Day: August 18, 2005

Cindy Sheehan and the Problem with the MSM

Tonight I happened to be watching Fox News for an hour before switching over to watch CBS News. During its broadcast, CBS offered up a content-free profile of Cindy Sheehan, the woman who is currently protesting outside President Bush’s Crawford ranch demanding a meeting with him.

Now Fox had also mentioned Sheehan, in order to slam her ridiculous claim in an April 27, 2005 speech in which she said, among other things,

We are not waging a war on terror in this country. We’re waging a war of terror. The biggest terrorist in the world is George W. Bush!

The proper term for a person who believe this is “nutcase.”

Now Fox is a right wing news media outlet, so it has highlighted all of the idiotic things Sheehan has been saying the past few months. A lot of left wing blogs have highlighted all the non-idiotic things she’s said. Presumably, a mainstream media outlet would provide a balanced look at what Sheehan believes and let viewers decide for themselves.

CBS, of course, offered none of the above. Instead, they covered Sheehan as they covered the 2004 election, as if there is some sort of horse race between Sheehan and mothers of soldiers killed in Iraq who support the war. So we had Sheehan and her pain and some other woman and her pain, and absolutely no mention of what Sheehan actually believes and is on record as advocating (i.e., no mention that she’s said she wants Bush impeached for example).

This absurd. Imagine if the grieving mother who still supports the war had been giving speeches at far right events where she called for the nuclear bombing of Mecca, and major media outlets simply decided to omit that detail as irrelevant.

So the viewer is left with no information on which to make a judgement and instead presumably is left to choose between which grieving mother he or she preferred.

Ultimately, the entire Sheehan episode is an example of why broadcast media is in such decline. Its more programmed and scripted than many of the sitcoms and dramas that run in prime time.

Just How Addictive is World of Warcraft?

It is so addictive that my Latin-reading, Medieval-studying wife has taken to IMing me bad World of Warcraft jokes while I’m trying to get work done. A sample,

So, an Orc walks into a bar with a parrot on his shoulder. The bartender says, “Hey, where’d you get that?” The parrot says, “Durotar. They got em all over the place.

Ugh.

Primate Freedom Project and University of Wisconsin in Fight Over Land Near University’s

Many weeks ago, Rick Bogle abruptly announced the cancellation of yet another Primate Freedom Tour in order to announce some Next Big Thing near the University of Wisconsin. It turned out that The Alliance for Animals and the Primate Freedom Project were in talks to buy land and sheds near the University of Wisconsin to set up an animal rights museum to protest the University’s primate research. Hardly the earth shattering revelation Bogle had promised, but hey it might come to rival the Mutter Museum.

A gentleman named Roger Charley owns a parcel of land that is situated between two University of Wisconsin research labs. Bogle claims that Charly reached a binding agreement to sell his property for $675,000.

But the University Research Park, an entity which is independent of but closely aligned to the University of Wisconsin, has offered Charly $1 million for the property, and Charly has said he does not have a binding agreement with the activists and is leaning toward selling to the University. Charly told the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel that he fears the building might be used to stage attacks against the laboratories,

The money is certainly a part of it. But I’ve heard from various people at various levels, various informal and not-so-informal customers, neighbors, just giving their two cents. If something were to happen a year from now because I sold this building, I would feel pretty terrible. I feel terrible about the whole thing in the first place.

But someone like Bogle would advocate for or excuse violence, would he? Well, Bogle offered this statement to the Wisconsin State Journal on what might happen if the University of Wisconsin prevails and buys the property,

If you don’t allow civil discourse on a public issue to occur, then people become frustrated and they are going to act out. My fear is that more radical elements of the animal-rights movement will react in ways that are going to upset everyone. I think the researchers at the primate center would actually be safeguarded by having us there.

Hmmm, seems Bogle has an offer for the University that they just can’t refuse.

Bogle’s evaluation of the animal rights movement is pretty telling. If they’ll react with violence if they lose out on a simple property transaction, this is a movement that isn’t worth engaging at all until it renounces such nonsense.

Imagine the situation were reversed. Imagine if by chance a building near People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals’ headquarters went up for sale, and the Consumer Center for Freedom made an offer on said property only to see PETA try to trump that offer with a much larger one. If CCF then said, “If they don’t sell to us I’m afraid more radical elements of the anti-AR movement might react in ways that are going to upset everyone” no one would be fooled into thinking this was anything but a veiled threat. Moreover, PETA and other activists would be justified in denouncing such an obvious appeal and encouragement of violence.

Apparently, if the animal rights movement doesn’t get its way, it will take its ball and go home and then return in the middle of the night to vandalize and destroy the opposition. Yeah, that’s certainly dedication to free speech and civil discourse there, Rick.

That said, Bogle’s quite correct that if he has a binding contract with Charly that predates any offer or contract with the University Research Park, then that should certainly prevail, as it will in court if the contract he had with Charly is as airtight as Bogle claims. Charly, however, told the University of Wisconsin that his lawyer identified unspecified problems with the document he signed with Bogle.

Source:

UW wins round on disputed land. Karen Rivedal, Wisconsin State Journal, August 14, 2005.

Land between primate labs in dispute. Associated Press, August 11, 2005.

Has FDA Vascillation Effectively Killed Market for Cloned Farm Animals?

The Associated Press ran a story this month outlining fears by the dairy industyr that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s inability to come to a decision about the safety of food from cloned animals may have already doomed that market. It has already led to the failure of one company that was prepared to sell cloned farm animals.

In 2003, the FDA issued a draft safety assessment that found food from cloned animals was probably as safe as food from non-cloned animals. But it also effectively banned the sale of food from non-cloned animals until it makes a final determination.

