Value and Dignity

Does anybody remember that post I made back in November where we reviewed 24 `good’ reasons to slaughter your horse besides the good old standards of crippled, defective, and unruly?  Those reasons were helpfully provided by our buddy Naughty Tobiano and the covered everything from mane rubbing to that unspeakable crime of being a mare.  (https://shedrowconfessions.wordpress.com/2012/11/27/24-reasons-to-slaughter-a-horse/) Of course, most of us that actually like horses didn’t agree with NT’s reasons, but they probably are reasons any good slaughterphile is on board with.  If you’re a good anti, you know these reasons were bigger load of crap than what you find piled up in the Petulant Pony’s dry lot that contains her hoard.

Given the perfection that the PSAs demand of their horses I’m going to surmise that any perceived flaw that a horse possesses is a valid reason to put it in the slaughter pipeline.  Certainly a youngish horse that has become completely blind due to Moon Blindness should be disposed of immediately.  Better to cash in on him while he’s in good flesh and you can feel good about yourself that you gave him back his dignity by squeezing the last few dollars out of him.  Horses always feel much better about themselves as they are being hogpiled into kill pens and tortured to death when they know that at least you have your beer money.  I am going to go out on a limb and estimate that 99.99999% of slaughter supporters would agree that if your 9 year old horse goes blind, you are completely justified in slaughtering him because anything else would be wasteful.  It’s all about value, right?  There is no way you should be obligated to keep this otherwise healthy animal for 15 or more years.  Horses are not pets!  Well, I’d like y’all to watch this video.  It is an application video for the 2011 Versatile Horse and Rider competition that was held at the Ohio Equine Affaire.  This is Becca and Stormy and all the footage on this video was taken AFTER Stormy became completely blind in 2005.

Becca and Stormy

 

I’ve been accused of being an elitist snob more than once by our PSA pals.  Stormy obviously isn’t a rail horse nor would he likely have been a world beater even before he lost his sight.  Who cares?  What you can clearly see in that video is a young girl that loves her horse and refused to toss him aside like a broken toy.  What you also see is that every horse has a `value’ beyond the almighty dollar no matter what hand fate deals them along the way.  I don’t know about you, but I think Stormy looks like a pretty happy guy and is doing something far more dignified than being tortured and ending up on Slaughterhouse Sue’s dinner plate.  Thank you Becca for being so awesome and showing everybody what value and dignity really is all about.

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24 Reasons to Slaughter a Horse

Last week, we picked apart the favorite PSA excuse for slaughter; setting base prices for horses.  Most of you saw it as a load of crap, but most of you are also sane and can see that meat prices have nothing to do with the value of a healthy, sound and well-trained animal.  Of course we got the information from the petulant pony, Naughty Tobiano.  She’s currently doing a whole series on good reasons to slaughter horses and kindly supplied us with 24 vices that would be good reasons to send your horse to slaughter.  I thought we would take a look at them since they seem somewhat related to these mythical `bad horses’ the PSA people keep ending up owning.

#1 – Cribbing

Cribbing is a super annoying habit some horses come up with.  It can lead to various management/health problems like colic and dedicated cribbers often wear their front teeth down to nothing.  Any of the sales I go to will list if the horse is a cribber or not in the catalogue as it’s not usually curable.  It is, however, manageable.  There are various straps and collars that you can use to minimize or even wipe out the behavior all together.  Cribbing is also something that seems to be lifelong for most horses.  I have yet to see a horse take up cribbing as a mature horse.  I guess the bottom line with cribbers is that if you really can’t stand the behavior, don’t buy a horse that cribs.  There are plenty of other people willing to put up with this particular `vice’.

#2 – Wood Chewing

Not the same thing as cribbing.  Most horses get into wood chewing out of boredom.  Sometimes they do it because they are missing something in their diet.  It’s fixable.  You can turn your horse out, you can give them something else to do (various stall toys) and you can paint wood surfaces and make that not so inviting for them.  I’ve had a lot of young horses that were stabled or kept in paddocks think it was a good idea to embrace their inner beaver.  Most will eventually grow out of it once they lose their baby teeth. I have rarely seen a pastured horse with adequate roughage provided and company take up wood chewing.  I took a spin around in the golf cart to look at our paddocks/pastures tonight and the only one that has chewed boards is the small paddock we use to isolate a horse that may be injured.  Other than that, not a single chewed board on the property.  Imagine that!

#3 – Teeth Grinding

Huh?  Our painted pony thinks that a horse that grinds its teeth should be slaughtered?  I’m confused.  I’ve had the odd horse grind its teeth when I’m riding. It’s never really bothered me and I’ve never given it much thought.  If a horse seems particularily uncomfortable with a bit in its mouth there are countless options to fix that too.

#4 – Weaving

Coming from a racetrack background, I’ve had my fair share of weavers.  You can’t really fix them as long as they’re stabled.  It also isn’t `contagious’.  I had one horse that weaved all day long and none of our other horses that we had at the time ever did.  Our `weaver’ wasn’t stressed out as he did that from the very first day he ever was in a stall and we owned him from the time he was a baby.  It was just his `thing’.  Do you know what we did about it?  We put a rubber mat under him so he didn’t wear a hole in the ground and we kept standing bandages on him so he didn’t accidentally bump his legs.  We also hung a radio outside his stall door and he would always weave in time to the music.  If he had to be annoying, at least we could make him cute about it.  I also owned this horse after he retired and for the rest of his life.  Guess what?  Once he was `let down’ from racing and lived in a nice big paddock with his buddies, he didn’t weave anymore.  The odd time if he got left in his paddock alone, you might catch him standing in a corner weaving, but those occasions got fewer and further between the older he got.  I guess my point is that he wasn’t hurting anybody or anything.  He was also a really cool horse to own and ride.  Hardly a reason to execute the poor guy because he was into self soothing.
#5 – Head Shaking

Head shaking is something that is a bit more controversial.  Some think it’s strictly behavioral and others think there is a neurological reason for it.  I lean towards behavioral in most cases.  I haven’t ever had a personal horse that was a dedicated head shaker.  I’ve had horses that had nose flies and done it the odd time, but never a dedicated head shaker.  I’ve also had racehorses that would sling their head when they got keyed up.  It hurts to get a head-butt from a horse.  I’ve always attributed head shaking to being a human caused problem.  Maybe that’s why PSAs have head shakers that need to be slaughtered and most of the rest of us never have?
#6 Extreme Ear-shyness

Really?  This is a good reason to slaughter a horse?  Ear shyness is %100 man-made and/or fixable.  If they have mites or plaque in their ears, treat them.  If you have an ear shy horse ,WORK with it and get it over it.  My 17.2h horse came to me very ear shy.  His former owner had twisted and twitched his ears to try to get him to bring his head down to work on. As a result, he didn’t want anybody touching them.  I couldn’t really blame him.  However, with a lot of patience and kindness, he will now drop his head to my knees so I can bridle him and I can use my electric clippers on his ears.  He just had to learn that I wasn’t going to twist them and hurt him.

#7 – Stall Walking

Yet another `vice’ that is man-made.  Stall walkers are bored.  They also aren’t really doing anything other than making a huge mess of their stall and more work for the person that cleans it.  If you are too lazy to deal with that, don’t keep your horse in a stall.  If you don’t have any other choice but to stable your horse, get off your ass and make sure he’s properly exercised and stimulated or maybe he’s not the right horse for YOU.

#8 – Wall Kicking

Why is your horse kicking the wall?  Maybe he needs a new neighbor?  Maybe he’s bored.  I’ve had horses get excited and kick the wall.  I’ve had a few that raised hell at feed time.  It’s annoying and expensive to have them kick their shoes off, so you find ways to work WITH the behavior or you don’t keep them in a stall.  Pretty simple.

#9 – Hard to Load

Really?  NT thinks this `vice’ could be a deal breaker.  How about working with the horse and teaching him to load properly?  A few months ago when we had to evacuate over 50 horses in a very short time frame, not all of them were experienced with trailers.  Guess what?  We got ever single one loaded and out in under 2 hours.  If you aren’t an abusive moron, you can make a hard to load horse, not hard to load.  Amazing how that works.

#10- Hard to Catch

Given how we have seen some of the PSAs treat their animals and considering what NT thinks `slaughter worthy’ is it any wonder that they have horses that are hard to catch?  I don’t have a single horse that is hard to catch.  I have some formerly hard to catch horses, but as of right now, they all come when they are called and I rarely go out to catch them with anything other than a carrot in my pocket and I don’t always even have that.  A little work in a roundpen will usually convince a horse to be a bit easier to catch.

#11 – Will Not Stand Tied

Why won’t your horse stand tied?  I’ve had exactly one horse in my life, racehorses included, that would not stand tied up.  She was a puller.  Some trauma in her past made her panic when she was tied up.  Violently so.  However, she would ground tie and stand all day long, even at horse shows, with her line on the ground.  You could literally park her somewhere and she would stay there as long as you didn’t tie her up.  I suppose, if I had been older I could have worked with her on the tying thing.  There are lots of ways to do that, it just didn’t seem important to me as a kid.

