DawnWatch.com

The recent decision, by the Better Business Bureau, to turn in a complaint against the United Egg Producers to the Federal Trade Commission, is in today's edition of the national paper, USA Today. (Monday, August 30, page 14B)

The story, by Elizabeth Weise, is headed "'Animal care certified' isn't all it's cracked up to be Complaint charges egg logo overstates humane care of hens."

The egg producers had appealed an earlier decision by the Better Business Bureau, which recommended discontinuing the use of "Animal Care Certified" seals. We read:

"This time, BBB's national advertising review board again ruled against the egg producers, saying the seals give the impression the eggs are produced by hens 'accorded a more humane level of care than is actually the case,' according to the report."

And we learn: "Starvation to promote renewed laying and beak trimming at 10 days or younger still are allowed."

"United Egg Producers (UEP) was among the first to institute industry standards for the care of laying hens. That led to higher standards overall. Each hen is required to have a cage area at least the size of a sheet of notebook paper."

Compassion Over Killing, the group that brought the suit, tells me that UEP guidelines actually call for only 67 square inches per bird, as opposed to a piece of notebook paper (8.5 x 11 inches), which is 93.5 square inches.

You can learn a lot more about the issue and see horrifying photos on the COK website http://www.EggScam.com

Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Shorter letters are more likely to be published.

A big story today, Friday August 27, is the impact of sportfishing on declining fish populations. It is on the front page of the California section in the Los Angeles Times (B1), headed "Sportfishing Blamed in Depletion." It is in the New York Times, on page A15, headed "Sport Anglers said to catch more fish than thought." It is in the Christian Science Monitor headed "Angst over Anglers," and appears in scores of other papers. It is handled as a conservation rather than an animal protection story, but our letters to the editor can emphasize the issue of cruelty.

The following is from Peter Singer's 'Animal Liberation' : "Surely it is only because fish do not yelp or whimper in a way that we can hear that otherwise decent people can think it a pleasant way of spending an afternoon to sit by the water dangling a hook while previously caught fish die slowly beside them." I have known animal protection advocates who eat fish, having been persuaded that the animals do not feel pain. Studies published last year, that were unpleasant but perhaps lifesaving (for fish) refuted that notion. When bee venom was injected into the lips of fish they rubbed them incessantly against the gravel and walls of their tanks -- the response one might expect from a person with no arms in a similar situation. When one thinks of the suffering of fish, today's story on fish depletion and the possible restriction of sport fishing takes added weight.

The Los Angeles Times article, by Kenneth R. Weiss, goes into the most depth. Weiss opens:

"Sportfishermen have a much larger role in depleting ocean fish than previously thought, catching nearly a quarter of the overfished species in U.S. coastal waters and about 59% of severely depleted rockfish off the Pacific Coast, a new study shows.

"The study, which scrutinized 22 years of fishing statistics for the journal Science, shines the spotlight on recreational fishermen, who have long blamed commercial fishermen for the severe decline in the ocean fish populations off America's shores.

"To help stocks recover, the authors say, sportfishing will have to face more severe restrictions. The government, they say, may have to limit the number of people who are allowed to fish for sport in the ocean, just as it restricts commercial fishermen at sea and recreational hunters on land."

Towards the end of the article Weiss discusses 'catch and release' in such a way as to point to the particular abhorrence of that practice which serves no purpose but to entertain fishermen:

"The study, the authors say, underestimates the total effect of recreational fishing because it does not count fish that are thrown back for being too small but that die anyway.

"Anglers who catch and release don't always help, because many of those fish die, the mortality increasing with depth, according to the study.

"Pacific rockfish, for instance, when pulled from 120 feet or deeper, with eyes bugging out and air bladders expanding out of their mouths, have very poor chances of living if thrown back."

You will find links to the article as it appeared in the Los Angeles Times, the San Jose Mercury News, the San Luis Obispo Tribune, the Contra Costa Times, the Monterey County Herald, and Florida's Sarasota Herald-Tribune at: http://tinyurl.com/4tvoc

If the story appeared in your local paper, I encourage you to send a letter to the editor on the practice of sport fishing. If you have any trouble locating the correct email address for a letter to the editor, don't hesitate to ask me for help. Or a call to the paper will probably get it for you even more quickly.

Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Shorter letters are more likely to be published.

-- The refusal of the show's producers to give government investigators video footage of the attack and its preceding moments

-- The upcoming NBC animated series, "Father of the Pride" based on the Siegfried and Roy show.

You'll find USA Today's coverage of Feld Entertainment's refusal to release the footage at:

"The company that produced the Siegfried & Roy magic show has refused to turn over video to federal authorities investigating the tiger attack on illusionist Roy Horn, The Associated Press has learned.

"The U.S. Department of Agriculture attempted to obtain video of the show through two recent subpoenas but Vienna, Va.-based Feld Entertainment would not hand over the footage, a USDA source familiar with the case said Tuesday.

"Under the federal Animal Welfare Act, the USDA has been investigating the Oct. 3 attack in which Horn was mauled by a 300-pound tiger during a live performance at The Mirage hotel-casino in Las Vegas.

"Horn survived the attack but suffered a stroke that left him partially paralyzed and the successful show closed.

"USDA spokesman Jim Rogers said Tuesday from Washington D.C., that the probe into the tiger attack remains open and confirmed that the show is under investigation for possible violations of the Animal Welfare Act."

Other articles have reported that Feld is allowing the USDA to view the tape but will not release it to the agency's care. It has been reported that the company is worried about the footage being aired on the news. In the day or two immediately following the incident, some reports mentioned that Roy Horn had been hitting the tiger on the nose with a microphone just before the attack -- it is not tape that circus proponents would want to have aired widely.

