd be light-years further along in meeting our barest obligations to the animals who depend on us for everything.

For those of you who are upset

That the Supreme Court of the United States struck down a federal law that criminalized the creation, sale or possession of "depictions of animal cruelty," please attend:

[T]he First Amendment protects against the Government; it does not leave us at the mercy of noblesse oblige. We would not uphold an unconstitutional statute merely because the Government promised to use it responsibly. (US v Stevens)

You can read the entire decision by going to this page and clicking for the PDF of United States v. Stevens.

I haven't been able to count out how many posts on this blog made me a felon* because they depicted conduct that is illegal somewhere.

Here's what the law actually said:

[T]he term ‘depiction of animal cruelty’ means any visual or auditory depiction, including any photograph, motion-picture film, video recording, electronic image, or sound recording of conduct in which a living animal is intentionally maimed, mutilated, tortured, wounded, or killed, if such conduct is illegal under Federal law or the law of the State in which the creation, sale, or possession takes place, regardless of whether the maiming, mutilation, torture, wounding, or killing took place in the State

This one is a slam-dunk for the First Amendment, and no, I seriously do not know what Alito was smoking. Though the decision did come down on 420 Day.

And the dude who won his appeal? Sold videos depicting dog fights. Possibly Not Our Sort of Person. Dunno. Haven't seen the videos, don't know anything more about him. Mr. Stevens got sentenced to three years for making videos from other people's footage. Three YEARS.

How much time did Block Courage Award winner Michael Vick serve for personally drowning and beating to death his losing dogs?

Oh yeah. Not one day.**
___________________

* Subject to the whimsy of any Federal prosecutor with a bug up his ass about something.

** Stop emailing me. Vick served time for racketeering. When he pled, the state dropped the cruelty charges. He didn't serve a millisecond for the dog abuse.

Oh, does that matter?

From the Toronto City News:

It's usually the perfect combination - a loving youngster and a gentle dog.

But something went horribly wrong at an Oshawa home Tuesday and now a three-year-old girl is facing the possibility of having plastic surgery.

Police say the youngster was being cared for by neighbours at 506 Lanlark Drive just after 1pm, and was petting a normally friendly pit bull.

Cops aren't sure what provoked the animal, but it suddenly turned on the child, mauling the tot from her eye to her cheek.

The toddler was rushed to Lakeridge Health Centre, where plastic surgeons began examining the damage. It's believed her eyesight will be O.K. but she may require surgical repairs to her cheek.

The same people looking after the child were also looking after the dog for the day.

"They were petting the dog," relates Richard Ovila, the babysitter's husband. "I don't know if they were patting together or what, when all of a sudden the dog turned around and took her on the left cheek."

The dog has been seized by animal control and those who know the creature are baffled. Pit bulls are generally among the most gentle of dogs and are usually excellent with children.

"It was a very serious dog bite," confirms Dave Selby of Durham Regional Police.

The youngster was surprised by what happened and reportedly continually asked the doctors who were treating her why the dog bit her. But like police, they didn't have those answers, either.

"It's just a very unfortunate incident and obviously our thoughts and prayers are with that young girl right now to make sure she can get through this situation and hopefully not have too many damages as she grows older," Selby concludes.

It's not clear what will become of the canine, but the owner is the neighbour's son and he has no idea about what's happened to his beloved pet. He's currently away on vacation down south for March Break.

Authorities hope this tragic event will provide a lesson for others.

"The best thing to do is keep your children away from unknown dogs or strange dogs that you don't know their personality or behaviour," suggests Tre Smith of the Toronto Humane Society.

The little girl has been taken to the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto for further assessment. She'll be staying there until at least Wednesday.

Something is off, you say?

Why, how could the gentle pet who "turned on" the toddler be a pit bull, when Ontario has criminalized them?

Where are the cries for the dog's death, the smug Itoldyasos, the obligatory accounts of locking jaws?

Why isn't anyone being investigated for dogfighting? Cited for harboring a vicious and dangerous animal?

Oh, sorry. My bad.

