In a moderately humorous story, two PETA workers have been charged with abducting a hunting dog. The humorous part is where the owner of the dog was the animal control officer that pulled them over. Try talking your way out of that! They claimed that they thought the dog was lost, but you’ll note that they removed the dog’s radio tracking collar when they picked it up.

A witness alerted the county animal control officer - who happened to own the dog. The officer stopped the vehicle soon after and, finding his dog inside, turned the case over to a colleague, Morris said.

The dog’s radio tracking collar had been removed and was found near where the women reportedly picked up the animal, Morris added.

New developments in an animal cruelty case against PETA employees

Detective Sgt. Jeremy Roberts told the court that during surveillance last June, he watched them pull up to the dumpster and toss several bags of dead animals inside. Then he arrested them.

Roberts says he found more dead animals in the van, a digital camera with pictures of living and dead animals and vials of substances later determined to be drugs used to euthanize animals.

Hinkle and Cook were indicted in October. They are each charged with 21 felony counts of animal cruelty, three counts of obtaining property by false pretenses, and seven counts of littering for illegally disposing of dead animals in a private dumpster.

I’ve never thought highly of PETA, but this case even surprised me. I’ve been following this since I first saw it in June. How exactly do your justify taking animals from a shelter where the might have been adopted in order to immediately euthanize them?

It’s a shame that the animal rights groups have devolved to this level of behavior. While I don’t agree with all of their ideas, they
sometimes have legitimate concerns. Animals are not always treated properly. Any hope of my being sympathetic to their cause though disappears when things like this happen.  I won’t be bullied into supporting ideas or causes.

Backstory: Eco-vigilantes: All in ‘The Family?’ | csmonitor.com

Five days later, through an anonymous communiqué, the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) took credit for the fire that destroyed the facility in July of 1997. But it would be years before the alleged plotters were apprehended. And until then, according to a 65-count indictment announced last week by the US Justice Department, the 11-member group of activists launched 17 similar attacks across Oregon, Wyoming, Washington, and California in what authorities consider one of the most extensive campaigns of “ecoterrorism” in US history.

I’ve written about PETA once or twice already, but they are in the news again. In what appears to be one of their most absurd protests ever, they’re now comparing the death of animals with lynching and concentration camps.

The really odd part is that they seem surprised by the bad reaction they’re getting. Imagine showing pictures of beaten and lynched blacks from the last century and comparing them to pictures of butchered livestock. Then comparing branding of cattle with the branding of people in Nazi Concentration Camps. See the similarities? Neither do I. Apparently I’m not the only one who didn’t like the comparisons.

One man demanded that the NAACP get involved immediately. Five minutes later, Scot X. Esdaile, president of the state and Greater New Haven chapters of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, arrived at the scene, surveyed the photos and blasted the organizers.

“Once again, black people are being pimped. You used us. You have used us enough,” Esdaile said. “Take it down immediately.”

“I am a black man! I can’Â’t compare the suffering of these black human beings to the suffering of this cow,” said Michael Perkins, 47, of New Haven. He stood in front of a photo of butchered livestock hung next to the photo of two lynched black men dangling before a white mob.

“You can’t compare me to a freaking cow,” shouted John Darryl Thompson, 46, of New Haven, inches from Carr’s face. “We don’t care about PETA. You are playing a dangerous game.”

I wasn’t surprised by the hostile responses described in the story, I was surprised by the restraint shown by the viewers. I don’t think I would have been nearly that polite.

Teaching PETA some manners
I particularly liked the comment by “KFC luncher Rusty Smith”. Now that is someone who shares my idea of a good diet.

“I think there’s a place in this world for all of God’s creations … right next to the mashed potatoes.”

Losing the Iraq War - Can the left really want us to?
Christopher Hitchens sums up something that has been bothering me for some time. He points out that that a number of people aren’t thinking of the far ranging consequences of losing the War in Iraq.

How can so many people watch this as if they were spectators, handicapping and rating the successes and failures from some imagined position of neutrality? Do they suppose that a defeat in Iraq would be a defeat only for the Bush administration? The United States is awash in human rights groups, feminist organizations, ecological foundations, and committees for the rights of minorities. How come there is not a huge voluntary effort to help and to publicize the efforts to find the hundreds of thousands of “missing” Iraqis, to support Iraqi women’s battle against fundamentalists, to assist in the recuperation of the marsh Arab wetlands, and to underwrite the struggle of the Kurds, the largest stateless people in the Middle East? Is Abu Ghraib really the only subject that interests our humanitarians?

Democrats’ new strategy: Almost winning
Mark Steyn clarifies the new Democratic strategy we’ve all been seeing, the “deferred success.” strategy. Very clever.

“In nearly the biggest political upset in recent history, Democrat Paul Hackett came within just a few thousand votes of defeating Republican Jean Schmidt in Ohio’s Second Congressional District.”

Yes, indeed. It was “nearly the biggest political upset in recent history,” which is another way of saying it was actually the smallest political non-upset in recent history.

I love this story. Who knew Governor Pawlenty has such a way with words?

“PETA should stay out of Minnesota’s proud fishing lifestyle,” Pawlenty said Tuesday in a two-paragraph news release issued by his staff. “Because of their letter, I’m going out for a walleye dinner tonight.”

He was responding to a July 29 letter from Karin Robertson, manager of the “Fish Empathy Project” for the Norfolk, Va.-based PETA. In the letter, she argued that fish feel pain, just as people do, and she urged him to outlaw angling.

I’ve commented previously on ALF’s (Animal Liberation Front) strategy of smashing labs in order to “free” animals, usually to the animals detriment. Michelle Malkin’s WHY THE FBI WATCHES THE LEFT links to a story about another lab’s destruction. My sympathy goes out to the author of the article. It is extremely stressful to live under personal threats as Mr. Blumberg is. He has some good points in his column, notably:

Moreover, and perhaps most alarming, is the adoption by certain groups of increasingly violent action to achieve their political aims. Indeed, the mounting acceptance of intimidation and violence within the anti-abortion movement eerily parallels the escalating tactics of animal rights extremists.

The escalation of violence and acceptance of violence by both sides in our politics has got to end. While I disagree with a lot about the modern political arena, I would never condone violence to solve these problems. We need to find a way to have politic discussion in our society without immediately resorting to insults and violence.

Better dead than Fed, PETA says

In a publicly embarrassing situation in North Carolina last week, two PETA employees were charged with animal cruelty. It brought to light the dark side of PETA. Apparently this organization feels it is much better for the animals to be euthanized than to be adopted out to good homes. Why else would they be taking animals from organizations which can and do adopt them out, only to euthanize them immediately.

The Center for Consumer Freedom, which represents the food industry, a frequent target of PETA campaigns, released data filed by PETA with the state of Virginia that shows PETA has killed more than 10,000 animals from 1998 to 2003.

10,000 animals in five years! Good thing they’re saving these animals from the nasty shelters. I’d hate to think what the animal shelters would have done with these animals. They might have given them good homes for God’s sake. The horror.

I personally haven’t had much respect for the organization since the ALF (Animal Liberation Front) lab raids of the early 90’s. I knew people at WSU who had labs damaged in one of those raids. In typical terrorist fashion they vandalized labs which had nothing to do with the research they were protesting, and most of the animals “released” didn’t survive the experience.