#12 – Bucking Under Saddle

Again, there about a thousand reasons horses do this.  Maybe they are getting pinched, maybe they don’t want your abusive ass on their backs.  How about looking for a reason other than `bad horse’ as to why they’re doing it?  I guess this would be tough if you are a PSA because the answer may be that YOU are the problem and we all know that PSAs don’t like that answer very much.  Far easier to slaughter them.

#13 – Rearing Under Saddle

Yet another man-made `vice’ that is worth a death sentence.  Why is your horse rearing?  I’ve seen the bits many of them use and I’ve seen pictures and videos of their ham-fisted efforts to ride.  Figure out the problem and fix it.  I guess that isn’t easy to do when you are the problem…

#14 – `Girthiness’ or Tack Shy

Huh?  Do these asstards not believe in actually TRAINING their animals?  Why is it `tack shy’?  I have never had a trained horse that was tack shy.  Never.  As for the `girthy’ business.  Deal with it.  Take your time, stretch it out, walk it around and then tighten up.  That’s what I love about riding English.  I tighten my girth once I’m on my horse.  I guess the PSA horses just get hauled out of the field and get the tack slammed on their backs, cinches done up to cut them in half immediately and they should be good to go with it.  Seriously, WTF?

#15 – Cold-backed

First off, how about seeing if your horse has a sore back?  Check the fit of your tack.  How about lunging the horse and warming it up before you heave your abusive ass on it?  I guess it’s far easier to just slaughter them…

#16 – Pasture Bully

How about moving the horse to a new pasture?  Don’t have one? Then sell or give the horse to somebody that does.  Any herd of horses will always have a boss.  Either let them work it out or find them compatible herd mates.

#17 ,18,19 – Biting, Kicking, Striking

I lumped these three together.  All `behaviors’ and all fixable or man-made.  Sometimes both.  I’ve handled a LOT of horses.  I can’t even count how many.  I’ve handled everything from new borns to 4/5yr olds that have never even been halter broke.  I’ve had horses do some pretty shitty things when you’re starting out with them.   They’ve also all gotten over it.  Not every horse is going to end up being a kid safe horse, but you can teach good manners if you’re smart enough to do so without getting yourself killed in the process.  Here’s a little video from a PSA.  THIS is why there are bad horses and this is why not everybody should be working with green horses when they have no clue what they’re doing.  Watch the video linked below and tell me if this little blow-up is actually the horse’s fault at all…

PSA Horsemanship

#20 – Bolting/running away

Sounds like a training/rider problem more than a reason to slaughter.  Perhaps the PSAs should stick to horses that eat quarters rather than the real kind?

#21 – Bad in Traffic

Really?  How about not riding in traffic?  If you can’t desensitize your horse to traffic (if that’s even a big deal to you) then buy one that already is.

#22 – Constant jigging or crab-stepping

Yet another man-made vice.  Back to the arena with your bad self if this is an issue.  Maybe take some riding lessons while you’re at it.  Why is your horse doing this?  Lots of times it’s because you’re gagging it half to death with your ham-fists.  Take that horse to the arena and do some long and low work and teach him to relax.  It’s not that hard.

#23 – Chronic Mane and Tail Rubbers

OMG.  If your horse is rubbing the mane and tail of itself, how about taking the time to figure out why rather than selling it to a kill buyer?  Maybe you could start off by worming the poor thing.  If that doesn’t fix it, maybe it has a skin condition.  Do you know that Listerine applied to the tail and mane will often stop the itching and clear up minor skin conditions?  A novel idea would be to have a vet come and see why the horse is doing it.  Most mane rubbers do it by reaching through the fence to get food. You could try feeding your horse! Lots of mares will `fence push’ and rub their tails out when they’re in season.  Deal with it.  I’ve yet to see a healthy horse that was on pasture do either of these things.

#24 – Extreme `Mareishness’

This is perhaps the easiest of all to fix.  Don’t buy a mare if you don’t want to deal with the hormonal issues.  Not every mare is all that hormonal.  Ones that are really bad can be put on Regumate or other therapies to minimize this.  You can have a marble placed in their uterus to stop a lot of it.  I guess  you can’t be a good PSA backyard breeder without mares though….

As you can see, there isn’t a single `vice’ on the list that should mean a horse needs to be slaughtered. In fact, they are all basically man-made and fixable or at least manageable.  Apparently, PSAs expect each and every horse to be 100% perfect all of the time despite the abuse and generally shitty horsemanship they are subjected to.  Well, horses are thinking, breathing animals and they even have feelings.  If you want a recreational vehicle that doesn’t require training or maintenance, I suggest you buy an ATV or a dirt bike.  The other thing PSAs want is to buy their horses for under $1000 and then turn around and sell them for several thousand dollars after they have messed them up.  It doesn’t work like that.  If you want a bomb-proof, healthy, sound horse that is actually trained to do something  you’re still going to have to a decent price for it.  Slaughter or no slaughter isn’t going to change that.  The only thing slaughter is going to do is give you a dumping spot for all the horses you mess up and I don’t think that’s the answer.  I think the answer is that any person that thinks any reason on this list is worth slaughtering an animal over gets out of horses all together.  You’re not a horseman and we don’t want you in OUR industry.

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Myth Busting

If you’ve been following along with the slaughter stuff for any length of time, I’m sure you’ve heard all the trumped-up reasons why we absolutely MUST start slaughtering all our horses again.  I could write forever punching holes in them.  However, one of the ones that irritate me the most is the whole `slaughter sets a base price for horses’ argument.  WTF?  Seriously!  I’m not usually given to direct responses to the petulant pony aside from the weekly recaps of the lunacy she perpetuates, but some things you just can’t let slide on by.  Misinformation pisses me off.

So, if we are to believe the slaughterphiles,  horses aren’t selling well because there is no `base’ price per pound on them.  I don’t even comprehend that line of thinking.  Horses are not raised to be food animals.  Does anybody look at the steak on your plate and wonder if it was papered or how well-trained the cow was before it was slaughtered?  I didn’t think so.  Because this is the type of horse that I’m most familiar with, I decided to pull up the stats for the recently concluded Keeneland fall sale for Thoroughbreds of all ages.  This sale is 11 days and features everything from weanlings, to race stock, to breeding stock.  The prices run from in the millions all the way down to $1000, but when averaged out over 11 days, it always gives us a pretty good indication of where our market is and how we’re doing.  Do you know what the verdict was?  The market is strong.  This is especially gratifying because everybody knows those damn thoroughbreds don’t make the best meat horses.  If you believe Holy Theresa Manzella, they cost double to feed than any other horse (complete and utter bullshit btw).

In the interest of fair reporting and full disclosure,  if you look at the hard numbers from Keeneland’s fall sale this year it was down a little.  However, last year’s sale featured once in a lifetime dispersals of some fairly high-end breeding stock which they have attributed to the higher numbers.  The late Bernard Evans holdings along with Saud bin Khaled’s Palides Investments N.V., Inc   were dispersed and brought some crazy high prices.  Included in that consignment was Royal Delta who sold for $8.5 million.  With those horses factored out of the numbers from last year, the prices are actually higher this year.  So, the `real’ numbers from this year saw the gross up 5.36% , the average up 2.74% and the median up 10%.  That doesn’t mean much to most people unless you attach the actual dollar amounts though.  So, this year’s average sales price over the 11 days was $52,248 and the median was $22,000.  Not sure about you, but those are pretty good numbers to me.  I’m not alone in that opinion.  Keeneland vice president of sales, Walt Robertson stated:

“This was a very good sale, and encouraging in that the market laid down a stable foundation for the industry, Last year’s sale was enhanced by the vintage dispersals. This year we saw a truer market. And while there was general support throughout, we definitely saw a concentration on quality with regard to all types–broodmares, weanlings and horses of racing age. There is no doubt the money is out there for a good horse.”

I think the last sentence is pretty important.  People are still paying good money for good horses.  That’s the one thing slaughterphiles like NT will never be able to wrap their minds around.  No thoroughbred breeder bases the value on their stock on meat prices.  They breed for quality and performance and meat prices neither factor into their choices nor do they set their `base’ prices.  I suppose when you sell horses that are unpapered, not finished for anything and look like the ones below, you probably can’t wrap your mind around the real horse industry and real sale prices.

Sale picture courtesy of NT

Another NT sale horse

Now, I have been accused of being elitist a time or two by the slaughterphiles.  I’m actually not all that elitist when it comes to horses.  I’m a realist.  What I keep as my personal pet horses are one thing, what I deal with for a living are another.  I’m not looking to resell my personal horses, but I’m also not breeding them.  Many of my `horsey’ friends ride grade horses or show culls and they are still great horses for what they want to do with them.  They also aren’t breeding them or looking to make a living from flipping them.  The fact is there will ALWAYS be cheap horses as long as there are idiots involved with breeding them and horse trading.  EVERY single breeder has a foal that doesn’t quite come out like you had hoped.  However, if you are breeding quality stock, raising them correctly and either training them or presenting them for sale properly, it’s far easier to find a good home for the odd cull than to keep creating them.  If you are a bottom end horse trader and the lack of slaughter is putting you out of business, I don’t feel even a little bit sorry that you can’t make a living selling horses to slaughter.  Whine and cry all you want, dead horses don’t drive the industry.  They don’t need tack, feed, veterinary care or any number of other related purchases.  If Suey and the IEBA gets their way, you still wont’ be able to afford to be in the horse trading business because it’s going to cost you more to do business with her than to put a horse down.  I won’t shed one tear if all the slaughterphiles get out of the horse business and it also won’t change my lifestyle and income one bit.  If you need meat prices to value your stock, please find another business to be in because the horse industry will be better off without you.  Just give us some time to clean up the huge mess that the slaughterphile mindset has created.