My computer must have a virus that searches text and autoreplaces. "Pit bull" for "golden retriever."

Feel better now? No?

This toddler will grow up with a scar on her cheek, and maybe her psyche, but secure in the knowledge that the Ontario government has wisely protected her from all possible harm.

Afraid to Ask What Happened to His Tail

A bomb-detecting dog named Treo has been awarded Britain's Dickin medal for his wartime service.





The US DoD doesn't permit animals to be honored for their service in this way. The official line, when medals that had been awarded were revoked early in WWII, was that to do so profanes the medals of human service members.

There are a lot of soldiers and veterans out there who owe their lives to a patrol dog or bomb dog who are quick to differ with this attitude.

Is it just me, or is there something neurologically wrong with Treo? Anyone know the story there? I'm almost afraid of what the answer might be.

I Didn't Read the News for a Couple of Days, And This is What I Find When I Do

Andrew Joseph Stack was not a "tax protester."

He was not a freedom fighter. (How many of the gormless Teabaggers who have proclaimed him so were screaming that the pathetic Taint Bomber should have never been read his rights?)

He was not a common criminal, garden-variety murderer-of-a-stranger-who-did-him-no-harm.

He was not "just a nutjob."

This dead white lying thieving tax-dodging murdering arsonist mofo was a terrorist.

Why is this even a question?

Angry bastard flies an airplane into a government office, killing individual human beings because he wants to force political change through fear -- that's a terrorist, folks. That's the feckin' definition of terrorist. And all the dumbasses who call him a hero need a one-way trip to Gitmo for fomenting insurrection against the legitimate government.

I do not give a shit that he was a WASP terrorist.

Pour sand in his jockey shorts and give him a spray-on tan, and how many "journalists" would be fretting over what to call him?

Flip This Dog for Profit: Mandatory Edition

HT to Fugly Horse of the Day.

Here's how dogs pulled from the Los Angeles pounds are carefully "placed" by a charitable animal rescue "organization:"



Well, at least the price is high enough that it's unlikely anyone is buying them for animal experiments or fight bait.

Check out rescues as carefully as you would vet a private breeder. A pretty website is not the same thing as a solid reputation.

Now -- will the ersatz rescuers in California stop sending dogs to this woman for resale? Or is it "out of sight, out of mind?"

I'm taking some heat from other animal welfare advocates about my skepticism regarding the proposed "Oreo's Law" in New York State.

Please note that word. Skepticism. Not opposition. Though that could change.

The way to convince a skeptic is, possibly not to scream about how everyone who is agin' us eats puppies for breakfast.

Advocates for the proposed law claim that the requirement that "rescues" have a 501(c)3 designation and their principles have no criminal convictions or active complaints for animal abuse are sufficient safeguards for the dogs that would be subject to mandatory no-questions-asked release.

Do they have any idea how rare convictions for animal abuse are? How many serial abusers dodge conviction over and over through no virtue of their own?

In fact, most animal welfare advocates do know how rare and difficult it is to get a conviction, especially when an abuser or hoarder has set him or her self up as a "rescue." They are the first to open up a litany of tales of the ones that got away, and are still out there running scams and inflicting cruelty.

Some claim, presenting no evidence, that the ASPCA maliciously killed the proposed law's namesake out of spite -- and not, as the A claims, because the dog was too dangerous to keep alive.

Concerns about the competence and stability of Pets Alive, the upstate rescue that went media-nuclear when ASPCA declined to give them this dog, are countered with "Well, it's not really about Oreo and Pets Alive."

Um, yeah ... it is.

The bill as it is currently proposed would have required the ASPCA to turn over what they say was a very scary dog to an organization that thinks this is a great story about their ability to rehab a "difficult" animal.

I'm not a huge fan of the ASPCA -- mostly because of their deceptive and manipulative fundraising practices. But they do seem to do a pretty good job at behavior intervention and assessment for the dogs in their NYC shelter. And they are a friend to the pit bull.