The show has received poor reviews. The current, September 3, edition of Entertainment Weekly heads its review "Animal Instinks" and gives the show a C+.

The Los Angeles Times has a particularly interesting large story about the new series on the front page of the Friday, August 27, Business section, (Page C1.) It is headed, "With 'Pride' Problems, NBC Finds It's a Jungle Out There;" and sub-headed "A mauling put the series in doubt. Its content has raised concerns."

"Scripts had been written, voice tracks recorded and millions of dollars spent on DreamWorks Animation's upcoming TV comedy about the animals in Siegfried & Roy's Las Vegas show. Then tragedy intruded.

"Roy Horn was mauled by a 600-pound Siberian tiger and dragged off the stage during an October performance. He was near death, his prognosis uncertain.

"Back at DreamWorks' facility in Glendale, executives were confronted with a delicate but inescapable decision: Should production continue on the computer animated show "Father of the Pride"?

Jeffrey Katzenberg is quoted explaining the theme of the show: "What would it be like to be one of these animals and to raise a family, and live in the Jungle Palace and go to work every day at a place where the CEOs are these two eccentric guys, Siegfried & Roy?"

We learn that after the October 3 attack "In Burbank, most NBC entertainment executives figured they should pull the plug. They worried that the mauling would make a satirical look at Siegfried & Roy and the animals seem in poor taste. Zucker, however, continued to champion the project, as did Katzenberg."

And we learn about an upcoming prime-time special focused on Horn's recovery called "Siegfried & Roy: The Miracle," hosted by Maria Shriver and scheduled to air Sept. 15.

"For a while, NBC executives considered running the Shriver special on the same night as 'Father of the Pride.' They changed course after hundreds of advertisers were left cringing in their seats during NBC's presentation of its fall lineup in May."

Stories about Siegfried and Roy, and the new show, present perfect opportunities for letters to the editor regarding the suffering of wild animals in circuses. You'll find loads of information on that issue, including distressing circus animal training tapes at: http://www.circuses.com

You can view video excerpts. They include a line in which the head lion, after slapping one of the lionesses on the butt, says "God I love this business."

The general feedback address (perhaps for feedback regarding the Shriver hosted special) is nbcshows@nbc.com

There is no institution in modern society more powerful than the media. Therefore, for the sake of the animals, animal advocates must do all that we can to befriend the media. It is never a good idea to send hostile notes to stations. However, a flood of polite email expressing much disappointment at the station's choice could be very useful. Stations take their feedback seriously.

There is a delightful story on the front page of the Monday, August 23, Los Angeles Times, headed, "Automakers Getting a Taste for Vegan Values; Pleasing those who shun animal products is seen as key to reaching a wider, affluent group." It is by Sharon Bernstein

We learn that "Vegans themselves are not a powerful market force... vegetarians make up just 1.5% of the general population, and vegans hardly register at all."

But Bernstein quotes Joe Marra, executive director of a market research firm that specializes in environmentally conscious consumers; he explains that more than a quarter of the adult population, about 56 million people nationwide, say they look for products that are "healthy and sustainable" and most will pay significantly more for them. Marra says, "The incidence of veganism and vegetarianism is very low, but the incidence of people being aware of issues like cruelty to animals is much higher."

Bernstein writes, "This broader circle of crossover consumers accounts for $226.8 billion in sales of alternative products, including organic foods, cruelty-free cosmetics and, increasingly, hybrid and other vehicles that emit less air pollution than typical vehicles, said Brad Warkins, president of Conscious Media."

Bob Kurilko, vice president of marketing for the automobile website Edmunds.com, explains why it is worthwhile to appeal to vegans:

"As a marketer you want to identify with the passionate group. The middle of the bull's-eye is where you want to focus your marketing, and then you want to expand your message around that. If you draw these concentric circles, the middle of the bull's-eye right now is the vegan."

"Toyota Motor Corp. is so attuned to the sensibilities of these so-called green consumers that the company doesn't even offer leather seats for the popular Prius.

"Ford Motor Co., under fire from environmental activists for its gas-guzzling sport utility vehicles, ran an eight-page advertisement in the New Yorker magazine touting the company's green credentials. The ad led off with the boast that 11 members of the design team for the company's soon-to-be-released hybrid Escape SUV are vegetarians, and its leader is a vegan.

"Even Mercedes-Benz, which does not make a hybrid, will offer a "non-leather" package starting with the 2005 model year, in response to customer requests. Previously, all of the luxury automaker's high-end cars came standard with leather seats."

"While not targeting vegans or vegetarians with direct appeals, Toyota has chosen not to offer its Prius with leather, aware that might offend some customers."

"As the market for the Prius has grown more mainstream, more and more potential customers have had the opposite reaction: Why can't you buy a Prius with leather in it? Christopher Cutright, fleet director at Hollywood Toyota and a top Prius salesman, said that nowadays most of his customers are requesting leather seats in their cars -- and paying a $1,500 premium to get it. Last month, Cutright said, Hollywood Toyota sold 36 Priuses -- 30 of them with leather added by the dealership."

Bernstein writes, "Through daily monitoring of Prius chat rooms online, the company has also learned that many of the company's new customers want leather seats. That has sparked a debate within the company: These consumers are the crossover market Toyota wants for its hybrid car. But putting leather in the Prius, even if it is just an option, could turn off the vehicle's core customers."

The article ends with Paul Daverio, manager for advanced technology vehicle marketing at Toyota, saying that Prius might use imitation leathers that do not impact on the environment but would never use real leather in the Prius.