Havre De Grace — recently sold for $10 million as a broodmare prospect

 

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The Mythical Work Driven Horse

It seems my `weekend’ turned out to be a bit on the longish side.  These things happen in horse world it seems.  Upon getting home our neighbor had a crisis resulting in the emergency evacuation of more than 50 horses and we have spent the last few days moving them around, settling them and trying to keep track of who went where and who did what.  Everybody is back home and happy now, but this writer feels like she has been run over by a truck.  I’m sure many of our PSA pals wish that was true!  Sorry PSAs, I’m back and I still think  you’re all a bunch of ignorant asshats.   Probably more so than ever having spent the last few days seeing a lot of actual horsemen set their egos aside and come together for nothing more than the sake of doing the right thing and the welfare of any and all horses.  They really are out there!  When the dust settled yesterday, it got me to thinking about the myth of the work driven horse and I thought we’d talk about that today.

 

As far as I can tell, the `work driven’ horse is a mythical creature that is mostly owned by PSAs.  He may or may not be a distant relation to the `bad horse’ that so many of them have as well.  There is a theory that the `bad horse’ is actually just a regular horse that failed to achieve `work driven’ status by its PSA owner.  At any rate, having the misfortune of being a `work driven’ horse, means that the owner can justify any form of douchebaggery they visit upon the poor animal.  This covers everything from riding the hide off the animal, whether it has an injury or not, to slaughtering it when it can no longer stand up to their demands.  They slaughter or kill these horses off young because the `work driven’ horse can never slow down or be retired otherwise it will die of sadness.  Another thing I have learned about their `work driven’ horses is that they are only happy when they are ridden into a lather and treated like equipment.  It would seem work driven horses don’t appreciate proper grooming or niceties like making sure they are comfortable and put away properly.  Apparently they only thrive on being used as hard as possible and life isn’t worth living to them when they can no longer be abused.

I have searched far and wide for a work driven horse to study in person.  I have yet to find one.  Don’t get me wrong, I have had countless horses under my care that more than earned their keep.  I’ve had racehorses that absolutely LOVED their job.  They were 100% into being racehorses and it would be hard to imagine them every being anything else.  This includes one of my personal horses that raced for 7 years.  He was the consummate professional racehorse and lived and breathed his job.  He didn’t qualify under the PSA `work driven’ status because he also enjoyed being pampered and fussed over.  I wish I had a dollar for every hour I spent sitting on a tub hosing that horse’s legs or grooming him.  When it was time for him to go to the track, either in the morning or for race time, this horse would drag you there if you weren’t moving fast enough.  As he got older, he wasn’t able to compete at the same level so rather than taking a risk losing him in a claiming race, we decided to retire him.  He’d done enough for us.  Because he was my personal pet, I decided to see if he would make a pony horse.  Not because he was work driven, but because with my nomadic lifestyle, I wanted to keep him near me.  I’m sure had I kicked him out in a field or slammed a western saddle on him the day after we decided to retire him, he would have gone to pieces and I could have claimed he was work driven, therefore unhappy in retirement and had him put down with a clear conscience.  Instead, we took the winter to let him down easy from his race life and transition him into his new `job’.  You know what?  He loved retirement.  He loved becoming an elder statesman that accompanied the racehorses to the starting gate and he didn’t worry himself to death or pine for his former life.  He stayed with us as a pony horse until age eventually caught up with him and it was time to actually retire.  He accepted that with the same class he did everything else.  He was able to do that because at each stage, we transitioned him carefully.

PSAs often talk about their work driven horses.  I’ve seen them talk about having to put horses down because they would pine away in a field.  I’ve seen them excuse their bizarre and borderline abusive practices by saying the horses was `work driven’ and that is what made them happy.  Because my end of the industry has a fairly high turnover rate as far as horses being able to perform at their peak, I’ve retired more than my fair share.  The majority of them have gone onto other careers, but there have been a few, due to injury or other things, that have had to retire outright.  There is a way to retire a horse so that they can let down and transition.  Taking one from full work and just booting his ass out in a field probably isn’t going to end well for the horse.  Feed needs to be changed, routines adjusted etc.  There is almost no horse that won’t retire happily with a little bit of effort.  The mythical work driven horse is a PSA fabrication to excuse their ignorance.  Nothing more. That isn’t to say that horses don’t enjoy their jobs and thrive at the peak of their performance careers.  They do.  I just know that they can also adjust to a slower lifestyle quite happily.  I’m going to leave you with a couple of links to another blog.  These people could be considered authorities on retiring horses and have seen it all; from high performance horses that have been injured at the peak of their careers, to horses that have just become elderly and need to slow down.  The writer talks about the concerns about horses not adjusting to retirement and being unhappy.  I guess I’m not alone in thinking that any horse can be transitioned into a slower lifestyle or happy retirement.  Goodness knows I still have a few of the lazy bastards on my feed bill right now that make me smile every single day.

http://paradigmfarms.blogspot.ca/2011/03/transitioning-to-retirement.html

http://paradigmfarms.blogspot.ca/2010/01/retirement-case-study.html

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How the PSAs Saved My Life….

Today’s blog is probably going to upset quite a few of the regular readers here.  I’ve been reading what the PSAs are saying and I’ve come to realize they have probably saved my life.  It seems that I have been oblivious to the fact that I am living very dangerously and have been for several years.  That’s right…..I have friends that are vegetarians and vegans!  If not for the likes of Naughty Tobiano and Mindy `Puppymill’ Patterson, along with the chorus of stupidity, I would have never realized how evil and treacherous vegetarians were. Even worse, I’m probably a bad anti because I’m not a vegetarian, although I spent several years refusing to eat anything that had feet.  Don’t ask.

Thanks to Puppymill Patterson, I now know that the vegetarians are poised to take over the country and convert everybody else to their sicko lifestyle.  Republican Vice Presidential nominee Paul Ryan has gone out and gotten himself a vegan speech writer by the name of Matthew Scully.  (http://dailycaller.com/2012/08/20/meet-matthew-scully-paul-ryans-vegan-speechwriter/) .  It doesn’t matter that Scully is a renown speech writer and even managed to make George Bush sound coherent when he wrote for him, this guy doesn’t eat meat so he is not to be trusted.  Apparently Scully is friendly with Wayne Pacelle of the HSUS and we all know that nobody is as evil as Pacelle except maybe Richard `Kudo’ Cuoto and Bob Barker .

Behold the face of pure evil…..according to the PSAs anyhow…

I’m not all that surprised the PSAs are hating on poor Matthew Scully actually.  He wrote an entire book called `Dominion’ about the ethical treatment of animals.  We all remember how Holy Theresa likes to talk about having dominion over animals while bastardizing scripture to suit her mission.  Well, Scully actually takes that scripture and writes about how people have misused it to justify their cruel and unethical treatment of animals through the years.  I actually hadn’t even heard about the book until Puppymill brought it to my attention, but I’ve got it on order now.  It sounds really inspiring. It also sounds like something that the PSAs are just going to hate. He goes after factory farming, slaughter and basically any other cruel practice that we have come to know from Big Ag.  Here’s an excerpt from the synopsis “Throughout Dominion, author Scully challenges and expertly counters the hypocritical arguments that attempt to excuse animal abuse: from those who argue that the Bible’s message permits mankind to use animals as it pleases; to hunters who claim that their sport helps control animal populations; and to defenders of popular and “scientifically proven” notions that animals cannot feel pain, do not experience emotions, and are not conscious of their own lives.” (http://www.powells.com/biblio?inkey=1-9780312261474-7)

The PSAs have their panties so bunched up about the Ryan/Scully marriage of convenience they don’t know who to vote for now.  Ryan actually supports horse slaughter (http://advocacy.britannica.com/blog/advocacy/2012/08/paul-ryan%E2%80%99s-record-on-animal-welfare-issues/#more-10602), but he’s romancing the enemy by hiring Scully to do what he does best.  The concept of Scully being a consummate professional and being able to separate his job from his personal life is lost on the PSAs because not a single one of them know how to do that.  It may also be because so many of them don’t actually have jobs and the ones that do are not all that professional.  Another concept that is lost on the PSAs is that no candidate is probably going to use the horse slaughter issue as part of their platform.  It’s not that people don’t care about animals, it’s that we are talking about such a small pocket of the population, neither candidate probably gives a crap about whether the five people over at the UH Facebook page vote for them or not.  However, the conspiracy theories abound.  Here’s some of the PSA’s thoughts on having Scully writing speeches for Ryan:

“you didn’t cringe just a little when Ryan called us a “humane and decent society?” Perhaps I’m hypersensitive to those words which have been hijacked by the animal rights movement. I’m just bringing that up as a rebuttal to your point that Scully did not inject his pov. While subtle, it’s there.”

– Pretty much the first time in my life I have seen anybody offended by being called `humane and decent’.  Wow.