The only way the ASPCA could prevent the dog from being taken over by people who were surprised that chasing a feral around a pen trying to pet her didn't work out as a rehab program would be to have her adjudicated as a dangerous dog. Pronounced vicious by a court.

Of course, the NY court system has nothing better to do than review testimony about whether or not every dog in a shelter is or is not vicious.

This would certainly not take years in each and every case, forcing the publicly-funded shelters to keep dangerous dogs alive in conditions that cannot possibly provide an acceptable quality of life. Oh no, these cases will jump to the front of the dockets and be resolved in days! And the scrabbling sound in my attic these days is leprechauns!

The standard for a court of law to declare a dog vicious and order its death against the will of its owner should be very high.

The standard for the owner of an animal -- including a shelter -- to make a decision about potential danger from, and quality of life for, that animal has always been significantly different.

Does any animal owner really want to change either of those principles? How will that improve animal welfare?

Here's a thought. If I could not, by force of law, make a decision to euthanize a rescue animal that I had determined to be dangerous and/or incapable of enjoying an acceptable quality of life -- an animal that I, or my organization, owns -- then I wouldn't do rescue. Period. Let someone else have all the responsibility and none of the authority.

I don't think I'm the only one. Work your way forward for the unintended consequence of the week.

People who dismiss objections to sloppy thinking behind novel legislation with the assurance that "the courts will provide recourse" have no idea how long the courts take to do anything.

Nor the expense and disruption involved when a nonprofit or government agency must contend with nuisance actions, including maliciously-brought actions. Money and time that should be devoted to caring for animals gets diverted into lawyering.

I perceive that I am playing Cassandra when it comes to most animal welfare advocates. I'm used to that in every area of life by now. What's worse is the revisionism a year or ten later, when I should be able to pull out the toldyaso.

I join the irrepressible Fugs in the title of this post.

What a Tyro Does ...

... when faced with a complex, important task that she won't admit is far beyond her capabilities, requires a knowledge set she has not begun to master, and is not susceptible to her pin-headed ideology.

Polishing the Turd that is Cranberry

Professor Chaos has the cover story in this week's Pittsburgh City Paper.

I don't care how purty a developer talks about "greenways."

When I see a man with a tripod and a theodolite at the edge of my hayfield, I find the key to the gun safe.

My last day on the Graham farm in Cranberry was a day or so after I returned from my Houlie Puppyseed trip to the upper Midwest. I dropped off one foster dog and delivered two puppies to their new owners. Then I came home.

It was also only a few weeks after the death of Mel, which has left a jagged hole in the universe that will never heal over.

I took Pip, Moe, Rosie and Sophia for a walk. Since Rosie was a wee tot, I drove to the coffin plant rather than walk them all up the street and across Rochester Road.

We set down our usual path into the woods, where a few weeks before I'd taken Rosie and all her siblings on a Puppy Outward Bound Adventure.



And then, quite abruptly, there was no woods. No path. Nothing.

A moonscape.

In the distance, a mountain of wood chips.

And a machine into which trees disappeared and wood chips shat forth.

Another jagged hole in the universe.

I pulled out my phone and called Professor Chaos. Between sobs I told him that we needed to start looking for land. Somewhere else. Right now.

Photo Phriday: Whew -- that was close

The turkeys are all still with us. Proof:


Dale thrives. She is so fat she cannot cluck (she grunts) and I periodically have to extract her when she gets stuck in a regular-sized nest box. As the slowest hen, she became a "favorite" of the adolescent former cross-dressing, gang-raping roosters. Roosters don't mind fat chicks.


What, you say something is wrong here?

"You know, there are certain days that remind me of why I ran for this office -- and then, there are moments like this, where I pardon a turkey and send it to Disneyland."

-- Barack Obama

Dat's why we had to move to New Yawk for to get a Bill o' Rights

HT to Shirley over at YesBiscuit for this story about free speech in the City of Brotherly Love.