It provides a great opportunity for appreciative vegan friendly letters to the Los Angeles Times. The Los Angeles Times takes letters at:

Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Shorter letters are more likely to be published.

There is an interesting editorial in the Sunday, August 22, Los Angeles Times, which invites letters regarding animal experimentation. It is headed "Monkey Do... Sometimes," with the sub-heading, "Let's hope this hard-work-for-no-pay idea doesn't catch on."

"It also seems that certain medical researchers who are confined to work areas in La Jolla's Salk Institute for Biological Studies can get pretty bored studying loafer monkeys. Which is unrewarding. So what they did (the humans, that is) was inject DNA into the rhinal cortex of the monkeys' brains. This is tricky business, but it's happening a lot these days. The DNA blocked the monkeys' pleasure response, which pleased the humans. And what do you think happened?

"The lab residents (the monkeys, that is) didn't loaf anymore. They worked their primate behinds off, not caring about rewards, imminent or otherwise. They were absolutely chore-manic. Freed from reward expectations and disappointments, the monkeys pulled their lab levers like crazy. This excited the lab workers (the human ones), who began scribbling like crazy, anticipating the reward of a scholarly article. Eventually, the injections wore off. The monkeys returned to acting like lazy humans. The humans returned to their research chores.

"Such a serious study, as reported in recent Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, can be complex reading, easily misinterpreted by laypeople who surely have a rhinal cortex but aren't sure where it is or what it does. Hint: The rhinal cortex is usually in the head and controls the attachment of meaning to recognizable objects. Say, you turn to a Sunday editorial page expecting an imminent intellectual reward. Without a rhinal cortex, you might think it was the comics and start laughing."

While the biomedical community tries to convince the world that animal experimentation is all about curing rampant and devastating human diseases, it is gratifying to see the Los Angeles Times editorial staff pick up on just one of the countless questionable experiments being funded and conducted. But, of course, primate experimentation is not a laughing matter. The piece opens the door for appreciative letters (studies have proven that papers are far more likely to publish laudatory rather than critical letters) that bring home the horror of animal experimentation.

Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Shorter letters are more likely to be published.

The Magazine section of the Sunday, August 15, Los Angeles Times is headed the "Fall Fashion Issue." One of the stories, plugged on the front page, is "A Touch of Fur." Inside, on page 51, the dismaying story is headed, "Warming Trend; Fur Is Everywhere This Fall, But Will L.A.'s Fashionistas Accept It?" Writer Peter McQuaid talks about fur's comeback, and even about its spread into summer wardrobes.

McQuaid lists loads of designers using fur in their fall collections, various celebrities wearing it, and has chatted with many Angelenos happy to promote it.

The story is accompanied by a picture of a model in an aqua "blue fox cropped jacket." McQuaid notes that designers are making fur look hipper by dying it different colors. Then he writes:

"What also has happened is a thaw in the discourse about fur. Although animal-rights groups have been remarkably effective at drawing a red slash through the use of animals for adornment, the take-no-prisoners approach of some of its more strident supporters may have fueled something of a backlash."

How ridiculous to blame the resurgence in fur sales on those protesting against it. Fur wearing was at its lowest in the early nineties, when the protests were the most strident. Brilliant marketing, including mass donations by Saga furs to young, hot, but still broke designers, fueled the resurgence.

There is a quote from PETA's Michael McGraw that seems awfully generous to fur wearers: "All that dyeing and shearing just makes it look less like it came from an animal. And consumers may be buying it without knowing it's real because it looks so fake."

McQuaid notes some of PETA's most recent tactics: "PETA is showing fashionable alternatives to animal-based clothing."

But the bulk of the article is about all the different types of fur you can now buy, where you can buy it, and who is buying it.

Please, with polite letters to the editor, let the Los Angeles Times know that the anti-fur movement is not dead and that wearing fur in summer is no way to be cool. The Magazine takes letters at: latmag@latimes.com

Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Please never use any of my exact phrases when writing letters, and please don't attach sample letters to media alerts. A slew of similarly worded letters on an issue will diminish the chance that any will get published, whereas many short original letters will increase the probability.

Sometimes I thoroughly enjoy producing DawnWatch -- like today, when having received a tip from Vicki Stevens at Doris Day Animal Foundation about an article in the August edition of Gourmet magazine, I get to spread the word. The article, "Consider the Lobster" is by

David Foster Wallace, an author best known for his very hyped, very long, and mostly well-reviewed novel "Infinite Jest." Wallace was asked to cover the Maine Lobster Festival. His coverage, published anywhere, would be well worth reading. It's appearance in Gourmet Magazine is astounding.

I will summarize some of it below, quoting various lines and a few paragraphs. But (and I can hardly believe DawnWatch is recommending the purchase of "Gourmet") since I cannot do it justice, I urge you to pick up the magazine while it is still on the newsstands and read the whole piece. And most importantly, share it with the compassionate people in your life who love gourmet food.

David Foster Wallace's article about the Maine Lobster Festival begins on page 50. He describes the huge event, and gives us some information on lobsters and the history of eating them. Then, on page 60, he puts forward the following -- rather a surprise in the context of Gourmet magazine:

"So then here is a question that is all but unavoidable at the world's largest lobster cooker, and may arise in kitchen's across the US: Is it alright to boil a sentient creature alive just for our gustatory pleasure?"

Wallace mentions the myth, spread throughout the festival, that the creatures are not sentient:

"Dick, whose son in law happens to be a professional lobsterman and one of the Main Eating Tent's regular suppliers -- articulates what he and his family feel is the crucial mitigating factor in the whole morality-of-boiling-lobsters-alive issue: 'There's a part of the brain in people and animals that lets us feel pain, and lobsters' brains don't have this part.'"