“So,whats the “hand shake” deal here? From what I gather,Scully isnt the type of guy to take this writing job for the pay,or acknowledgement.Whats on the table? a deal has been made,or find out whats about to be put on the table. He has made some kind of deal to agree to do the speech writing,a bill opposed,or passed,or sponsored.Could be an active one,or one that hasnt been presented yet,but is about to be. Find out whats in waiting,and will probly find out what he benefits from being the writer for any politician.”

–  Geez, the guy has to feed his family and pay a mortgage.  The `deal’ is probably exactly the same as when he wrote for Bush, Cheney and Palin.  None of these people were known to be vegetarians or all that into animal rights.  It’s a job.

“How much you want to bet a portion of his fee goes towards HSUS? Hand shake deals are age old,politicians been doin for 100’s of years to make deals on bills to be passed,or opposed. Dont have to be niave to know that,”

– Really???

“We don’t have to fear him inserting AR stuff into Ryan’s speeches…. we have to fear him gaining insider access and leaking WH info to Pacelle….”

– Maybe Scully will mind-meld with Ryan and completely control him too.  I hear all vegetarians have special powers that we don’t really understand and that’s what makes them so dangerous.

“Mindy is there any way we could get word to their campaign and let them know where we stand. I’m sure they can be elected without our groups votes but there are livestock people all over this country who also vote. I can only speak for me but I’m not in favor of letting scully or Ryan compromise the work that has already been done or our group being led in to the apearance of a double standard. If do that in my opinion our voices won’t mean anything in DC or anywhere else. Just voicing my concerns. There’s a lot at stake here for our cause. I’m sure their campaign knows about Scully which if this is true means they are insensitive to the things our group stands for.”

– Somebody alert the media that  the Romney/Ryan ticket is `insensitive’ to the further abuse and torture of animals!

“This is where our collective force makes the difference. We ALL have to write, call, email, Facebook, and Tweet to our federal representatives and inform them about the animal rights movement and agenda. We need to get Obama out of office, for sure! But our fight will not fade away over night. We cannot rely on one person or one organization to get it done. And we must be vigilant and consistent in order to have our voices heard. I am convinced that many U.S. Reps and Senators just don’t know. I believe Paul Ryan is a good man and would make an outstanding VP, and I sincerely don’t believe Ryan is by any means an AR sympathizer, but the last thing we need is for the Matthew Scully’s of the world to be writing the words of our nations leaders, or gain a foothold in the WH simply because he’s “a great speech writer!” I like what XXXX said earlier, “Forewarned is forearmed. Now we watch.” Thomas Paine also said it best, “Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it.”

– Puppymill Patterson said this.  You would think that somebody that spends as much time in DC as she claims to would have a basic working knowledge about how things actually work.  Scully is hired to write speeches for Ryan and cover the issues that RYAN wants to address.  There is person over on this thread patiently trying to explain these same things to the PSAs but they aren’t hearing it.

All this brings us back to the other PSA paranoia machine.  NT tells us that it’s all one big conspiracy to force everybody into vegetarianism and that the only reason so many people want to ban horse slaughter is to get a foot in the door and make everybody in America vegans.  Seriously, she said that and she even busted out the caps on us to let us know how serious she is.  In fact, our hypocritical pony even goes so far to admit that her support for horse slaughter has less to do with eating horse meat or controlling the horse population than it does to stop the animal rights people from ” FORCING the vegan lifestyle on ALL Americans”.  One can only hope she doesn’t get the idea that supporting the kicking of puppies and slapping of babies has anything to do with vegetarianism in the future.  Things could get really ugly…..

To be fair, NT isn’t the only freak show as far as this whole AR/Vegetarian/Vegan conspiracy goes either.  Puppymill Patterson is convinced that the HSUS and AR people are poised to overthrow the government and have planted a bunch of `gatekeepers’ in DC to make sure that the Senators and Reps don’t hear what the animal haters like herself have to say.  In fact, she’s not going to trust Ryan until she knows he’s indoctrinated into the PSA way of thinking.  That includes supporting all the cruel practices like puppymills, gestation crates, battery cages, and anything else that means more money, more suffering for animals.

“I spend enough time in D.C. throughout the year to know that waaaay too many U.S. Senators and Reps just flat out don’t know about the AR agenda or HSUS. And their gate keepers are the young people in their office who just graduated from college — most likely a liberal institution. These gate keepers interpret the info when people like myself come to meet with them and give them my 5 minute elevator speech about the dangers of an HSUS sponsored bill. So do I worry about Paul Ryan? I would not if I knew he were equipped with the truth! Not if I were confident that he knew the TYRANNY of the animal rights agenda. Only then would I not worry. We must stay vigilant and inform! That’s why I encourage everyone to write, write, write their U.S. Senators and Reps! They work for us! Here’s an easy way to do just that…”

Wouldn’t you just love to hear the comments that get made after Puppymill gets off the elevator?  I really have a hard time thinking that many people take these paranoid hicks all that seriously.  BTW, what is up with the mid-westerners hating on animals so much?  I know not all of you do, but there seems to be a rather large pocket of douchebags populating that part of the country.

I have a really good friend that is a vegetarian.  We often go out for lunch and she has never judged me for what’s on my plate, although I’ve made `ewwww’ noises about some of her choices.  I’ve even gone so far as to ask her if she farts more than normal because I heard that vegetarians do.  Apparently that is a myth.  We walk our dogs together and, let’s just say, she’s never blamed anything on the dogs.  This same friend has helped me out more times than I can count and always makes me laugh.  I’ve even had meatless meals at her house and liked them.   My friend is so deceitful, that she even shaves her legs and wears normal clothes so that people don’t peg her as a vegetarian right off.  The evil skank even complimented me on my leather jacket once.  Little did I know it was all a ruse.  Now I know better…Thank you PSAs…that was a close one!

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Is Everybody Ready?…..It’s Time to Point and Laugh!

What a week!  It just keeps getting better and better as far as finding things to point and laugh at.  I’ve actually had some concerns about getting it all covered in one blog entry, things have been so busy.  This is a really long entry this week, so grab some supplies and settle in because it’s time to get on with the festivities.  Once again, it’s Point and Laugh Friday…..brought to you by the letter `V’ for victory!

As usual we’re going to kick things off by checking in with the Matron of Morons, Slaughterhouse Sue.  It was another fairly quiet week for Suey.  One can only assume she is busy writing of her special brand of poetry that reads like Rainman wrote it or she’s still in a weakened state due to lack of carcinogen tainted meat in her diet.  Nevertheless, she did manage to lay down some links early in the week to inspire the three remaining UH followers and repulse the rest of us.  The first was a `fun facebook page’ from France all about eating horse meat.  I almost think Ole Suey goes out of her way to be gross, but then I realize it probably comes naturally for her.  At least she didn’t talk about her ass again this week.  I’m still in therapy over that assault on my mind’s eye.  The next article she linked  is not just funny, its effin hilarious.  I’m not even being sarcastic at this point.  Slaughterhouse Sue linked an article about Rockville on the 25th.  It was full of the usual misinformation, lies and quotes from Suey.  The hilarity comes in when somebody contacted the writer and brought them up to speed about what is really going down in Rockville, so they added an editorial comment in bold at the top on the 26th apologizing for the omissions and stating that Suey was `unavailable for comments’ when they tried to clear things up.  Rockville Mayor, David Moore also stated that nobody has heard from Slaughterhouse Sue since May.  Not only funny, but knee slapping funny as the link remains on the UH page with Suey’s endorsement of `Good article!’.  You can check it out yourself :
(http://www.latitudenews.com/story/words-appetite-horse-meat-creates-jobs-american-heartland/).  I do have to commend Latitude News for doing the right thing and adding this comment to the top of the article.  Naturally, this sent Slaughterhouse Sue scurrying back into hiding and she has been `unavailable for comment’ for the remainder of the week.

As we are well aware, when Suey goes to ground, it is up to her henchmen to step up to the plate to perpetuate the lies and propaganda that are so necessary to her mission to profit from the torture of horses.  Because Holy Theresa was busy getting ready for her fund-raising extravaganza for her slaughter supporting rescue this weekend, we were left with D-bag Duquette once again.  Actually, I shouldn’t complain.  I get a huge kick out of D-bag when he gets all authoritarian on our asses and busts out his word of the day toilet paper for quotes.  His big polysyllabic word this week was `variable’.  Rumor has it he was pretty damn proud of using it in a sentence and he high fived himself in the forehead in celebration.  We went into detail about his big media push yesterday, but this quote from him is worth repeating : ““70 percent of the world’s countries have too many variables to accurately predict when the industry will be able to start again.”“.  Despite me begging, nobody has been able to tell me WTF it even means yet.  Perhaps the writer’s gibberish to English translator did not know what to make of D-bag’s profanity laced ramblings and this is what it came up with……kinda like those funny auto-corrects we keep seeing posted around.  At any rate, the article was full of misinformation and whining and, of course, Suey was unavailable for comment again, basically leaving poor D-bag holding the poo bag.  Mindy`Puppymill’ Patterson was dusted off and forced to take over linking duties on the UH page as well…Business as usual.