Kori Martin is a life long, die-hard Eagles fan. She is also an animal lover; therein lays her conundrum. While gravely disappointed at the signing of Michael Vick by the Philadelphia Eagles, Martin still supports her home team but her experience while attending a home game at Lincoln Field yesterday has her absolutely flabbergasted!

While entering the arena to go to her family's season ticket holder seats a security guard told her she could not enter the arena wearing the shirt she purchased from pitbullgear.com because the anti-Vick message would be offensive to players and other people.

Seems that Michael Vick is tough enough to drown a puppy or beat a losing pitbull to death with his so-manly bare hands, but his sensitive feelings might be bruised by a lady in a t-shirt.

As the Examiner correctly notes, there was nothing profane or libelous or graphic on the shirt.

The Examiner incorrectly calls for the Eagles owner to "apologize" to this season-ticket holder, who did not know that the First Amendment does not apply to a paying customer attending a public event at a stadium owned by the City of Philadelphia and largely financed by the city and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania (my tax dollars at work, thank you).

The only acceptable "apology" to football fans and the majority non-sociopathic Eagles roster is to fire Vick and let him "rehabilitate" by sweeping floors for minimum wage -- the fate of many a released jailbird who has done nothing violent, and also, a perfectly honorable job when performed by an honorable person.

Once again, TGFTO (Thank God for The Onion), which absolutely nails it with this story.

PHILADELPHIA—Michael Vick's pregame pep talk Sunday, in which he recounted the events of a brutal 2004 dogfight between his pit bull terrier Zebro and rival pit bull Maniac, failed to inspire his teammates in any way whatsoever, Eagles team sources reported.

Vick, who was playing in his first NFL game since serving an 18-month prison sentence, called the 10-minute story "really motivational," and reportedly failed to understand why his graphic recounting of how Zebro ripped out Maniac's larynx caused teammates to stagger out of the player tunnel and onto Lincoln Financial Field with their heads hanging.

We can only hope that the real players forced to share a roster with a man who finds joy in electrocuting dogs in a swimming pool also share the outlook of The Onion's fictionalized Gaither:

"The only reason the Chiefs scored in the second half was because I was still thinking about what Mike said during halftime about 'trunking,'" said linebacker Omar Gaither, referring to the practice of putting two pit bulls in a car trunk, closing the door, and allowing them to fight for 15 minutes until one is dead. "Why is this freak on my team? Why are people cheering for him? Seriously, answer my questions. Why?

Rochester Speaketh With Forked Tongue

Sioux City pit-bull hater and vicious dog owner Aaron Rochester, author of that city's gormless breed ban, is going to let the city kill his biting Labrador as a way of

reciprocating the loyalty and devotion of man's best friend

humbly acknowledging that even councilors aren't above the law

keeping the streets of Sioux City safe for jogging

recognizing that the Constitution does not permit ex post facto laws

Oh wait, no he's not. Yes he is. No he's not. WTF? Hey jagoff, you gonna kill your dog or not?

Oh hell, I don't know. And apparently, neither does the newspaper reporter who covered the latest Council meeting:

Rochester continues to say he will not appeal to Woodbury County District Court, but he said last week he wanted changes to the city's one-strike vicious-animal law, which says an animal that bites someone and is ruled vicious must be put down.

So instead of suing the government of which he is a part over a law that he may in fact have written, he's going to try to rewrite the law to issue his vicious biter a get-out-of-jail-free card?

Rochester said he will wait out the 30-day appeal window before having his dog put down.

Rochester seems, incredibly, to argue that he should be able to write an ex post facto law that will majickally render his unprovoked biter not vicious because the council previously extended the deadline for citizens subjects of Sioux City to register their Communists pit bulls, after having already stolen and killed some other people's pets.

The logic appears to be that, since we didn't kill everyone's harmless pets, only some people's harmless pets, I get to legislate my vicious biter back onto the front porch. Only killing some people's harmless pets is precedent, see.

Can someone who is more fluent than me in Jenyoowine Frontier Gibberish make some sense of what the mayor, Mike Hobart, is reported to have said?