"Besides the fact that it's incorrect in about 11 different ways, the main reason Dick's statement is interesting is that it's thesis is more or less echoed by the festival's own pronouncement on lobsters and pain, which is part of a Test Your Lobster IQ quiz that appears in the 2003 MLF program courtesy of the Maine Lobster Promotion Council."

He shares the promotional quote, then writes, "Though it sounds more sophisticated, a lot of the neurology in this latter claim is either false or fuzzy."

He explains why, then he writes: "The more important point here though, is that the whole animal-cruelty-and-eating- issue is not just complex, it's also uncomfortable. It is, at any rate, uncomfortable for me and for just about everyone I know who enjoys a variety of foods and yet does not want to see herself as cruel or unfeeling. As far as I can tell, my own way of dealing with this conflict has been to avoid thinking about the whole unpleasant thing. I should add that it appears to me unlikely that many readers of GOURMET wish to think hard about it, either, or to be queried about the morality of their eating habits in the pages of a culinary monthly. Since, however, the assigned subject of this article is what it was like to attend the 2003 MLF, and thus to spend several days in the midst of a great mass of Americans all eating lobster, and thus to be more or less impelled to think hard about lobster and the experience of buying and eating lobster, it turns out there is no honest way to avoid certain moral questions."

I am thrilled he felt there was no honest way to avoid those moral questions as I think many writers would have avoided them. And many editors of culinary magazines might have refused to print them in this kind of detail, even if the refusal meant wasting the money spent on securing the article.

"The basic scenario is that we come in from the store and make our little preparations like getting the kettle filled and boiling, and then we lift the lobsters out of the bag or whatever retail container they came home in, whereupon some uncomfortable things start to happen. However stuporous the lobster is from the trip home, for instance, it tends to come alarmingly to life when placed in boiling water. If you are tilting from a container into the steaming kettle, the lobster will sometimes try to cling to the container's sides or even to hook its claws over the kettles rim like a person trying to keep from going over the edge of a roof. And worse is when the lobster's fully immersed. Even if you cover the kettle and turn away, you can usually hear the cover rattling and clanking as the lobster tries to push it off. Or the creature's claws scraping the sides of the kettle as it thrashes around. The lobster, in other words, behaves very much as you or I would behave if we were plunged into boiling water (with the obvious exception of screaming). A blunter way to say this is that the lobster acts as if it is in terrible pain, causing some cooks to leave the kitchen altogether and to take one of those lightweight little plastic oven timers with them into another room and wait until the whole process is over."

Wallace talks about how ethicists determine whether "a living creature has the capacity to suffer and so has genuine interests that it may or may not be our moral duty to consider." A footnote refers to the work of Peter Singer on this matter. Then Wallace writes:

"It takes a whole lot of intellectual gymnastics and behaviorist hairsplitting not to see struggling, thrashing, and lid-clattering as just such pain-behavior. According to marine zoologists, it usually takes lobsters between 35 and 45 seconds to die in boiling water."

He tells us that some more compassionate chefs stab the lobster between the eyes before boiling, hoping to render it insensate. But, he explains, "The problem with the knife method is basic biology: Lobsters' nervous systems operate off not one but several ganglia...and disabling only the frontal ganglion does not normally result in either quick death or unconsciousness."

Wallace discusses whether the pain a lobster feels might be different from that which we feel, which coincides with an emotional component that we call suffering. Then he writes,

"Still, after all the abstract intellection, there remain the facts of the frantically clanking lid, the pathetic clinging to the edge of the pot. Standing at the stove, it is hard to deny in any meaningful way that this is a living creature experiencing pain and wishing to avoid/escape the painful experience." He goes on to discuss lobsters' abilities to exhibit preferences.

"I'm not trying to give you a PETA-like screed here -- at least I don't think so. I'm trying, rather, to work out and articulate some of the troubling questions that arise amid all the laughter and saltation and community pride of the Maine Lobster Festival. The truth is that if you, the festival attendee, permit yourself to think that lobsters can suffer and would rather not, the MLF can begin to take on aspects of something like a Roman circus or medieval torture-fest.

"Does that comparison seem a bit much? If so, exactly why? Or what about this one: Is it not possible that future generations will regard our own present agribusiness and eating practices in much the same way we now view Nero's entertainment or Aztec sacrifices? My own immediate reaction is that such a comparison is hysterical, extreme -- and yet the reason it seems extreme to me appears to be that I believe animals are less morally important than human beings and when it comes to defending such a belief, even to myself, I have to acknowledge that a) I have an obvious selfish interest in this belief, since I like to eat certain kinds of animals and want to keep doing it, and b) I have not succeeded in working out any sort of personal ethical system in which the belief is truly defensible instead of just selfishly convenient."

With his comment about animals being less morally important he includes footnote number 20: "Meaning a LOT less important, apparently, since the moral comparison here is not the value of one human's life vs. the value of one animal's life, but rather the value of one animal's life vs. the value of one human's taste for a particular kind of protein. Even the most diehard carniphile will acknowledge that it's possible to live and eat well without consuming animals."

Wallace continues, "Given this article's venue and my own lack of culinary sophistication, I'm curious about whether the reader can identify with any of these reactions and acknowledgements and discomforts."

He ends his article with questions about the connections between aesthetics and morality.

