Information provided by the Equine Welfare Alliance
Senator Opens Up Personal Can of Deadly Political Worms
Max Baucus - The Horse Eating Senator and Brewmaster of Dead Horse Beer
Newspapers from coast to coast are carrying stories about doomed Senator Max Baucus (D-MT) pleading for the Congress to bring horse slaughter back to America. Baucus is calling for an end to a ban on the funding of USDA horse slaughter inspections that has kept the industry out of America since 2007. In doing so Baucus is taking part in a growing tradition of political penance for disgraced members of the secretive horse slaughter caucus, one of the few remaining bipartisan institutions of Congress.
On August 28th, 2007, Senator Larry Craig became the first victim of the caucus when he was arrested in a restroom of the Minneapolis St. Paul International Airport for soliciting sex from an undercover officer. The incident was made all the more embarrassing by the fact that Craig had long crusaded against all forms of gay rights.
His career doomed, Craig (R-ID) was called upon to do his penance. Instead of resigning and slithering out of the searing glare of the public spot light, he was made to finish out his term as a senatorial road block against the American Horse Slaughter Prevention Act.
Thus Craig stood in the contemptuous gaze of his fellow senators and refused to allow the bill forward by denying “unanimous consent”. Now it is Senator Max Baucus’ turn to don his political suicide vest and go out in a final act of obedience to his keepers.
A career politician, Max Baucus was first elected to the Senate in 1978. He is up for re-election in 2012, but there is a roadside bomb waiting for his campaign to drive by and his keepers in Washington must know it will almost certainly be fatal.
In December of 2009, a video was uploaded to YouTube showing Senator Baucus ranting about the lack of support Republicans provided on the health care debate in what appears to be an advanced state of inebriation. The six minute video shows the Senator gesturing wildly as he condemns his opponents in a slurred, stuttering, rambling, repetitious harangue.
During the video, Senator Roger Wicker (R-MS) attempts to defend the opposition in an almost overly polite rebuttal, but Senator Max Baucus virtually shouts him down in “reclaiming his time”.
Although the YouTube video has been viewed almost 2 million times, the mainstream media has largely given the good Senator a pass on his performance. Never-the-less, it is certain to be irresistible ammunition for Baucus’ opponent in the upcoming election and the inevitable attack ads will make it front page news.
One can only imagine the campaign ads against Baucus featuring one of the many juicy tidbits from the video and asking rhetorical questions like why we set a lower standard for piloting our government than we do for operating a moped.
In 2006, then Senator George Allen (R-VA) was captured on a YouTube video calling a staffer of his opponent, a young man of Indian descent, by the racial epithet “macaca”. That single word doomed Allen’s campaign, and demonstrated the political lethality of YouTube. What waits for Baucus is likely far more damning.
Enter the horse slaughter lobby. It has plenty of money from animal agriculture and organizations within the horse industry like the American Quarter Horse Association who profit from horse slaughter. What the horse slaughter lobby lacks are elected officials willing to sacrifice votes by leading the charge for an industry that 3/4ths of American voters believe is abominable.
Law making has often been compared with sausage manufacturing because it is such an unsavory process to watch. But like a sausage manufacturer, our political machine wastes nothing, including the political carcasses of Craig and Baucus.
Thus Baucus dutifully waves a laughable GAO (General Accountability Office) report over his head and stands stoically in the limelight as he professes his support for returning horse slaughter to America. Only decades in the Congressional sausage factory could equip a politician with the moral ambivalence required to carry out this final duty for the dark forces that have quietly nurtured him in their bosoms for so long.
Related articles
- Critical Week In Stopping the Flow of Cross Border Horse Slaughter (rtfitch.wordpress.com)
- For Horse Lovers Everywhere: The Truth About Horse Slaughter (rtfitch.wordpress.com)
- GAO Follows Horse Slaughter Lobby Down the Rabbit Hole (rtfitch.wordpress.com)
- The True Unintended Consequences of Horse Slaughter (rtfitch.wordpress.com)
Categories: Horse News, Horse Slaughter
Straight from the Horse's Heart 
I know I’m biased but nobody can hit a home run on an editoral like John Holland!
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That is a good one!
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Thanks John and Vicki… this is a beaut!
Ugly is as ugly does.
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Speaking of Montana, I found this on the Federal Register/Sept. 1, 2011:
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2011-09-01/html/2011-22352.htm
SUMMARY: Per 30 U.S.C. 188(d), Wilks Ranch Montana, Ltd. timely filed a
petition for reinstatement of competitive oil and gas lease MTM 98742,
Fergus County, Montana. The lessee paid the required rental accruing
from the date of termination.
No leases were issued that affect these lands. The lessee agrees to
new lease terms for rentals and royalties of $20 per acre and 18-2/3
percent. The lessee paid the $500 administration fee for the
reinstatement of the lease and the $163 cost for publishing this
Notice.
