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    Entries in Animals (29)

    Saturday
    06Mar2010

    An Idea Whose Time Has Come

    Your honor, my client pleads guilty to being an alpine Ibex…

    If I were taking the bar exam next week, I’d probably pass (even though I have absolutely no law training whatsoever) and I’d probably become the nation’s foremost attorney for pets:

    Swiss voters will go to the polls on Sunday to decide on a proposal to appoint state-funded lawyers across the country to represent animals in court.

    Supporters of the initiative say such lawyers would help deter cases of animal cruelty and neglect, by making sure that those who did abuse or neglect animals would be properly punished.

    Opponents however claim that Switzerland, which already has strict animal protection laws, does not need any more legislation.

    The canton of Zurich has in fact had its own animal lawyer for a number of years; the current incumbent, Antoine Goetschel, is the only state-funded lawyer in Switzerland who goes to court to speak on behalf of animals.

    America is the home of zany animal advocacy antics. We need animal lawyers now in the worst way, since we already put the needs of animals above those of kids and other human beings in many situations. Attorneys who are out of work, too incompetent to do anything difficult, or have been fired because their client forgot to show up for court could thrive as animal lawyers. I smell the makings of a show on NBC here. As far as I know, Kelsey Grammer is still desperately looking for work.

    Saturday
    06Mar2010

    Keep Your Fingers to Yourself

    This poor lady either has the makings of a fabulous lawsuit or the infamy only someone who has no common sense deserves:

    Police say a bear bit off a woman’s fingers at a Wisconsin zoo after she ignored barriers and warning signs to try to feed the animal.

    The Lincoln Park Zoo in Manitowoc closed after the incident Friday morning. Police say the 47-year-old woman lost a thumb and a forefinger, and two other fingers were partially severed.

    The woman’s boyfriend was bitten as he tried to pry the bear’s mouth off her hand, but he didn’t lose any fingers. Her 3-year-old granddaughter wasn’t injured.

    If you ignore barriers, you tend to forfeit the possibility of getting a settlement. I have no doubt in my mind that the woman might still try to sue; common sense means that if someone sets up a barrier to keep you from doing something dangerous, you should probably respect that barrier. And yet, every year, America is the home of a form of social Darwinism that demonstrates that the last words of quite a few of our countrymen is “…watch this!”

    I also think it’s important to point out that our public schools are a terrible failure. Literacy in America seems to be dropping every year. People seem to be getting dumber and dumber every day. If the woman can show that her inability to read contributed to her inability to know that sticking her fingers in front of a hungry bear, she might have a case. I suspect that any lawyer taking her case is going to go after the makers of the hot dogs she might have stuffed in her face (and had on her hands) when she lost her fingers or the makers of the cage that failed to make the cage strong enough or small enough to keep some idiot from sticking their hands through them.

    Wednesday
    24Feb2010

    This is Why We Don't Live in Maryland Anymore

    Once Byron is able to safely transport the last of the mink habitat inhabitants down here to St. Thomas, we will no longer have a presence in the State of Maryland. When I made the decision to pull up stakes and leave, there was forty inches of snow on the ground and the Howard County Snow plow driver was throwing bottles of urine at us as he pushed snow into our cul de sac, blocking us in. I shall probably live in New Hampshire once again, but the middling part of the Mid-Atlantic is no where I shall ever live again.

    Go straight to hell, Mid-Atlantic. You are uninhabitable for decent people. You are a butt sandwich I’m not going to accept anymore.

    That’s why I smirked when I read this:

    A major nor’easter is expected to bring blizzard conditions to interior New England and heavy rain and near-hurricane-force wind gusts to Northeastern coastal areas Wednesday through Friday.

    Little, if any, snow will fall in Boston, Massachusetts, while Washington, New York and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, could see as much as 5 inches of snow with locally higher amounts, CNN meteorologist Sean Morris said.

    Record snowfall totals of 30 inches or more will be possible across upstate New York, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine, Morris said. Very strong winds will combine with the heavy snow to produce dangerous white-out conditions and widespread power outages.

    You can do thirty or forty inches of snow in New Hampshire; they have plows there. They have a snow removal system there. You cannot do that same amount of snow in states like Maryland, which have spent all of their money on schools that don’t teach and government programs that ensure that the poor are always poor and cannot read and write. You cannot do that in a state where the people who own snow removal equipment can jack up their prices and collect blood money from the Federal government while you and yours sit snowbound in a development run by an incompetent homeowner’s association that forgot to bribe the equipment-starved county to plow them out first.