I urge you to thank Gourmet for printing the article. Appreciative notes from vegetarians or vegans are fine -- you might encourage Gourmet to further explore the organic and free-range farming movements and include more plant-based recipes like the terrific selection of eggplant recipes in the August issue. (Notes suggesting that Gourmet should stop promoting meat and other animal products are not only unrealistic, they amount to giving the magazine negative feedback for having printed Wallace's lobster article -- that would be a real pity.)

Perhaps most importantly: I know not all DawnWatch subscribers are vegan or even vegetarian. Many have signed up due to their interest in dogs and cats, and are new to exposure about the suffering of animals in the food industry. Or some care about the suffering of those animals but have not yet stopped eating them (or the products of their suffering) and might subscribe to or occasionally buy "Gourmet" magazine. The magazine needs to hear from its readers, so letters from you, who do like Gourmet Magazine, but particularly liked its article focusing on the ethical issues around causing animals to suffer, are vital. The appearance of this article in Gourmet Magazine indicates a paradigm shift, slow but unmistakable, regarding the way our society views the treatment of members of other species. Your letters will encourage that shift.

"If you have general comments for the editors at Gourmet magazine, please enter your comments below and click on the Send button. We read everything you send us, but unfortunately we can't respond to each message personally.

Finally, though I love reading letters people write (and beg you to send me any that are published) it is best, if you would like to share them, to forward me the letters after they are sent (or before if you would like an edit) or to cut and paste them and then email to me. I do not recommend CCing me on letters to editors, thereby giving the editors the idea that they are a joint effort.

A front page story in today's (Friday, August 13) New York Sun about the Olympics ("After Four Years, Tens of Millions of Dollars, and Tons of Paint, Athens Cries Out, 'Let the Games Begin'") refers to the stray dog issue only with this absurd line:

"Numerous glitches have arisen: the spreading doping scandal, public outrage over the Olympic mascots that look like furry science beakers supported by flat yellow feet, and animal-rights activists' concern that the city is neutering stray dogs."

The New York Sun takes letters at: editor@nysun.com

You will find more accurate information about activists' concerns -- that thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, of dogs are being poisoned, on the MSNBC website at:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5436880
MSNBC was one of the few US major media outlets to cover the story in depth. You can send an appreciative note to letters@MSNBC.com . Appreciative notes encourage similar coverage.
MSNBC recommends, "Please note: If you are responding to a particular story it will help us greatly if you include the URL of the story in question."

And the Friday, August 13, Chicago Tribune has a story on the issue, by Dan Mihalopoulos, headed, "Give me shelter;
Athens creates a summer camp in effort to clean up its problem with strays." (Page 12)

"Fearful that packs of stray mutts would tarnish the country's image and threaten Olympic visitors, Greek authorities declared that the dogs must disappear from the neighborhoods around the sports facilities....From Aug. 1 to Sept. 15, many dogs that usually feed on scraps from garbage piles or handouts from Athenian tavern tables are being kept in shelters, kennels and private homes well away from the Olympic flame.

"The 1,500 dogs taken to shelters under the Greek government's program are supposed to be sterilized and vaccinated before being returned to their old haunts after the Olympic flame is extinguished."

But apparently Athens had a lot more than 1,500 stray dogs, so something here isn't quite right. Again, the Chicago Tribune is one of the few outlets to pay any attention to the issue so appreciative letters are recommended. However, you should question the figures. And given the wealth of our nation, the US record on companion animal welfare is also appalling. We kill approximately 5 million dogs per year since spay-neuter is still not universal, few governments have enacted laws to even encourage it (for example making licensing significantly cheaper for altered dogs) let alone enforce it, and people continue to breed dogs, while millions die in 'shelters.' So letters that question not just the Greek, but also the US treatment of companion animals would be appropriate and even more useful. You'll find the Tribune story on line at:
http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/printedition/chi-0408130373aug13,1,5517700.story

The Chicago Tribune takes letters at:
http://www.chicagotribune.com/services/site/chi-lettertotheeditor.customform

or ctc-TribLetter@Tribune.com

You can view a shocking five minute documentary, entitled "Greece in all her Glory," on the web at: http://www.ua4a.org/Greece.mov

For more information on the Greek dog situation, contact:
Marijo Anne Gillis of Welfare for Animals in Greece
Telephone (212) 427-0587 E-Mail: TwinkiePerkyEbby@msn.com

There is a wonderful story about Wayne Pacelle, the new Chief Executive Offer of The Humane Society of the United States, on the front of page of the Style section (Page C1) of the Monday, August 9, Washington Post. It is headed, "Vegan in The Henhouse; Wayne Pacelle, Putting Animals On (and Off) The Table."

"Wayne Pacelle is the new head of the Humane Society of the United States. Better take your dog in tonight -- 'cause pet ownership could be in trouble. Might want to stock up on steaks before meat prices soar as factory farms shut down. And your children are being brainwashed to veganism in school.

"The new watchdog of the animal kingdom has critics fretting. They warn that behind his John Kennedy Jr. good looks, gentle manner and boyish charm is a teeth-baring dogmatist whose hidden agenda is a scary brand of doctrinaire animal rights that for mainstream Americans would make 'humane' feel like the food chain turned upside down.

"'He's enemy number one,' says Beth Ruth of the U.S. Sportsmen's Alliance, a pro-hunting group that has clashed bitterly with Pacelle."

Pacelle says you can judge a person by their enemies as much as their friends so he doesn't mind the flak he gets from some of his opponents. But he counters their claims saying he is a reformist rather than an abolitionist. Yes he is vegan, started Yale's Student Animal Rights Coalition during his college days, and says with pride that he got vegan meals instituted into the dining hall system. But his tactics are probably best defined by the following quote:

"What I represent is mainstream approaches and tactics, even though personally, in the way I live my life, I'm a little more orthodox. I don't believe there's going to be any revolutions. I believe it's going to be a slow process of people seeing alternatives, accepting them and using them."