Hobart seemed sympathetic to Rochester's plight when he said, "The Supreme Court often has set aside judgements (sic) on capital punishment -- on cruel and unusual punishment."

However, he said, "I agree with Jim. I think the perception would be out there if we do something for a councilman" that the council members were giving special treatment to one of their own.

"What I'm most uncomfortable with is my own stupidity in not understanding the law -- that it was a one-bite issue," Hobart said. "I thought we would weed out a good dog who does something stupid."

Dick Williams said the animal ordinance is flawed. His comments prompted Hobart to say, "I have represented murderers and those who have done heinous crimes. They are docile. Anybody, including a dog, can act docile."

Sioux City Council. I wouldn't kick a dog in the ass with them.

Gaia and Luna

I was three years old.

In the living room of my mother's cousin's home in Canada -- family vacation.

How often did a toddler's parents park her in front of a television set and command: Watch! Remember!

I remember it more vividly than I remember my high school graduation, my own wedding, the morning of September 11.

Of all the generations of homo sapiens who have lived on this planet, of all the generations who are yet to come, we are the ones who experienced this singular moment.

Our planet became no longer The World. Never just A World. Our World. A whole thing, one among many, and the only home for all of us.

In 2009 dollars, the entire Apollo program cost about 20% of what we've spent waging war against a country that never attacked us, and hunting for one contemptible criminal who remains free.

I have a secret ambition. In sixty years, I want to be that crochety old broad, that ornery centarian to whom reporters flock for The Interview.

The old woman on her nineteenth-century farm who remembers The Day of the twentieth. Of the millenium.

Will one of those reporters drop in by video link from her home on Mars?

Do we have the greatness of will to make that happen?

They Also Serve

National War Dogs Monument

A deep injustice righted

Becoming Ourselves, Again

In which the blogger sincerely promises that this will be the last political post for a while, and commits to a return to dog stories, some meaty training topics, and perhaps more funny pictures of chickens. And in which I apologize in advance to my relatives for mining family history for a metaphor about America.


The core of conservatism -- real conservatism, not the loopy, vicious pseudo-Christian slash 'n' burn pre-millennialism that has been claiming the title in this country for the past, say, 27 years -- is a deeply-held belief that the way things are is the way things ought to be; or at least, that the way things are is preferable to the uncertainty of many unexplored possibilities. Real conservatism is, therefore, based in a profound love of this world as she is, and a respect for the gifts of the past.

The core of liberalism -- real liberalism, not some whinging self-absorbed reflex of pale political correctitude -- is a deeply-held belief that the world can be better, and that this end must be achieved through the earthly efforts of human beings. Real liberalism, therefore, is based on a profound love of potentials and possibilities, and an optimism for the promise of the future.

Those both sound pretty good to me.

I live in a nation that was audaciously founded to embrace both. I'm fine with that. Dynamic tension keeps life interesting, but not too interesting.

I also live in a nation in which the polymath genius who asserted to the world as self-evident truth the Enlightenment heresy that "All men are created equal," owned human beings as chattel -- owned his own natural children just as he owned rare books and fine wine and merino sheep. A nation in which, as well, the architect of the Constitution owned human beings.

I am not fine with that. Conserving that status quo is not okay by me. That was not being "of one's time." Nostalgia for those Good Ol' Days -- not cool. America, as in Shining City on the Hill America, as in Beacon to the World America -- America had a long way to go, a lot of progress to be made, before she fulfilled her promise to her people and her world and became herself. And things really did get quite a bit worse before they started very slowly and fitfully and with much fire and blood getting better, which supplies even the most committed progressive with some perspective about why some people do get awfully nostalgic for some other Good Ol' Days and always think everything sucks more now. Sometimes it does. The cotton gin was not a gift to the moral development and advancement of mankind.

It is the optimism of liberalism that could see not just what was wrong about that disturbingly familiar-looking young man waiting at Jefferson's table, but what was right about the sentiment that we are endowed with the those unalienable rights. Progress is not measured in how far we have come from the injustices and atrocities of the past, but how close we draw to the promise of our ideals.