Let’s move on to Mendy Tobiano.  I have to admit I’ve been withholding information from the readers here.  Mendy has been most unhappy with this blog and has taken to writing WordPress to whine about it.  The bestest part of it all is they love me because they host my blog and they also send me her letters when I ask for them.  Perjury is a bad thing….just sayin.  Mendy Tobiano got her knickers in a twist because we made fun of her grooming and tack fitting practices last week.  She had a hissy fit over on Horse Farts about how trimming a bridle path is a `choice’ and she chooses not to.  Well, let’s not forget that she also claims to win all these classes and titles with her super awesome training skills.  I don’t know about the rest of y’all, but any show I have ever participated in, grooming and presentation was a huge part of winning; even the 4H shows.   Also, trimming a bridle path for your horse is a kindness.  It doesn’t have to be more than an inch or two, but it will let the bridle lay where it’s supposed to and not tangle their mane up and cause discomfort.  I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that Mendy doesn’t care about stuff like that when she considers this picture an example of a well-groomed horse with properly fitted tack.  It is the same horse that claims she wins all these classes on, including Hunter Under Saddle.  Maybe there is a Backwoods Big Game Hunter Under Saddle class I’m not aware of though……

Ok, we aren’t quite done with Mendy Tobiano yet, but the rest of her news is all tied up with some other Horse Farters.  Yes, NT is still blogging and still nobody is paying attention other than maybe NT’s family members and people she coerces into commenting, so we won’t worry too much about it.  Other than paranoid and nonsensical ramblings and aping this blog, there isn’t a lot of content there.  The two times I took a look this week, I thoroughly enjoyed her new platform that shows how few views she actually does get.  She’d probably crap her Depends if she saw the stats over here.  Where the hilarity and hijinks comes in is with her favorite Facebook bat cave and the drama they had this week.  It seems that my selection of Sunday’s PSA did NOT go down well with the HFA club.  Our poster gal Jes, made several comments on how little she cared and how she wasn’t going to read it, but y’all know she did.  Mendy Tobiano would love to have people believe this blog is devoted to her, so it bothered her that she wasn’t featured before her buddy.  As a result, they booted out the majority of horse farters and went undercover.  Presumably this is to give them some peace and quiet while Jes looks for her missing chin and Mendy Tobiano tries to locate her dignity.  We probably shouldn’t hold our breath waiting for either of those things to ever happen.  It’s sure a good thing they showed us all how little they cared!  I’m going to put this one in the victory column that due to this blog, they have gone underground where nobody seeking actual truth and information will ever have to stumble upon their idiocy.  At least they can now sit around and congratulate each other about what great little horse abusers they are and Mendy Tobiano can flirt with herself in relative privacy.

Don’t say I didn’t warn you this would be a long one, because we still have stuff to discuss.  Remember Angela Marshall?  The woman who sent her crippled horse on a 30 hour trip to torture?  Yeah, she is now going to fund the studies to find out the withdrawal time for Bute apparently.  She also would like to provide horse meat to her family. ” I would be happy to have horse meat available to my family. Why export a perfectly good source of meat?? I think the UK knows something we dont, like how awesome horse meat really is.”  If she truly feels this way, why the fuckity fuck didn’t she just eat her own horse rather than sending him on a death ride to Canada?????  I’m sure there were are farmers, butchers and hunters in her area that would have been more than happy to come shoot her horse and dress him out at home; which would have been far less cruel and traumatizing to the horse.  Maybe she didn’t want to feed her kids Bute?  Say it ain’t so!  I guess the fact that the UK people are actually not big consumers of horses at all hasn’t occurred to her.  Most of them are as disgusted about it as 80% of our population is.  Maybe when you’re a welfare wife with a clown-car vagina, all countries `over there’ are pretty much the same and she confuses the UK with the EU…And before NT pops up to say how mean I am for talking about the poor little chillrun, remember that it was NT that brought up the fact that she has all these snotty kids, twins on the way and nobody in her household has a job in order to make us feel bad for her.  If you throw the card on the table, you don’t get to choose how it gets played.

Guess what?  We still aren’t finished!  You’d think with them slithering under their rock we wouldn’t have much to talk about, but we seem to have even more.  Of course, being the attention whores they all are, we shouldn’t be surprised that they can’t stay buried forever.  Not all of them have alter egos to do the public talking for them like Mendy Tobiano, although she certainly isn’t the only one that does that these days.  It seems that Daffy found refuge with Tony Wildhorse Ullrich and his pages.  For those of you that don’t know, The Tonester loves nothing more than to pick a fight on Facebook and crow about it.  He’s the editor of The Wild Ones magazine, but it seems that even after collecting subscription fees, there is an issue getting the magazine out in a timely fashion.  That is all playing out very publically on the magazine’s Facebook page.  Hurry on over before he deletes the evidence! It also seems that he had his page devoted to mocking and making fun of a few wild horse advocates (I’m assuming that’s what they are) taken down as well.  I forgot to mention that this is also a PSA favorite pastime….reporting each other to Facebook and trying to get accounts suspended.  Perhaps The Tonester will stagger back over here and dazzle us all with his ignorance in the comment section like he did last week, but don’t hold your breath on that either.  They are currently closing ranks and showing us all how much they don’t care about this blog.  That’s what they think the benefit to being `secret’ is, but sadly for them, there is still a mole…

Last up for this week is the link extravaganza that went on over at the UH Facebook page.  They are all outraged at the strict testing going on at the TWHA Celebration show and naturally have convinced themselves that this is all a conspiracy by they HSUS and USDA to take away their personal rights.  They feel that it is their right to abuse and torture any animal as long as it makes them beer money and gives them something to brag about.  They are also very upset that they aren’t seeing very many foals with their mammas in the fields as they drive around the back roads looking for some roadkill to make a nice pot of stew with.  For one thing, many breeders have already weaned their babies this time of year considering it’s almost September.  Another thing, is I’m not sure why less foals is so horrible considering they are all concerned with all these unwanted horses that need to be slaughtered and eaten immediately.  We have also learned this week that vegetarians and vegans are evil and are to be feared and burned at the stake.  I guess you don’t get to have choices unless they fall into line with the horse eating agenda.  I wonder if they realize that many anti-slaughter advocates are not even a little bit vegetarian.  The concept of anti-cruelty is as foreign to them as having all your own teeth and having more than two forks in your family tree.   They just assume that it means it’s going to take away their rights and we’ll all be forced into vegetarianism soon.  In other news, the sky is, in fact, falling and if we could just slaughter some horses global warming would end.

As much ground as we have covered this week, it feels like we have just scraped the surface.  I keep getting asked by the few PSAs that venture over here why I make fun of everybody.  Well, what would you have me do?  Take these ridiculous creatures seriously?  The fact is that the issue that finds us all at odds is a very serious one.  People that have advocated for an end to horse slaughter have been bullied and maligned forever by the PSA (pro-slaughter advocate) side.  We’ve been wrongfully labelled as animal rights activists or zealots and otherwise dismissed as `emotional’.  Slaughter IS an emotional subject for many of us.  That’s what makes us human.  However, I have tried to stick to facts and science to back up my stance as have most of the people I have seen out there working towards ending the threat of horse slaughter.  At the end of the day, call me what you want because it won’t change a thing.  I will continue to write about things that come up and I will continue to poke the anthill of PSAs as long as it amuses me.  Hate me or this blog all you want, but it’s WORKING and it’s doing that with a lot of help from the readers here.  The more PSA asstards that shut up and run for cover, the more we can get done.  Without their misinformation and paranoid ramblings out in the open, the people that are legitimately trying to make an informed decision will have a clear path to actual facts.  Have a great long weekend everybody and don’t forget to hug your horses!

In Memory of HFA

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Slaughter Will Fix EVERYTHING

Wow!  It’s only Tuesday and we’ve already had a bounty of drama!  Seems we have the asstards of the PSA contingent on the run as they have now gone to ground and hid.  Have no worries though, we have endless fodder stored up and my tentacles continue to reach far and wide.  We are business as usual and can devote more time to the real issues now that the HFA buffoonery has been silenced.  Not sure about y’all but I’m putting this one in the victory column and directly attributing it to them not liking the view in the mirror we keep holding up for them.  I’ve been busier than anybody should ever have to be lately, and my connection is a bit dicey for the next few days, so please bear with me.  Sadly, the PSAs never take a break and I may have to write several chapters to Point and Laugh Friday if the first few days of this week are any indication.  Today, I want to talk about some articles they use to prop up their stance on slaughter.  I’m sure you’ll be as confused as I am as to how they think they help them out, but we’ll discuss them anyhow, because that’s what we do best!

Mindy `Puppymill’ Patterson

Today’s lunacy is brought to you mostly by Slaughterhouse Sue’s favorite foot soldier.  The one and only, Mindy `Puppymill’ Patterson, clueless leader of the Cavalry Group and tireless advocate for animal cruelty in Missouri and beyond.  She has taken a page out of Ole Suey’s `Rallying Your Dwindling Supporters’  handbook and gone into a frenzy of linking up articles to inspire and motivate the three remaining members of the United Horsemen.  The first article we are going to look at today is about the Tennessee Walking Horse Celebration being held in Shelbyville this week.  It is the biggest event of the year for the TWHA and I’m going to tell you right now that Puppymill is `shocked and horrified’.  It appears that after irrefutable evidence of soaring and other brutality used on the Big Lick horses, that the TWHA has finally decided to become pro-active and have implemented their toughest testing in the 74 year history of this event.  They are also practicing transparency by posting the results of their testing online within 24 hrs.  (http://www.tennessean.com/article/20120822/NEWS01/120822011?fb_action_ids=3608637094717&fb_action_types=og.recommends&fb_source=aggregation&fb_aggregation_id=246965925417366) I’m not sure about the rest of you, but I don’t see a lot negative in this link.  It looks to me that this breed is finally trying to clean up its act and do right by the horses they identify themselves with.  Not so fast……according to Puppymill, it’s all a great big conspiracy by the HSUS and USDA….