He adds, "My views have evolved. I'm not the same person I was in 1987. I was definitely less tolerant. If I was viewed as just a complete flamethrower, I would never be able to get bills passed in Congress."

The lengthy article, which makes much of the power of Pacelle's charm and the threat it poses to animal abuse industries is an interesting read. You'll find it on line at:

It presents a great opportunity for animal advocates, both abolitionists and those who favor the more mainstream approach, to send letters that address the way members of other species are treated by human society.

The Washington Post takes letters at: letters@washpost.com . The paper instructs: "Please do not send attachments; they will not be read.

Letters must be exclusive to The Washington Post, and must include the writer's home address and home and business telephone numbers. Because of space limitations, those published are subject to abridgment. Although we are unable to acknowledge those letters we cannot publish, we appreciate the interest and value the views of those who take the time to send us their comments."

The UK dispute between the militant contingent of the animal advocacy movement and the animal research community is covered in the Sunday, August 8, New York Times. (Section 1, page 6.)

"Construction had barely begun in February on a research laboratory at Oxford University -- one scheduled to experiment with animals -- when the string of violent incidents began.

"In the months that followed, the offices and trucks of a major concrete supplier to the site were vandalized a dozen times. Animal welfare guerrillas with axes and bolt cutters sliced through brake lines and contaminated fuel tanks. A factory and several trucks were set on fire.

"An anonymous posting on an animal welfare Web site called Arkangel, which described the raids, attributed the violence to a radical group called the Animal Liberation Front, which was formed in the 1970's.

"In June, shareholders in the Montpellier Group, a publicly held company in London that was building the lab, received a forged letter, supposedly from the company's chairman, threatening them and telling them to sell their shares. Montpellier's stock price plummeted. The company soon pulled out of the project.

"The construction site, in Oxford's science quadrangle, is now silent, although the university said that it would find another builder and that the work would continue on schedule.

"Montpellier's withdrawal was the second major victory in Britain this year for emboldened animal welfare groups, which have proved to be more militant, and better organized and better financed than ever. In January, after months of pressure, intimidation and protests from the groups, Cambridge University abandoned plans to build a major primate research center.

'''It has been an incredible year for us,' said Greg Avery, a spokesman for Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty, a group that wages a continuing campaign against Britain's largest research lab, owned by Huntingdon Life Sciences, near Cambridge. 'The animal-rights movement is bigger and stronger than it has ever been.'''

According to Alvarez, "Animal welfare advocates usually choose traditional methods like demonstrations and letter campaigns to protest the experiments, which they consider fruitless and immoral....But the advocates working outside the law and going after anyone even tangentially linked to the research centers have garnered the most success, particularly at Huntingdon Life Sciences."

We learn, "Taxi drivers sometimes refuse to pick up customers there, and the drivers of fuel trucks will not deliver oil.

This year, 51 suppliers cut off business relations with Huntingdon, a number that is tallied by the animal welfare groups. The attacks can also be personal. The managing director of the lab, Brian Cass, was beaten by men with baseball bats, and the cars and homes of Huntingdon employees have been vandalized in attacks linked to animal welfare advocates. "

However SHAC denies direct responsibility for any violence: "Mr. Avery said his group was not responsible for any violence, and he defended its right to make life difficult for companies associated with the lab, calling them fair game."

"Now the fear is that the militants' success at Oxford will strengthen the movement."

She concludes her article voicing the concerns of Dr. Tipu Aziz, a neurosurgery professor at Oxford University who researches Parkinson's disease and says that experiments on animals are not only necessary but are required by law in developing medicines, and that "Heart surgery, transplants, brain surgery -- none would have been possible without experiments on animals."

He says, ''Most lay people don't realize how their health and well-being would be affected without animal research. It's an intrinsic part of modern medicine.''

Indeed, animal tests are required for all new drugs -- not just cancer drugs, but every single new drug, such as the latest headache tablet that works for six hours rather than four hours. And that is so despite the clear ethical issues around sacrificing animal lives for trivial purposes and much evidence challenging the predictive value of animal tests with regard to humans. A great source of information on that evidence, and an organization that, without refusing to acknowledge some knowledge obtained from animal testing, questions the continued reliance on animals given what we know now, is "Americans for Medical Advancement." That organization's website is http://www.CureDisease.com

Another great resource is the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, http://www.PCRM.org

You can read the full New York Times article at: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/08/international/europe/08rights.html . No matter how one feels about the economic sabotage and violent threats against the laboratories, the story presents a great opportunity for letters to the editor addressing the violence inside of them.

Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Shorter letters are more likely to be published.

There is a lead story (front page in some editions and page A3 in the final edition) in the Sunday, August 8, Washington Post, headed, "USDA Investigates Death of Circus Lion; Activists Challenge Ringling Brothers' Account, Say They Notified Federal Officials."

"The Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey circus is facing a federal investigation amid allegations that it allowed a young lion to die in a sweltering animal train crossing the Mojave Desert and then tried to keep key information from the government.

"Soon after the investigation was launched, a recently fired Ringling Brothers lion handler delivered an affidavit to Agriculture Department officials contending that the lion died because the boxcar it was riding in was extremely hot and the animal needed water.

"He said circus officials would not stop the train to cool the animal off despite reports by him and another handler that the 2-year-old lion, named Clyde, and other animals were suffering from intense heat.