    You would think all of this snow would have saved a company like Hummer; alas, it did not:

    General Motors’ deal to sell its Hummer brand to a Chinese automaker fell through Wednesday and the company said it now plans to shut down the brand.

    GM did not give any details about why the agreement to sell Hummer to Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machines Co. Ltd. could not be completed, saying only that it was disappointed it was unable to close the deal.

    One of the things that I did notice about the snowstorms we received in Maryland earlier this month was that they revealed that the Hummer did fairly well in the snow; hospitals were forced to use them to get sick people into emergency rooms. The military version of the Humvee is preferable; that thing they call a Hummer is a fraud, but it did look like a pretty good runner in the snow. The military version went through the snow like shit through a skinny goose. I dumped the Suburban because, well, why not? I’d rather get a Mercedes and leave it at that.

    On the site where Scuddy’s Bar stands, we will construct a mink habitat for Byron and extend our property holdings out and down the narrow lane that brings a single car up to the property. If you were to ask me about hurricanes, I would say that, at least when a hurricane comes and destroys everything, you don’t have to wait for a snowplow to come and save you.

    Sunday
    21Feb2010

    Environmentalism Meets the Needs of the Military

    3rd US Infantry Division patch, Fort Stewart, Georgia

    This must be a rather difficult series of choices:

    Under crystalline winter skies, a light infantry unit headed for Iraq was practicing precision long-range shooting through a pall of smoke. But the fire generating the haze had nothing to do with the training exercise.

    Staff members at the Army base had set the blaze on behalf of the red-cockaded woodpecker, an imperiled eight-inch-long bird that requires frequent conflagrations to preserve its pine habitat.

    Even as it conducts round-the-clock exercises to support two wars, Fort Stewart spends as much as $3 million a year on wildlife management, diligently grooming its 279,000 acres to accommodate five endangered species that live here.

    Last year, the wildlife staff even built about 100 artificial cavities and installed them 25 feet high in large pines so the woodpeckers did not have to toil for six months carving the nests themselves.

    The military has not always been so enthusiastic about saving endangered plants and animals. In the early years of the administration of President George W. Bush, the Pentagon often argued that protecting endangered species would hinder its battle preparedness; in 2003, the military lobbied Congress for limited exemptions from federal protection rules.

    But base commanders have gradually realized that working to help species rebound is in their best interest, if only because the more the endangered plants and animals thrive, the fewer restrictions are put on training exercises to avoid destroying habitat.

    Today, herculean efforts to save threatened species are unfolding at dozens of military sites across the nation, from Eglin, Fla., where the Air Force has restored and reconnected streams for the Okaloosa darter, to San Clemente Island, Calif., where the Navy has helped bring the loggerhead shrike back from the brink of extinction.

    Good God, we almost lost the loggerhead shrike? Thank the Creator that the Navy was there to save it, whatever it is.

    Somehow, I don’t think the treehuggers of a generation ago thought they would find common cause with the modern military.

    Tuesday
    19Jan2010

    The Supreme Court Turns its Back on Common Sense

    Warning poster for Carp

    Come now, what’s a Supreme Court for anyway?

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to order immediate closure of shipping locks near Chicago to prevent Asian carp from infesting the Great Lakes.

    The court rejected a request by Michigan for a preliminary injunction to close the locks temporarily while a long-term solution is sought to the threatened invasion by the ravenous fish. The one-sentence ruling didn’t explain the court’s reasoning.

    Asian carp, primarily big head and silver varieties, have been migrating up the Mississippi and Illinois rivers toward the Great Lakes for decades. They have swarmed waterways near Chicago leading to Lake Michigan.

    Thanks to some yahoo with a Koi Pond, we’re about to see the Great Lakes infested with vicious, disgusting Asian carp. Thank you very much. Why does this matter?

    Many scientists say they could starve out popular species such as trout and salmon.

    They also are spooked by passing motors and often hurtle from the water, colliding with boaters forcefully enough to break bones.

    Officials poisoned a section of the canal in December after discovering genetic material that suggested at least some carp might have eluded an electric barrier on the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal and could be within six miles of Lake Michigan. If so, the only other obstacles between them and the lake are shipping locks and gates.