“The Tennessee Walking Horse industry has been wrongfully vilified by HSUS and USDA because of the bad actors.  I attended the opening day of The Celebration in Shelbyville, TN last week and was shocked and horrified as I witnessed first hand how HSUS and USDA have successfully diminished this national annual event.  I’m saddened by the low participation and low attendance because the participants are simply afraid to show up.  HSUS has gone after the TWHA because they are considered to be the “easy target” or, in my opinion, the gateway to destroy other horse events!  We all had better be prepared to defend the TWHA because they will be coming for all other horse events next!”
– Where to start?  If you read the linked article, it clearly states they are expecting 200,000 spectators by the end of this week.  That sounds pretty strong to me, but I suppose the fact that most people will show up for the championship and big classes held at the end of the week is lost on Puppymill.  I guess she couldn’t scream `diminished’ had she bothered to show up later in the week.  Also, I belong to an industry that has come under heavy scrutiny due to some public asshattery by the minority.  As a result we have detention barns and very strict testing procedures.  You know what?  If you aren’t a cheater, you embrace that sort of thing because it doesn’t change how you do business and it might weed out the bad apples. It tends to level the playing field and the real horsemen will rise to the top.  If you aren’t cheating, you have no worries and you aren’t afraid to show up.  The TWHA is an `easy target’ because of their inability or refusal to police itself.  The atrocities committed against the Big Lick horses disgust the general public and are completely barbaric.  It’s been the worst kept secret in the horse industry for years, but with the internet, social media and people being more conscious of these things, it is not acceptable on any level any longer. I guess if you’re a PSA the answer to all this is to just slaughter horses and shut up about the abuse.  Just to reiterate, Puppymill is `shocked and horrified’ and blaming the HSUS and USDA for all of this.

Ok, let’s move onto another concern that Puppymill Patterson has.  She linked this article about how we all may be forced to be vegetarians by the year 2050.  (http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/vegetarian-2050-190426669.html).  I’m not sure about the rest of y’all, but I think by the year 2050 I’ll mostly be eating soft food if I’m even kicking around at all so I probably won’t care.  At any rate, the article talks about drought conditions and the estimated water shortage not being able to support the estimated 9 billion people’s eating habits by that year and that raising animals for food will take up 5 to 10 times more water than raising the crops for a vegetarian based diet.  Nowhere in this article does it mention horses.  However, Puppymill’s comment upon linking this article was: “Doom & gloom. And more proof we need U.S. horse slaughter now.”  Go ahead and read what she said three more times and it still won’t make one lick of sense.  Of course, the UH half wits are on the same wavelength, so they get it….

“The article is a good point to start several discussions. 1. Is it really inevitable that the world population will reach 9 billion? i’m happy with 7. In fact, I thought we had enough at 6 billion. Maybe we need to start figuring out what it takes to stabilize the increase in population instead of killing time worrying about how to feed all. 2. I think there is currently enough food production to feed everyone. The problem is the food and people are not in workable proximity to met nutrional needs. The same goes for water. Maybe we should devote efforts to proper distribution of humanity rather than throwing resources at feeding people in food scarce locales. 3. The artilce doesn’t seem to consider that water is a naturally reused resource. 4. The article makes no mention of increaseing water use efficiency.”

– I sincerely hope this person is not serious in what they are suggesting…..

“the article also doesn’t cover the fact that hsus and peta are doing all they can to ensure that this is the case by doing away with farming”

– HUH????

Guess what?  She wasn’t finished yet!  There was an article about the slaughter plants they are trying to open which I’ll cover in more detail in the next few days.  It pretty much deserves its own treatment.  There was also this little petition Puppymill wants everybody to sign because she is going to Washington DC in a couple of weeks and wants to present it.  (http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/investigate-usda-aphis-and-stop-proposed-rule-to-regula.html)  It has an entire 2600 signatures on it so I’m sure the boys in Washington will take it very seriously.  Hell, Mendy Tobiano and her multiple personalities may account for a third of them for all we know.  Basically it’s a move to halt the proposed rule to regulate pet sellers and that shouldn’t surprise any of us that know that Mindy is a huge puppymill supporter and one of the PSAs that think any sort of regulation or law in place to make sure animals are handled humanely infringe on her God-given right to be an asstard.  I sure wish I could be a fly on the wall when this little band of animal abusers take their cause to DC.  I always enjoy comedy.

The UH’s Tour Van

So that’s a little sampling about what is going on in the PSA world this week.  It’s been active for sure!  That’s the good thing about silencing pockets of these people…..there are always more that are willing to step up to the plate.  Still, we will methodically keep countering their propaganda with the truth and eventually more will just go away.  You know, we have had a few venture over here with some questions.  I don’t even mind that if it’s civil. Please look upon that as an opportunity to educate and maybe sway some opinions.  While nobody likes to poke fun and tweak noses more than me, we are all here for a reason and can’t afford to lose focus just yet. Stay dry everybody!

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We may not be able to fix stupid, but we sure as hell can make fun of it!

Why is it every time I wrap up our week with an edition of Point and Laugh Friday, the PSAs ramp up the stupid for the next 48 hrs?  At some point you would think it wasn’t even possible to get any more stupid or misinformed, but we haven’t even come close to it yet.  So, we are about to rehash a few tired arguments for the millionth time because we can and because I’m irritated again.  Apologies in advance and I suggest you wear protective head-gear for this blog; whether that be a tinfoil beanie, helmet or both.

Ok, it seems my Point and Laugh Friday hit a few nerves behind close doors and panties are not only in a bunch, they are chafing some butts in a big way.  In an effort to make me stop pointing out the idiocy, the PSAs are going to attempt business as usual, which means that they are going to pontificate about slaughter.  Yay!  I love it when they remove all doubt as to how ignorant they all are.  So let’s kick things off with the petulant pony, Mendy Tobiano hefting herself up on the podium to edumacate us all….

“Three years later we are still bitching about the issues in this article.
Will this ever end? Horses are livestock. As long as that’s the legal definition, slaughter of them is no different than a cow or hog. Now why is it the USDA cannot seem to get off their asses and send the inspectors in for the horses. Gosh, election years suck don’t they”

– This is what happens when you have tunnel vision and are completely ignorant to how things work.  While horses may be considered to be `livestock’ by many and for legal terms, they are considered to be companion animals by the FDA.  That means that horses are not raised for food consumption like a cow or hog.  Stomp your feet all you want, that’s just they way it is right now.  Also, as has been discussed in numerous media forums, the USDA had their budget cut by $9 million this year.  To fund inspections for horses, which are not raised for human consumption and the majority of the population oppose, that would mean it would come at the expense of inspecting hogs, cattle or poultry.  Since horses are also not considered to be a staple in the American diet as the other animals are, you are asking them to redirect funding that comes directly from the US taxpayer for inspections on something that will largely be for overseas consumption and profit.  As Slaughterhouse Sue likes to say; It’s simple economics.  Now, you can factor in the Moran Amendment that is on the table that would effectively wipe out slaughter again and  NOBODY is going to put USDA inspectors in horse slaughter facilities until that is resolved.  Get over it.

” Not only do they need to get up and get the slaughter houses going, they need to get the withdrawl times set for bute and other drugs which they are refusing to do because of the politics involved in horse slaughter. I would be willing to donate $ when I have it to gety this done!”

– This little gem comes from Montana’s former owner.  She wants to donate money to get slaughter happening!  Awesome!  I wonder if that’s the best use of her welfare checks?  Given how evil and stupid we know her to be, it’s not surprising she is still trying to make `Bute’ happen. It’s never going to.

“I agree that testing for withdrawal periods on meat products from horses known to have been buted needs to be done. The only thing we have is the results of sick people who were TREATED with bute not those who ate it…..There is a hugomongo difference between direct ingestion of something and eating something that had the substance given to it.”

– Maybe ole NT would like to step up and be the guinea pig for this testing?  Or maybe she can volunteer some of her family?  I guess the concept of second-hand smoke is over her flat head too?

“The funny thing is people actually use bute themselves. All medications have adverse effects, sometimes it bothers one person and not another. All medications have withdrawls. They need to get it done!”

– Yes and people also smoke meth and don’t die right away either, but that doesn’t mean it’s advisable to do it yourself.  But this is coming from Montana’s Mommy again so we shouldn’t be surprised about the level of ignorance.  Maybe she’ll sell some of her kids for those kinds of lab experiments when they age out of the WIC program and do her bit to make slaughter happen so those mini horses she adopted have a place to go when she inevitably screws them up.