"Frank Hagan, the veteran Ringling Brothers employee who wrote the affidavit, also said that circus lawyers told him and others familiar with the incident not to talk with Agriculture Department officials who were coming to the circus train to ask questions. Hagan said in the affidavit that the circus fired him soon after on what he contends was a pretext.

"The lion's death in July and the federal investigation have quickly become part of the battle between circuses and animal rights activists over the treatment of animals in captivity."

"In the document, he said he was one of two handlers in charge of caring for the 14 lions. He said all the animals were in good condition when they left Phoenix on July 12 and during the first day's train ride, but when he checked them the next morning they were panting. Hagan said that he and his colleague watered the animals down but grew worried as the train entered the Mojave Desert, with its 100-plus temperatures.

"Around 9:30 a.m., Hagan said, he called a supervisor and told him the animals needed to be watered down again and that the train had to stop. Hagan said the supervisor told him they were behind schedule and could not stop. Hagan said his co-worker called the same supervisor and got the same response.

"Hagan said the train did not stop until about 2:45 p.m., and that when he and his co-worker went to water the lions, it was apparent that Clyde was dying. Hagan said the animal's tongue was hanging out and the lion was barely breathing. The animal died soon after, he said, and was later moved to the cooled 'meat truck' where food is kept."

"The timing of the lion's death could be an issue in Denver, where voters will decide Tuesday whether to ban animal circus acts -- including those with lions, tigers and elephants -- from the city. The ballot initiative is the first of its kind, although some smaller cities have banned circus animal acts.

"Animal activists and circuses, including Ringling Brothers, have treated the Denver vote as an important test case, and the lion's death has become part of the debate. Discussing the Denver vote, Tom Albert, vice president of government affairs for Feld Entertainment, recently told the Rocky Mountain News that, 'The fact is, without the animals, there is no circus.'"

"On Friday, Ringling spokesman Johnson contacted The Washington Post to report that an 8-month-old elephant named Ricardo was euthanized at the center last week after falling off a low platform and fracturing its two hind legs. He said the animal had been rejected by its mother and was reared by the center staff."

You can read the full article, which provides some more detail about Clyde's case, at:

It presents a wonderful opportunity for letters to the editor that challenge Albert's suggestion that without the animals, there is no circus (I urge animal advocates to visit the glorious Cirque du Soleil next time it is in town) and that question using captive wild animals for human entertainment. You'll find comprehensive information about circus cruelty, including video of young elephants being beaten during training sessions, at http://www.circuses.com

The paper warns, "Please do not send attachments; they will not be read....Letters must be exclusive to The Washington Post, and must include the writer's home address and home and business telephone numbers. Because of space limitations, those published are subject to abridgment. Although we are unable to acknowledge those letters we cannot publish, we appreciate the interest and value the views of those who take the time to send us their comments."

There is a fascinating and encouraging article on the front page of the Wednesday, August 4, New York Times headed, "In Drug Research, Some Guinea Pigs Are Now Human."

Andrew Pollack opens with a description of a test, on a human subject, for an anxiety reducing drug. Since the test involves questioning the person about his feelings of impending doom, it is clearly not a test that could be done on a nonhuman animal.

Pollack explains that the test is part of a new trend in the pharmaceutical industry:

"Drug researchers are conducting small, fast, relatively inexpensive tests on people to get a quick gauge of a drug's promise before committing to full-scale clinical trials that may involve hundreds of patients, millions of dollars and many years of study. Often called experimental medicine, the approach is meant to reduce the huge costs of drug development and speed the most promising treatments into the marketplace."

"In the past, many of the tests might have been done only on animals. That might seem to raise ethical concerns, but the people who regulate and monitor drug experiments say that no problems have risen so far."

The suggestion that ethical concerns arise only when we start testing on people is unfortunate. But the next line is wonderful:

"And scientists and industry executives, while acknowledging the potential for ethical issues, say that experiments on people are more reliable, because animal tests often fail to accurately predict whether a drug will work on people."

"Amgen, for instance, gave different potential arthritis drugs to human volunteers and then used a blood test to gauge the best one to take forward into clinical trials. The results were almost the opposite of what Amgen found when it conducted similar tests in animals."

"Even a small improvement in the ability to predict failures could save $100 million in development costs per drug, the F.D.A. said in a March report."

While not abandoning animal studies, scientists might now move back and forth between animal and human studies. Phase 1 trials might be used to gauge efficacy, not just safety. In some cases, human testing is being done even before a drug is given -- for example, to validate the imaging system that will be used in the trial. Some scientists call these ''phase 0'' trials.

You can read the whole lengthy article on line at: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/04/business/04experiment.html

It presents a great opportunity for letters to the editor, questioning animal testing.

Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Shorter letters are more likely to be published. And please be careful not to use any of my exact wording or that from any other alert. A bundle of similarly worded letters on an issue, clearly part of a campaign, will hinder the chances that any letter on that topic will be published.

ANIMAL RIGHTS EXTREMISM FILLS UK PAPERS

For the last week, animal rights 'extremism' in the UK has been huge news. It is all over the front pages, and opinion pages, of the UK newspapers. A few months ago, militant animal rights activity made news when plans to build a primate laboratory at Cambridge were abandoned; the expense of protecting the laboratory from animal rights activists was cited as the main reason. Two weeks ago, the building company working on a laboratory at Oxford dropped out after some of its equipment was destroyed and activists wrote to shareholders threatening them with exposure on the Internet. And remarks made at the recent animal rights conference in Washington DC, by Los Angeles trauma surgeon Dr Jerry Vlasak, made the UK newspapers and television networks last week. He is reported as having said that the murder of five to fifteen vivisectors would save millions of animals. He did not recommend that tactic but suggested that violence was inevitable in social struggles.