Because my President has, almost in the hour of his victory, lost his grandmother -- his rootstock on this earth -- a word about my own maternal grandparents. And why I think that, despite some of what I'm going to tell you, I believe that tonight's historic victory for America honors both their memories, and the memories of so many of our honored ancestors.



My grandmother, Caroline Toso Shoenfelt, was a lifelong Democrat in a pretty Republican little town in the Western Reserve of Ohio. I don't remember her talking politics much, but I do remember that she worked at the polls in every election. Civic duty was more prominent than partisanship. It's not clear to me that there was a difference for her.

When I was a single graduate student, she tried in all seriousness to fix me up with a certain obscenely famous and ungodly talented recluse cartoonist who lived in the town. "Heather, he's single, and he's rich now, and I happen to know he's a Democrat!" What more could a Gramma want for her granddaughter?

Caroline Shoenfelt was also, during my lifetime, a Congregationalist -- Hudson being something of an outpost of New England in the nearly Midwest. What I did not know until the recent baptism of my youngest niece was that she had left the Lutheran church -- the Missouri synod, aka Shiite Protestants -- over doctrine. When the minister declared that my niece was born "a child of darkness," my Mom leaned over and whispered (and I paraphrase, but not as much as you might think) "It was shit like that that made your grandmother leave the Lutheran church." Now it happened to be Trinity Sunday when Sean was baptized, meaning that the congregation recited the entire Athanasian Creed. I'd never heard a loyalty oath being administered before, and it was uncomfortable. I had the distinct tactile hallucination of a pike point gently pressing into the small of my back. (Later Ken said I was mistaken, that it was definitely a gladius.) I saw Gramma's point.

She smoked little cherry cigars and drank the occasional Canadian Club, put too much salt on her celery and too much sugar on a bowl of wild strawberries. I inherited only the vice of oversalting; my taste in whiskey is more spendy as I age. She had great legs and skin that did not wrinkle much with age, and I was lucky enough to inherit both.

Robert Shoenfelt worked for Firestone through The War (and after), and also owned an auto repair shop in town. I'm pretty sure he was also a lifelong Democrat, but you know, he never told me that, and I could be entirely mistaken. He tended a huge garden and orchard, worked in metal and wood and photo emulsion and brick and stone, and was a Master Mason -- leading to a cognitive muddle that persisted well into my adulthood about where the practice of actual stonemasonry ended and the practice of Freemasonry began. (I was astonished to learn that most Masons do not know how to set mortar or lay a cornerstone.)

My grandparents' rural property was a few acres, I guess, but to a feral child it was a whole world. Pata cut a network of paths through the overgrown fields with his lawn tractor, and I would disappear into those fields for hours just about as soon as I could toddle off. It wasn't until I was an adolescent that I realized he had mowed those paths for me. I never, never got the slightest impression that a granddaughter was second best to a grandson.

This midwestern mechanic kept a bust of Nefertiti on the console television. Hand-forged a bronze ankh for my mother. Had bookshelves full of arcana, spiritualism, natural history, ecology. I read Silent Spring on my grandparents' living-room floor, and being about eight, cried for the dead birds. They tolerated -- even welcomed -- a swooping, pooping nest of barn swallows on the front porch every summer. They composted when no one had ever heard of it.

Robert Shoenfelt had male pattern baldness and Alzheimer's. My uncle and both of my brothers were lucky enough to inherit the former. If I inherit the latter, I have a friend (no, I am not telling who) who has sworn to put me out of my misery and find some good woman to take care of my husband.

My husband-to-be met my grandfather when Alzheimer's had already reduced him greatly -- but not yet beyond recognition. The core of the man was still there, and it was a good day for him. As we left the house and drove away, Ken turned to me and observed "Your grandfather is a wizard, you know."

Oh yes. I knew.

But.

The conservative says, cleave to what is good in what you have, and embrace all the baggage that is attached.

The liberal says, we must do better to become what we truly are.

My grandfather did not self-censor around the grandkids. And my grandfather indulged many prejudices. At times he seemed to do little else.