“Yep—I had a friend who died from an aspirin allergy. But we don’t pull aspirin off the market…….I wonder if anyone would like to do some research for me on drugs that COMMONLY kill people or have horrendous side effects (like the Cialis mythical 4 hour erection) but are still on the market. Like kids who die from benadryl”

– Actually I think `somebody’s’ time would be better spent teaching NT to read with comprehension.  Then maybe she can learn the difference between side effects and carcinogens.  Maybe she can also learn the difference between testing for a performance level threshold and tissue residue.  Or maybe we can just not bother and let keep handing her more rope to hang herself with because as annoying as this gets, it’s pretty damn funny too.

“Vets can give cattle bute extra label and there IS a withdrawal time for MEAT ( not milk) there cant be very much difference in elimination time for cattle vs. horses. However, I have tried to get info. from the USDA and FDA-both are extremely aggravating as they give run-around conversation and avoid straight answers, saying it is a very controversial subject.”

– No it is not approved for use in food producing animals.  Period.  No elimination time because it is BANNED.  Why is this such a hard concept to grasp for these asstards?  Seriously.  It’s just not that hard.  BANNED means BANNED.

(http://www.vetmed.ucdavis.edu/vetext/INF-DA/ButeProhib.pdf)

“this is somethin most people don’t know , thier hasn’t been any complaints on horse meat since the early to mid 80’s , and happend twice is all , and the deal on the drug issue is that when kill the horses , every part is stamped , like the lungs , heart , liver , kidneys , these are hung racks , and checked in a time period in case thier is a type of drug that shows up , if so the meat was tanked , and not sold for human’s , at least that is how it used to be , and that is somethin that the anti’s don’t want anbody to know or they didn’t know that , that is what they did at Beltex”

– No asstard, not every carcass is tested.  Yes, they are identified, but the testing is random to a degree.  The on site CFIA or USDA inspector is supposed to identify likely candidates to test ie. horses with noticeable lameness, illness or anything that may suggest they had been medicated, but we all know that’s very hit and miss at best.  Back when Beltex was operating they were only testing for Trichinosis.  Canada has only been testing for banned meds for less than two years, so it’s pretty safe to say the US slaughter houses never tested for that stuff.

Given how profoundly stupid these people are, is it any wonder the USDA and FDA have made it so difficult for them to get through on the phone?  I suggest that both agencies hire very cranky people (No, not me because I already have a job) to answer these calls.  I probably shouldn’t even say anything and let these idiots continue to make fools of themselves as they  charge around on their own being nuisances and never being taken seriously.  How can you take somebody seriously that either cannot or will not grasp a simple concept like `Banned’?  Now we have NT saying that maybe it’s banned for humans to use, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be able to eat something that has taken it.  If this were true, I guess the whole contaminating the ground water with euthanized horses thing shouldn’t worry them either or killing rats with poison shouldn’t harm an animal that eats the rat?  It seems there is nothing else to say, so I’m going to leave y’all with a little limerick that NT wrote.  It pretty much says it all…

There once was a man who ate horse

His own mount for steak was his source

He did bute his pony

Since tainted meat is phony

And his liver is just fine, of course!

Last minute edit here:  Looks like we have yet another horse carcass showing up in the food supply with Bute in it…Oops.  

https://webgate.ec.europa.eu/rasff-window/portal/index.cfm?event=notificationDetail&NOTIF_REFERENCE=2012.1215

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Guess What Day It Is!…..It’s Point and Laugh Friday!

What a great week it’s been!  We’ve had lots of good news and our PSA buddies have continued their trajectory of stupidity to keep us all entertained.  Thanks to our PSAs we even got to learn some stuff through disproving their misguided notions and outright lies.  To say it’s been a busy week would be an understatement.  Because we have so much ground to cover, it’s best to jump right in to this week’s edition of Point and Laugh Friday…..brought to you by the letter `F’ for fuckery.

Slaughterhouse Sue dipped a tentative gnarly toenail into the waters this week to see if it was time to make a triumphant return from her self-imposed exile after getting run out of New Mexico.  She pretty much stuck to her tried and tested schtick of posting a link  in hopes of rallying her few remaining supporters. This week it was the `Action Alert’ from the New Jersey Farm Bureau asking for people to support the veto on the transportation ban on horses for slaughter.  No comments from her peanut gallery followed and only one `liked’ it, so  I guess the other three supporters couldn’t put down the Doritos long enough to click `like’. Next up, Suey got pissed when one of the UHers posted up this link : (http://www.cattlenetwork.com/e-newsletters/drovers-daily/Callicrate-rails-against-NCBA-praises-HSUS-166326766.html)  It has nothing to do with horses other than some beef producers working with the HSUS.  We all know how Suey hates anything to do with the HSUS so she kept things classy with this comment: “Those idiots, with Callicrate leading the charge, just lost whatever small amount of credibility they ever had. Talk about prostituting yourself…this about takes the cake!”  Not sure about you, but I think somebody like Slaughterhouse Sue talking about credibility is about like seeing a hooker talking about celibacy.  It doesn’t make a lot of sense.  I wish I could say Suey was done with that statement but she had one last shot to fire before scuttling back under her bridge.  That was this comment she made after linking an article about the HSUS not drawing a lot of support in Indiana : “Now…this is FUNNY! Eleven million supporters, my ass…”  Of all the vile and offensive statements this creature has made, this one made me die a little inside.  Does anyone need the image of her large, cottage cheesey, hairy ass burned onto their mind’s eye?  I’ve pretty much been off my feed ever since 😦

Speaking of Suey’s ass, Douchebag Duquette made good use of his off-leash time this week.  Apparently, he lost his remote control and was stuck actually watching the News  that came on after his kids were done with Sesame Street.  Something must have sparked in his tainted horse meat addled brain and inspired him to post this little gem: “I saw something very interesting on the news last night, they were talking about the NFL and how it was a 9.8 billion dollar a year business……Hmmmm?? How is it that the #1 recreational industry in the US (The Horse Industry) that was a $102 billion dollar a year business, over ten times the impact of the NFL gets so little play in the media or congress????? You would think that the amount of jobs lost directly and indirectly because of what our government let happen would be front and center.. Shouldn’t it be??”  I guess it’s difficult for D-bag to fathom that the six people that show up for the kiddies’ 4H show are considerably less and spend less than the people that show up for NFL games.  Besides, the big money in the horse industry is NOT the bottom feeding UH crowd that base the value on their stock on the meat market.  I’m not even sure what his point is about the media.  Does he want to televise slaughter and make a reality show out of it?  Does he want more media coverage of him getting verbally spanked by people?  I’m not following…..The good news is he returned to his dungeon to play lap-dog to Mama Suey for the remainder of the week.  The other good news is we hardly had to hear from Holy Theresa as she was allegedly busy doing penance for being such a sanctimonious piece of poop.

Moving on down the ladder to the bottom feeders even of the horse eating crowed, it’s time to check in with good ole Mendy Tobiano.  Seems Mendy is back to hoarding horses under the guise of fostering them for the `sheriff”.  Maybe that’s her new euphemism for Craigslist.  The problem with her little `story’ is that if the horse was a legal seizure, it would have had to been held for at least 30 days and then two notices of public auction would need to be made in the local papers which the sheriff department would handle.  It certainly wouldn’t have been handed to her and flipped within days as she claims.  Chances are she’s just horse trading as usual because once again, Mendy Tobiano’s story does not add up with what the actual laws are.   At any rate, here is a picture of the poor thing which may or may not have a new home. Why can’t these PSA people every actually GROOM an animal before riding it and WTF is up with the ill-fitting tack all the time?

This brings us to the nice little watermark on the picture and the dramedy that caused it.  The PSAs are operating under the misguided notion that putting their name and date on a picture makes it copyright.  It does not.  It just makes sure they get credit for it and I have no problem with that at all.  The actual fact of copyright is you have to PAY and register copyright for each and every picture and it can take up to 8mths for that to happen. Or at least that’s what you have to do if you want to actually enforce a copyright, which still wouldn’t work here because even if it was a real copyright….“• Fair use exceptions are allowable for such purposes of teaching, research, news reports, parodies, and critiques provided that the value of the copyrighted material is protected. “  So, it would appear to be business as usual for this blog.  What kicked all of this off?  Well, the PSA’s meltdown over being featured here last week went on and on.  Mendy Tobiano led the charge to try to make me feel bad by posting up a series of blogs designed to play our sympathies for the abusive asstards that were featured.  I guess if you have kids, health issues, or suck at life, that gives you a free pass to slaughter and abuse animals in NT’s world.  In my world there is never an excuse and I will continue to feature morons that wave their freak flag in my face.  Call it `news’, `parody’, or `critique’, it’s all fair use.  Produce proof of registered copyright and I’ll happily take the above picture down.

I wish I could say we were done with the antics of the petulant pony woman, but we are not. Because she is still unemployed, that means her and her personalities appear to have endless amounts of time to be all over the net.  She continues to sell off clothes and tack so that she can postpone actually going out and working, but maybe she can get some pointers from Montana’s former owner how to work the system and get the taxpayers to pay for her hoarding habit.  That new dog of hers won’t feed itself unless her pig’s days are numbered as well.  She rounded out the week by climbing up on the cross and being a martyr claiming `they’ are not going to do things the way they have been and, instead, extend a hand of friendship to `their’ fellow human beings and attempt to be a positive force….Then she ran off and participated in writing me poetry with her PSA buddies and calling me a hoe etc. Oh and let’s not forget about flirting with herself as NT.  I suspect somebody either had a med adjustment or was off them all together this week.  This is what NT left us with….barf with me…

BTW…you also can’t copyright images you snatched off google….