Several additional studies have been published in the interim confirming the FDA’s draft assessment that food from cloned animals is safe and indistinguishable from that produced by non-cloned animals, but the FDA’s final determination of safety is still nowhere in sight.

One company, Infigen, has already went out of business thanks to the FDA waffling. In 2002 and 2003, Infigen made headlines for advances it made in cloning pigs that allowed it to produce cloned pigs with just one round of embryo implantation in a single pig compared to earlier methods which required multiple rounds of embryo implantation in multiple animals to produce viable clones. Infigen co-founder Michael Bishop told the Associated Press that the FDA’s delay in approving food from cloned animals was the straw that broke his company’s back,

It’s hard to find people who want to do business with you when a government agency could possibly regulate against the food products entering the food chain.

According to the Associated Press, Bishop believes that cloned farm animals will never be economically viable.

This sentiment is apparently shared by many dairy farmers whom would otherwise benefit the most from cloned animals. As the Associated Press notes, because cloned animals are so expensive its unlikely they would ever be used for slaughter. Instead they would be beneficial in things like a dairy operation where a farmers could clone particularly productive dairy cows.

But the FDA lack of a decision and the current ban clearly creates the impression that milk from cloned cows may not be safe. Susan Ruland, a spokeswoman from the International Dairy Foods Association, told the Associated Press,

There’s a strong general feeling among our members that consumers are not receptive to milk from cloned cows. This seems to be one of the things where technology seems to drop something in the lap of the food companies. It’s not driven by the market or any benefit to the consumer.

There are currently farmers in the United States who have cloned dairy cows, but they feed the milk to family and employees rather than sell it for the moment. Wisconsin dairy farmer Bob Schauff, for example, tells the Associated Press that he had four clones of a prize-winning Holstein dairy cow made four years ago. Schauff calls the ban,

. . . ridiculous. It’s a phobia more than anything scientific. We need to get FDA to come along and say it’s fine. They’re as normal as any other animal. Common sense has to take over soon.

So when will the FDA finally resolve the matter one way or another? That’s anybody’s guess. According to the Associated Press, an FDA official said that the agency has no timetable for making a final decision.

The full text of the FDA’s draft assessment can be read here.

Source:

Dairy industry skeptical about cloned cows. Frederic J. Frommer, Associated Press, August 11, 2005.

HSUS Opposes Hunting at Federal Wildlife Refuges

The Humane Society of the United States is opposing plans by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to expand recreational hunting on wildlife refuges in Massachusetts and nine other states. The USFWS is taking public comments on the plan through September 3.

The HSUS is focusing on the Massachusetts because hunting is currently not allowed on the Great Meadows and Assabet River refuges in that state. Such hunting would be allowed as early as this October if the USFWS plan goes through.

The HSUS opposes all hunting in wildlife refuges. In a 2003 press release about the possibility of opening up hunting in the Great Meadows and Assabet River refuges, the HSUS said,

A wildlife refuge should be just that: a refuge for wildlife. It should be one place in which animals are safe from the hunting and trapping already allowed on both public and private lands in Massachusetts.

HSUS’ Heidi Prescott told the MetroWest Daily News,

We believe the Fish and Wildlife Service is compromising the biological and ecological integrity of our national wildlife refuges by providing hunters the opportunity to kill the animals that live on the wildlife refuges.

HSUS also has a pending lawsuit that goes to the heart of what sort of evaluation of the impact of hunting must be conducted prior to expanding hunting in wildlife refuges. HSUS maintains that the USFWS has to prepare an environmental impact statement. USFWS says that the environmental impact statements are unnecessary since the agency has conducted environmental assessments that found expanded hunting would not impact its mission of maintaining habitat in the refuges, and might even promote species diversity by lowering deer population levels.

Currently, according to HSUS, hunting is allowed on more than half of all federal wildlife refuges.

Sources:

Animal rights group blasts hunting plan. Jfon Brodkin, MetroWest Daily News, August 12, 2005.

Reject Hunting and Trapping at Massachusetts Refuges. Press Release, Humane Society of the United States, August 15, 2003.

PETA Calls on Richmond, VA, to Reject Philip Morris Facility

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals recently sent a letter to Richmond, Virginia, Mayor L. Douglas Wilder urging Wilder to stop the planned construction of a Philip Morris research facility in that city.

Philip Morris plans to finish construction on a $300 million research and technology center in 2007. Richmond has donated land worth $3.2 million for the project and agreed to a 10-year tax abatement to convince Philip Morris to build in Richmond, where Philip Morris is based.

According to PETA, architectural plans for the new center include rooms labeled “Primate Room 1” and “Primate Room 2,” which PETA claims are rooms destined to house non-human primates for research. However, PETA itself is not in possession of any plans that show these primate rooms. Instead, Mary Beth Sweetland told The Richmond Times Dispatch, PETA is relying on information it received from someone who PETA believes does have access to those plans.

Philip Morris spokesman Michael Neese told the Times-Dispatch that there were no plans to house primates at the facilities and that any animal research there would be conducted with rodents.

The animal research is likely directed at finding safer cigarettes, which Philip Morris and other cigarette companies have long investigated (Philip Morris has, in fact, test marketed different versions of a safer cigarette over the years).

Regardless of the type of research or animals used, the project is unlikely to be derailed by PETA. A spokesman for Richmond told the Times-Dispatch,

The mayor does intend to stand by the commitment he made to Philip Morris, and they are a valued corporate citizen in Richmond.

Sources:

PETA urges city to pull Philip Morris support. John Reid Blackwell, Richmond Times-Dispatch, August 12, 2005.

PETA Calls On Mayor Wilder To Pull Public Financing Of Philip Morris Center. Press Release, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, August 10, 2005.