<?xml:namespace prefix = o /> I will now take a few lines to plug a superb, and highly relevant, new book, "Terrorists or Freedom Fighters?: Reflections on the Liberation of Animals" (Lantern, 2004) edited by Steven Best and Anthony J Nocella. I have a chapter in it, as do Ingrid Newkirk, Tom Regan, Paul Watson and many terrific activists and writers with whom you will be familiar. You can learn more about it at:

http://www.cala-online.org/TOFF/Terrorists_or_Freedom_Fighters2.htm and purchase it at www.lanternbooks.com or www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/159056054X/dawnwatch

<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /> I will paste, below, Joan Smith's superb commentary piece in the Sunday, August 1, Independent. I hope it inspires you to write.

Independent on Sunday (London) August 1, 2004, Sunday

COMMENT; Pg. 23 --- ANIMALS HAVE RIGHTS AS WELL

By Joan Smith

Of course animals have rights. That is why we have laws against cruelty and neglect in this country, as well as a ban on experiments on higher primates. This needs to be pointed out forcefully in a week when the Daily Mail praised the Home Secretary, David Blunkett, for promising to get tough with "animal rights extremists". This category, according to the Mail, includes not just people who use threats and violence but those who "bullied cowardly Whitehall into denying a knighthood to Professor Colin Blakemore", a leading advocate of animal experiments.

Actually, it is reasonable that a democratic society should withhold honours from a man who advocates something many regard as morally dubious. Does that make me an extremist? I don't think so, any more than Jeremy Bentham was a crazed zealot when he wrote in the late 18th century that "the day may come when the rest of the animal creation may acquire those rights which never could have been withholden from them but by the hand of tyranny".

Philosophers have been debating this subject for hundreds of years. As a lapsed vegetarian, I am well aware of my own failings in this respect, but the general trend has been towards granting greater rights to animals. Few people have changed their minds as quickly as Michael A Fox: less than a year after he published a book called The Case for Animal Experimentation in 1986, the Canadian philosopher recanted, conceding that he could no longer see any justification for human beings benefiting from the suffering of animals.

The usual justification is that laboratory animals suffer and die in the noble cause of finding a cure for HIV or cancer. So it has been instructive to note, in the past week, how many times money has wiggled its way into the argument in favour of animal experimentation. The Mail complained that animal rights activists "threaten Britain's world-beating, multibillion- pound pharmaceutical industry". The Daily Telegraph was furious about the pounds 1bn a year investment "lost to Britain" through the actions of people who oppose animal experimentation. The Times fretted that a more forceful regulatory regime to protect laboratory animals would risk "scaring off the very knowledge-based employers on which the economy depends".

Not so moral, is it? It's one thing to infect live animals with a nasty virus in the hope of developing a vaccine to protect humans and another to do it in the hope that the big drug companies will make even more money and create more jobs. Indeed the vehemence with which supporters of animal rights are denounced is designed to obscure the fact that most experiments on animals have little to do with great medical or scientific advances. In 2002, about 80 per cent of the 2.7 million animal experiments performed in this country were mandatory toxicology tests, designed to prevent companies from harming their customers.

I have not even begun to mention the suffering imposed on animals by factory farming. In the US last week People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals revealed videotapes from a camera planted by a group member who worked undercover at a slaughterhouse in West Virginia. Employees of the slaughterhouse, which has a contract with the fast food chain Kentucky Fried Chicken, were filmed stamping on live chickens and hurling them against walls. Eleven workers were sacked and the slaughterhouse was warned by KFC's parent company Yum Brands - itself the target of lawsuits aimed at making it stop forcing birds to grow so fast that their legs collapse - to improve conditions or lose the contract.

Cruelty towards animals brutalises the human beings who take part in it, as philosophers have long understood. Ministers, farmers and pharmaceutical companies are within their rights to deplore violence and intimidation from people who support animal rights. They may denounce extremists as "internal terrorists" (Blunkett) and compare the Animal Liberation Front to al-Qa'ida (Daily Telegraph). But they cannot deny that millions of animals are being exposed to unnecessary suffering or that the movement to give them more protection has a very powerful case.

The mass poisoning of stray dogs in Athens, as that city prepares for the Olympic Games, is finally starting to get some press. The Sunday, August 1, New York Post has an article by Julia Szabo headed "Olympic Shame."

"Greek animal activists allege that the strays, which once numbered between 30,000 and 50,000, are being deliberately poisoned.

The Greek government has denied involvement in the dogs' disappearances. But witnesses say they've seen dead and dying animals rounded up by trash collectors. Parks in the city and suburbs of Athens, once teeming with strays, are now mostly empty."

There is a quote from vet assistant Angela Fleming, of the Athens group Caring for the Animals:

""Dogs are being left a cocktail of poison in food scattered across the city. It is barbaric. These animals are hungry, so they will eat the bait. And then they froth at the mouth and convulse and die a lingering, horrific death. Whoever does this doesn't see the pain."

Szabo adds, "New Yorker Marijo Gillis does; she traveled to Athens to document it. Her graphic five-minute video, viewable on www.ua4a.org/Greece.mov, depicts terrible animal suffering and is very difficult to watch.

"But Gillis, founder of the non-profit Welfare for Animals in Greece, hopes people will protest what they see. 'Please join me in conveying outrage and shock over the compassionless treatment of animals in Greece,' she urges. To make a tax-deductible donation, call (212) 427-0587."

Appreciative letters will let the Post know people care about such issues and will keep the story alive.

Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Shorter letters are more likely to be published.