I learned from him that Japanese cars were complete shit.

That cats were hateful creatures, suitable for target practice.

That black people were ... I cannot even begin to catalogue the shortcomings of black people. At my beloved Pata's knee, I first heard the injunction to "send them back to Africa." I kid you not. And worse. These lessons did not set. These lessons made me confused at much too tender an age about loving someone utterly and, utterly rejecting some part of him too.

Vile speech in front of little children -- and hateful, unworthy thoughts -- were the slave master's bastard of my grandfather's life.

But things did change.

I took my driving test in a little white Toyota. My grandparents' little white Toyota. Because those Japanese were sure making good little cars now!

One of the last big manly projects Robert Shoenfelt undertook was to put a new roof on the house. And who should join him up there but a tomcat who had been hanging around? Caroline finked him out to the rest of the family -- she heard him talking companionably to the cat while he worked. Caught him petting the cat. That cat was OK. Good company. Not like other cats.

And then there was my parents' friend, Evelyn Chatton.

My mother describes her as "The most truly spiritual and beautiful soul it was my pleasure to call my friend." I remember her as a quiet presence of comfort.

With trepidation -- and I'm sure more than a little fortifying coaching for Evelyn, and cautionary threats for Robert -- they introduced this dignified black lady to Robert, a man who was as his true self, in spiritual resonance with her.



And he loved her, and respected her. And that changed him. Not completely. Not holding hands and singing Kum-bay-ya with Carl Stokes change. That would never come. Since Robert fervently believed in reincarnation, I'm sure he will have or has already had an opportunity to continue to evolve.

That bronze ankh that he crafted for my Mom (the one I'm going to inherit one day, and my nieces will inherit from me)? He labored just as long over its twin, cut from the same slab. The ankh, as the hieroglyph for "a journey" is derived from the shape of a sandal strap. They should be made in pairs.

The other ankh was a gift for Evelyn Chatton.

Tonight I saw my America become, not just a little bit easier to love unreservedly, but more itself. I saw the promise to the world that is America the Big Idea leap forward towards its own realization, and away from the centuries-long betrayal that has been, at various times, America the bully, America the greedy, America the fearful, America the shrill -- and buried deep, but still there, swaggering in its ugliness, America the slave master.

I know that it is hard for a conservative -- a true conservative, one who loves what is so much that changing it seems too perilous to risk -- to face the future without genuine fear right now. The line between an abundance of prudence and clinical paranoia, once so clear, has been erased by years of cynical manipulation. Big changes are coming -- big changes would have come no matter what, but now we have a direction for them, and that seems threatening to those who suspect change on principle.

Step outside. The stars are spectacular over Pennsylvania tonight; maybe they are where you are, too. For all human purposes, they've been there forever, and they'll be there forever after tonight. That thought should calm anyone. Take a deep breath. Think about what it is that we have to conserve in America. Our oldest treasures. One of them begins with an unsupportable, wild-ass assertion: "We hold these truths to be self-evident ..." Another, 18th-century collectivism: "We the People ..."

American conservatives are charged with the difficult task of maintaining the radical propositions enshrined in our civic scriptures and national ideals, from the Mayflower Compact on forward. Guys, you have to conserve liberalism! That's hard to hold down with a fork. But a great task for all Americans, starting on a momentous night when we will begin to

Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain
Seeking a home where he himself is free.

Everybody but me has connections

I can't get hold of a big-ass Obama yard sign, even though I live right next to a polling place.

But the production crew down in the barn apparently has more juice than I do.

Chelsea A. Arthur promises ...

Free eggs for all the kids in Grosse Pointe Farms, Michigan.

Kids, you know what to do:

Can we have international election monitors in Ohio?

Concentrated Evil

From the Gray Lady herself.

OMFG.

Will they be tying damsels to the railroad tracks as well? Drowning puppies?

More from the Indianapolis Star.

And the Great Falls Tribune.

And from CBS News -- why the hell has this not been on the front page of the Pittsburgh papers every day?