    Last week, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said additional carp DNA — but no live fish — had been found in three different spots along the Chicago River within a mile of where it flows into Lake Michigan.

    As usual, the incompetence and corruption of the State of Illinois is in play here:

    The state of Illinois, backed by the Obama administration, fought the proposal. They said the DNA samples weren’t sufficient evidence that the carp were on the verge of slipping into Lake Michigan, and said closing the locks would damage shipping and passenger traffic on the busy waterway.

    A message seeking comment was left Tuesday with Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan’s office.

    Money triumphs over common sense. Hey, I thought we got rid of the crooks in Illinois? Apparently not.

    Close the locks, poison the water, stop the invasion. I don’t care if someone’s greased palm loses a few dollars. The economic loss of game fishing is too much to risk. There’s a darned good reason why Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan are trying to protect the environment—they have common sense. In Illinois? They have filthy rivers, polluted lakes, and virtually no one with the credentials to call themselves a sportsman. Every year, carloads of Illinois jackasses wander into the north country, starting forest fires, using illegal drift nets, fishing with dynamite sticks, and shooting cows. It’s a disgrace.

    Wednesday
    06Jan2010

    Did You Think They Would Welcome You?

    Ady Gil, from deck of Shonan Maru No. 2

    The confrontation between environmental activists and Japanese whaling vessels just took a turn in a new direction:

    A conservation group’s boat had its bow sheared off and was taking on water Wednesday after it collided with a Japanese whaling ship in the frigid waters of Antarctica, the group said. The boat’s six crew members were safely rescued.

    The clash was the most serious in the past several years, during which the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has sent vessels into far-southern waters to try to harass the Japanese fleet into ceasing its annual whale hunt.

    Clashes using hand-thrown stink bombs, ropes meant to tangle propellers and high-tech sound equipment have been common in recent years, and collisions between ships have sometimes occurred.

    The society said its vessel Ady Gil — a high-tech speedboat that resembles a stealth bomber — was hit by the Japanese ship the Shonan Maru near Commonwealth Bay and had about 10 feet (three meters) of its bow knocked off.

    Losing three meters of your bow is one way to go about things. Back in Japan, there is elation. The fishing vessel, Shonan Maru No. 2, is now the most popular thing afloat.

    Ady Gil

    Over at the Japan Times, there are these details:

    Paul Watson, head of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, told Kyodo News the Shonan Maru No. 2, a vessel sent by Japan to ensure the security of its whaling fleet, deliberately rammed his group’s A$2 million (US$1.8 million) vessel Ady Gil and “sheared the bow right off.”

    “It ripped 8 feet (2.5 meters) of the front of the vessel off,” Watson said. “At this point it does not look salvageable. It’s taking on water.”

    According to his account, both vessels has been stationary in the water when the Shonan Maru No. 2 started up and then steered deliberately into the Ady Gil, which had been harassing the fleet, at around 3:50 p.m. Australian time.

    One of the Ady Gil’s six crew members sustained several cracked ribs in the incident, he said, adding that five crew members were evacuated, but its captain remained onboard “trying to see what he can do to salvage the vessel … or at least some of the equipment.”

    Watson, speaking from aboard the ship Steve Irwin, also said Sea Shepherd put out a mayday distress signal “but the Japanese fleet refused to acknowledge that and just kept going. It was a hit and run.”

    The Japanese Fisheries Agency blamed the collision on Sea Shepherd, saying the Shonan Maru No. 2 crew had tried to ward off the approaching Ady Gil with water cannon but the antiwhaling vessel employed maneuvers such as suddenly reducing speed, which resulted in the collision.

    Glenn Inwood, the spokesman for the Institute of Cetacean Research, said that according to his report the Ady Gil was idling in the water and then went “full steam ahead” to cut off Shonan Maru No.2. He said the Ady Gil skipper miscalculated and the “fault lies” with Sea Shepherd vessel for the collision.

    According to Watson, the Shonan Maru No. 2 has been “particularly aggressive” this year after it earlier tried to damage the activists’ helicopter. “I think their order this year is to try and cause material damage to the ships.”

    Bias? Hard to say. Either way you look at it, that was quite the bum scuffle on the high seas. Here is a previous story on the organization in question, and all I can say is, the United States needs to stay out of this conflict. No good can come out of getting between whale meat and the conservationists who oppose the hunt.