The lessee met the requirements for reinstatement of the lease per
Sec. 31 (d) and (e) of the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920 (30 U.S.C. 188).
We are proposing to reinstate the lease, effective the date of
termination subject to the:
Original terms and conditions of the lease;
Increased rental of $20 per acre;
Increased royalty of 18\2/3\ percent; and
$163 cost of publishing this Notice.
That led to another search:
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Teri Bakken, Chief, Fluids
Adjudication Section, Bureau of Land Management Montana State Office,
5001 Southgate Drive, Billings, Montana
http://www.sublimepub.com/publicity/sale-of-n-bar-ranch-makes-for-headline-news/
The Wall Street Journal reports the sale of the N Bar Ranch, a 62,000-acre Montana ranch listed by Hall and Hall at $45 million.
The Wall Street Journal’s Juliet Chung writes:
The new buyer was a Texas domestic limited partnership principally owned by brothers Dan and Farris Wilks, who founded Frac Tech, a Cisco, Texas-based oil-field drilling-services firm. A spokeswoman said in an email that they own other ranches and “have a long-time love for the land…and intend to continue the ranch’s current operations.”
The ranch supports 1,500 head of cattle and includes about 51,400 deeded acres and about 10,600 acres of leased lands. Its headquarters is listed in the National Register of Historic Places. Joel Leadbetter of Hall & Hall had the listing.
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And then there’s this:
BLM Seeks Input to Develop Pryor Mountain Wild Horse Gather Environmental Analysis
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Billings Field Office seeks public input on a proposed 2012 wild horse gather within the Pryor Mountain Wild Horse Range (PMWHR) during a 30-day scoping period, Aug. 1-30, 2011. The public scoping process is the initial stage in developing an Environmental Assessment (EA) that analyzes the effects of the proposed non-helicopter gather and removal of excess horses within the PMWHR.
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Thanks, Louie. More jumping through hoops. It would help if the Forest Service would maybe do a tentative lease of the Pryor herd’s ‘formerly’ available FS lands. Then do a formal policy change to allow those lands to be included in the PMWHR. All it takes is a signature. Their reasons for rebuilding the fence have not convinced anyone out here.
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The Government never learns do they?
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WHAT AN IDIOT!!!!!!!!!!!! THIS GUY IS POLITICS, HEAVEN HELP US AND OUR HORSES. HE REALLY NEEDS ANOTHER DRINK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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RE: Newspapers from coast to coast are carrying stories about doomed Senator Max Baucus.
So long Max … you had the chance to join the 21st Century – you chose not to.
You might want to contact Conrad Burns, also from your beautiful state, formerly representing Montana, total population of: 989,415 – US Census 2010
Too bad you both were total incompetents and sold out the state to what its potential could have been, for your own greed.
You will BOTH go down in US History as Extreme Devils, and burn in Hell – count on it!
Oh. and by the way, did you both get dropped off a UFO in the middle of the night approx 50+/- years ago along with Slaughter House Sue Wallis?
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If not I am certain that he is somehow related to “Red” Ed Butcher, also from Montana….
>________________________________
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And let’s not forget Conrad Burns was from Montana!
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Re:If not I am certain that he is somehow related to “Red” Ed Butcher, also from Montana…
I am sure you are right.
I am amazed at the ignorance of Montana – not so surprised at Wyoming Population, 2010 – 563,626 http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/56000.html
Hey guys, it really is not that you both have a tiny population, it also appears you are All brain dead too. Could you please correct that ASAP – or go back to your alien planet. We are NOT EVER sacrificing our Wild Horses for you, or your politicians – get use to it!
.
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We, here in the state of Montana, are not all brain dead, Garnet. Just swimming up stream and losing our battle to the “good ol’ boy” network! Hopefully the election of 2012 will turn the tides so to speak. Please do not judge our state unfairly …
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Another paid for [by the foreign meat business] politician.
He is speaking up on an issue that impacts the entire country and yet, only represents the view of less than 2% of horse owners nationwide that don’t want the responsibility that comes with horse ownership.
Just one more example of our elected officials not listening the people that put them in office.
If you haven’t done so already, call your senators – https://rtfitch.wordpress.com/2011/09/13/ewa-calls-equine-advocates-to-action/
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He should be thrown out of Congress. What a disgrace.
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we are so responsible for getting the right people in office . . . ‘we’ as a nation are not doing our homework . . .
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Frequently, both parties prop up garbage candidates…resulting in low voter turnout and essentially no decent candidate to choose from.
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How much does it cost to buy a Congressman?
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More than we dare spare for a foolish elected official who has likely turned his/her back on those who elected them. You wouldn’t like em if you could buy em, Louie…
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Probably already bought and paid for by the highest bidder, anyway Mar.
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