 

Daffy had a relatively quiet week in the vast tundra of Facebook.  Sadly, I can’t say the same about here.  She continues to post with regularity and I continue to hold her posts for moderation to try to calm down her hysteria.  So far so good.  She hasn’t grown a brain, but she has managed to have a few simple exchanges and be only minimally offensive.  Her crazyass mother seems to have given up registering new accounts to post bomb us all and I continue to put her in time-out.  I can only deal with one functional illiterate at once.  Hopefully, I haven’t just beatlejuiced her.  They are both great for comic relief for all of about five posts and then enough is enough.

Daffy and family

So, that pretty much covers the lowlights of the PSA antics this week.  It certainly doesn’t cover all of them and it is very challenging pick out their greatest hits at times.  They devote a lot of time to me and this blog which is awesome.  It means it’s working .  While they are preoccupied with me and who I am, the rest of you are doing the real work.  We had awesome news this week with Sugarcreek getting suspended for at least three weeks and Andio getting busted falsifying his EID paperwork.  It would seem the PSAs haven’t even registered how serious that one was.  Especially a certain PSA that just shipped a horse she claimed to have buted, then recanted when the EID was mentioned.  As always, once we’re done pointing and laughing, there is something you can do to make a real difference to end slaughter.  Please take the time to sign this position and share it out as much as possible: (http://www.change.org/petitions/overturn-the-legalization-of-horse-slaughter-for-human-consumption).  Hopefully, the PSAs will take a day off this weekend so I can finish up our Sunday PSA for this week.  I think you’ll really enjoy this one.  Keep up the good work everybody….we’re getting there!

 

 

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Let This Be The Last Time We Speak Of This

I’m cranky again.  I freely admit it.  You would think I would know better than to get irritated or even all that surprised by the outright lies that PSAs tell by now.  I think I’m mostly pissed off because I am really tired about discussing what I’m about to.  It depresses me.  I’m going to talk about being an asstard and sending your crippled horse on a 3o hr truck ride to slaughter and also being just a great big fat liar about why you did it.  You would think the least thing these people could do would be to own their evil if they are so certain that slaughter is the answer.

By now the regular readers all know about the saga of the PSA horse called `Montana’.  The poor thing first came onto our radar when his owner made this post on a Facebook site “So its official, I am going to bute my horse for the first time. Too bad I am “ruining” his meat for later especially since he is in pain and will eventually be put down….” Sadly we all know how things ended for the poor horse when she went off on everybody because she was `forced’ to send him on a 3o hr truck ride for slaughter in Canada.  Of course, this was after she had voiced the romantic notion of delivering him herself and being with him when they shot him in the face several times.  That all went out the window when it became obvious it was going to eat into her profit margin.

Naturally, because good ole NT likes to label herself as `pro-agriculture’ and pretty much anti-kindness, she has taken up for this horrible excuse for a horse owner.   Remember that this person has repeatedly stated the horse had ringbone and went downhill super fast.  That’s not how ringbone usually works, but whatever.  Now she says the horse was `injured’ by a metal post 3 yrs ago. The new story is he was off and on lame for the past three years and took a very bad turn for the worse.  Nowhere does this owner ever mention that this horse was seen by a vet.  It would appear her farrier, who I’m just going to come right and say is a moron if she is accurately reporting what he said, did all the diagnostics on the horse.  She is also now saying that she NEVER gave the horse Bute because she didn’t want to mask his pain and hurt him worse.  Clearly this person has no business owning horses if she thinks Bute will do anything other than decrease the inflammation and make the horse more comfortable.  It’s not a nerve block or anything.  She could have given the horse a cortisone injection or even dexamethasone to make him more comfortable too.  You can read up on ringbone here:

http://www.horsetrue.com/ringbone-in-horses.html

You pretty much need a vet and a set of x-rays to accurately diagnose ringbone.  It’s more of an arthritic condition that worsens over time.  We had an old ranch horse that ended up with ringbone in her later years.  She was kept very comfortable well into her late 20’s and lived quite happily with the little kids brushing on her and loving on her.  Anyhow, our PSA says that finally an abscess developed `around the coffin joint’ (again going on the farrier’s opinion rather than a set of film) and blew out the coronet band.  The horse was horribly lame.  Of course he was.  I’ve had horses get an abscess and they act like they broke their leg.  However, that lasts about a day until you soak and drain the thing and relieve the pressure.  Have you ever had a sliver under your nail?  Probably feels about the same. The PSA makes NO mention of soaking this horse’s feet or doing anything to make him comfortable other than to phone the kill buyer.  We had a horse in our barn that did not have ringbone that ended up with abscesses in three feet at the same time.  She came in with horrible feet.  With soaking,  poultice bandaging and antibiotics, she was running around within the week.  Of course we had to keep her feet bandaged and treated until she closed up, but she was treatable and went onto be a happy, sound horse.  It just took some actual effort on our part to fix things.  The PSA also never gave this horse any sort of pain meds to make him more comfortable.  She was in such a panic to `not waste his meat’ that she made him suffer needlessly.

It’s treatable!

The story gets far worse than we even knew.  Thanks to Naughty Tobiano for filling in the gaps.  The PSA likened Montana’s pain level to `walking on a razor blade’ so she waited three days to have the kill buyer to come and pick him up.  From there, the poor thing got to go on a trailer ride from Minnesota to Michigan and be `held’ for three days.  The great news was he was `approved’ for human consumption.  From there he began his 30 hr trailer ride to the slaughter facility in Canada, likely Fort McLeod, AB,  where he may or may not have been killed right away.  He was by his owner’s account extremely sore and was never given anything to ease his pain.  This is beyond  cruel, it is outright barbaric and bordering on criminal cruelty.

Sadly, we are just getting started on the lies.  We are supposed to feel sorry for this evil sicko because she has three kids with twins on the way and nobody has a job in her family or something like that.  Too bad I don’t have the sympathy gene for people that make shitty choices and abuse animals.  She goes onto telling us what great care the kill buyer takes with his animals and how happy she knows the horse’s end was quick.  Quick?????  He was shipped to another state, held for three days and then crammed onto a load of other horses and shipped 30 hrs while he was so sore he was `walking on razor blades’.  How is that quick and painless?  She said they are not allowed to bury horses in her Minnesota and she didn’t want to go to jail for doing so.  She is a great big fat liar. (http://www1.extension.umn.edu/agriculture/horse/care/humane-options-for-unwanted-horses/#carcass)  She had several options to have him put down right at home with a bullet that wouldn’t have caused this animal pain and suffering.  She’s one of these `contaminate the ground water’ asstards.  She is also still crying about no slaughter in the US being the reason for this horse’s torture.  I guess it doesn’t occur to her that Rockville, Mo or the plant in New Mexico would have been almost as long, if not longer, of a trailer ride for her poor horse.  Of course we get the warm fuzzy that she bought two mini horses with her blood money and is going to train them to be service horses and even named one after Montana.  Sadly, this PSA is closely associated with and fosters for a rescue that has an executive director that is also very pro-slaughter.  What a nest of assholes there is up in that end of the world. Oh and the picture I originally was sent of her?  She said it was one she didn’t know was taken.  Yet another lie because it is one of an entire series. She seems to be looking right at the camera in others, so I’m not sure what the point in lying and saying your husband `snuck’ a picture of you is.  I guess pathological liars just don’t know how to tell the truth.

I would love for this to be the last time I feel compelled to mention this asstard.  I think she is profoundly cruel and stupid and people like her shouldn’t be allowed to own animals.  There is nothing in her sob story that justifies what she did to a horse that she claims `meant everything’ to her.  I have a very senior horse of my own.  He is over 30 yrs old and he won’t be around forever.  I’ve had him 29 years and he really is my everything. I am thankful for every single day he’s still here, happy and healthy, but I have also looked into some unpleasant things for when his time with us is up.  I’m aware of my disposal options, what it costs and there is money set aside.  He will never know the horror and torture that Montana did.  For this person to say that she would go to jail if she buried her horse is just an ignorant lie.  Even if she doesn’t have the land to bury him, a rendering company will come and pick up carcasses. It wasn’t a huge surprise to her the horse’s life was going to end.  She was crying about it for at least a month before she actually signed his death warrant and took her blood money.  Shame on her for not investigating a humane option for this animal she claimed to love so much.  Every time this person comments about this, she just makes herself look worse and I wish she would just STFU.  I’m sad for her horse and I know he deserved far better than he got from his person.  Some actions are just not defensible.  What’s with all the pointing fingers and excuses if you truly believe slaughter to be such a great and wonderful thing?

One last word to this PSA….Kill buyers LIE.  Just like you do.  No, they don’t test every carcass for meat and your horse may or may not have shipped right away.  He may or may not have been killed right away.  He told you what you wanted to hear.  You were just stupid enough to buy it.  Kill buying is NOT an honorable profession.  Grow up.

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