Today, Thursday March 13, thousands of news outlets carry coverage of yesterday's hearing in which the president of Hallmark testified in court. Hallmark is the dairy cow slaughter plant caught torturing animals on undercover video released by HSUS. If you have missed that story, or not seen the tape, please visit: http://www.hsus.org/farm/news/ournews/undercover_investigation.html
As the late, great, Gretchen Wyler used to say, "We must not refuse to see with our eyes what they must endure with their bodies."
The New York Times article on the hearing, headed "Meat Executive Admits Sick Cattle Were Used," (pg C3)
opens with:
"The president of a slaughterhouse at the heart of the largest meat recall denied under oath on Wednesday, but then grudgingly admitted, that his company had apparently introduced sick cows into the hamburger supply....
"Testifying before the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Mr. Mendell, who appeared only after being subpoenaed, assured lawmakers that despite his lack of knowledge about conditions at the plant, sick animals were not slaughtered for food, so no safety issue existed.
"But Mr. Mendell retracted the statement when shown a second video in which a 'downer' cow was shocked and abused by workers trying to move it to the 'kill box,' then finally shot with a bolt gun and dragged by a chain to the processing area."
You'll find that article on line at http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/13/business/13meat.html
Reports in other papers are similar. HSUS's Paul Shapiro shares the following story links with us:
Wall Street Journal:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120533310279730335.html
USA Today:
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/2008-03-11-westland_N.htm
Los Angeles Times:
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-hallmark13mar13,0,3144893.story
And he also gives us this Google link to thousands of stories of the issue, so you can skim through and see if it is in your local media:
http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&q=%22steve+mendell%22&
The impact of the undercover investigation has been huge, and we can greaten that impact further by keeping the story alive in the papers, and focused on the animals, with our letters to the editor. The story presents a perfect opportunity for those of us on plant based diets to spread the news about the benefits, for our health, the environment, and clearly for the animals.
The papers cited above take letters to the editor at:
letters@nytimes. com
wsj.ltrs@wsj.com
http://tinyurl.com/hvsuz
letters@latimes.com
If you have any trouble finding the correct email address for a letter to your paper's editor, don't hesitate to ask me for help.
Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Remember that shorter letters are more likely to be published.
Yours and the animals',
Karen Dawn
(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. You may forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts if you do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this parenthesized tag line. If somebody forwards DawnWatch alerts to you, which you enjoy, please help the list grow by signing up. It is free.)
Please go to www.ThankingtheMonkey.com to read advance reviews of Karen Dawn's new book, "Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way we Treat Animals” and watch the fun celebrity studded promo video.
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Date: Thu Mar 13 20:10:03 2008
