Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has been the subject of animal rights protests in the past, but he seems to be adopting their rhetoric in his campaign against large pig farms. The National Hog Farmer, a publication of the pork industry, reports that in a series of speeches in the Midwest, Kennedy said, among other things, that,
This threat is greater than that in Afghanistan. This is not only a threat to the environment, it is a threat to the American economy and democracy.
Reflecting that his crusade is largely a religious one, Kennedy told his audience that,
Closing the last family farm is like tearing out the last pages of the last Bible, Torah or Talmud.
Of course, tearing out the last pages of either the Bible, Torah or Talmud would be a Constitutionally protected act (provided the tearer is the owner of the book), while the claim that large, corporate pig farms constitute a bigger threat than the Taliban and Al Qaeda is an absurd statement.
Source:
Waterkeepers Take Crusade to Midwest. Gretchen Schlosser, National Hog Farmer, January 15, 2002.