Story by Vicki Tobin ~ VP of Equine Welfare Alliance
Dribble from Darkside Does Not Daunt Public
CHICAGO, (EWA) – In a spate of national polls targeting Congress, support for ending horse slaughter is holding steady on Popvox in the mid to upper 70 percentile with 79 percent favoring a slaughter ban on the house bill and 76 percent opposing slaughter on the senate bill. The results continue a decade long trend against the killing of horses for human consumption even though slaughter proponents had a significant head start on the poll and on legislative monitor sites. In poll after poll numbers have held steady in the 70 percentile range.
A bill to ban double decker trailers for horse transport has 84 percent support on Popvox. transport of horses in the trailers designed for cattle which are shorter than equines. Such transport is deemed cruel by advocates of more humane treatment.
White House Petitions that requires 5,000 signatures by the end of October has the opposition to horse slaughter in the lead by 1,842 signees. The anomaly is one petition on Petition2Congress that is favoring horse slaughter by 454 signees but could be due to an ill-informed equine advocate that was asking supporters of a ban to sign the opposing petition but to comment against slaughter. I do not know how many advocates signed that petition not realizing they were only taking up the opposition’s numbers. Since every other poll or monitor reveals a significant lead against horse slaughter, we can only assume that the numbers are skewed by the error.
A bill to amend the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 is opposed by 79 percent of Americans on Popvox. This bill was introduced by Cynthia Lummis (R) WY and would basically make a tragic mismanagement policy permanent and immune to review. This is the bill that provides grazing rights at far below the cost to manage the program and is a government handout to special interests.
Also on the White House site is a petition to reinstate protections for America’s wild horses and burros that has 2,717 signees of the 5,000 required. I am not aware of an opposing petition.
For those monitoring the polls, the numbers are changing constantly but the general trends remain unchanged.
Story can also be viewed on Horseback Magazine
Related articles
- Anti-Horse Wyoming Politician Promotes Fraud Against President and Congress on Facebook (rtfitch.wordpress.com)
- We The People: Support a Ban on Horse Slaughter (our-compass.org)
- D.C. Rally for Horses Fires Up Capitol City (rtfitch.wordpress.com)
- Senator Baucus Dons his Horse Slaughter Suicide Vest (rtfitch.wordpress.com)
- For Horse Lovers Everywhere: The Truth About Horse Slaughter (rtfitch.wordpress.com)
- Desperate Wyoming Horse Eater Shows Her Burro In Illogical and Inhumane Rant (rtfitch.wordpress.com)
- GAO Follows Horse Slaughter Lobby Down the Rabbit Hole (rtfitch.wordpress.com)
Categories: Horse News, Horse Slaughter
Straight from the Horse's Heart 
No reason we cannot reach 20,000 signatures on White House petition. Keep getting the signatures. We do not have to cheat to win. We need signatures on Petition2Congress. The petition of the purveyors of injustice and lies is cheating with duplicate signatures. Sign in with a legitimate name then click and vote thats all it takes people. Make sure you sign all the petitions and ask friends and family to do the same. Post at tack shops, feed store etc. A little effort on our part equals a victory for justice. Lets get the signatures.
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I expect nothing less from the horse killers. They will do anything to get the chance to kill our horses. But as one can see we have the majority. Right is Right!!! We only need to get them all to work with us and save our horses, pets and wild ones. And the burros too!
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President Obama will be interviewed today by Geo Stephanopolous of GMA/ABC News. The public is invited to send questions via:
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/mailform?id=14640489
and at YahooNews (link is on the abcnews.go.com page).
What would any of the advocates here ask? How would you phrase the question for impact, attention for selection, unemotional and brevity? I figure if enough advocates follow the above suggestions, there is a decent chance for selection.
BTW, Ms Pickens has some very interesting data on her “mustang” site….good historical info for advocates.
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Hey, everyone who may have wondered where Animal Welfare Institute was after not seeing them at the conference. I wrote Chris Heyde and here is his reply Glad you had a good time. I was busy on the Hill doing meetings to educate various offices on the wild horse issue and our horse slaughter bill. We really need to ramp up outreach to legislators through calls and emails as well as attending local town hall meetings. Unfortunately, activists haven’t been doing this so politicians are only hearing from pro-horse slaughter people at these events.
I have already met with the various folks at the BLM, they need lots of pressure.
Thanks again, Chris
You will remember, his message is the SAME WE HEARD FROM ELIZABETH, LANDRIEU’S AIDE. We need a list of our members from the various states so that they can be called to target the committee members and congress critters most influential at the various stages of the bills. I do not think we have that, and thus this is happening!
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I was under the impression that the org, Americans Against Horse Slaughter maintains state lists for that exact purpose.
Something doesn’t sound right. What I read here and other pro wild equine and antislaughter sites, is that people ARE calling. That the aides and folks like Mr Hyde say they aren’t sounds is contradictory…..something smells.
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According to Congressman Whitfield, Senator Rockefeller said he had received no calls concerned SB 1176 from his constituents. I went to the national chart at the Care2Change site, and WV was absolutely colorless indicating no votes. So this is consistent with what we learned at the conference regarding one particular state.
I have never gone to the Americans Against Horse Slaughter site and have no idea what they are doing nor would they have any way of knowing what I am doing or not. It seems like a lot of us who were at the conference come to RT’s site perhaps because we can communicate with each other about both issues.
I never set out to fight a battle against horse slaughter. I was trying to find a way to understand what had happened to the mustang mare who chose me to be her herd, so I could more effectively help her. I stumbled into this mess. I didn’t know much of anything when I started, but I knew the difference between a pond wrecked by cattle and a pond horses use as a water source was a lot more than the BLM gave me credit for knowing when it put that photo with the bogus caption on its web site. After a while, thanks to Vickie and the work of others, it became impossible to ignore that the wild horse issue and the slaughter issue are connected in the deep, dark chambers of Harry Reid’s black heart.
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When you go onto Madeleine Pickens site, you will see that 70,000 letters from Wild Horse and Burro advocates where delivered to the White House.
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That’s right, Louie! I forgot about that. Something is just weird about “no input” from antislaughter/prowild equine supporters NOT contacting Congress, DOI and the White House.
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I thought that was HSUS’s and AWI’s and IDA’s raison d’etre…lobbying. Even ASPCA is starting (or is, already has a lobbying arm).
I’m just confused….so Congress, the White House and DOI/USDA only listen to lobbyists? That seems back-assward.
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Yes, Laura…I understand your points (although some of your post is cryptic).
I have always believed that the animal welfare (or rights in some case) advocate BIG lobbying orgs suffer from “not invented here” syndrome. If we didn’t think of it, if we can’t get a cut of the action they feign activity, but really don’t support it. And there is one org that will NEVER, EVER fall on their swords….they only move when the KNOW they will win.
It appears to be the same with folks like Ms Pickens and other well known wild equine advocates….they just can’t seem to agree, to get the main cause accomplished.
As to other lawsuits affecting your work; sorry, but DOI/USDA would find any excuse to limit access and transparency. I don’t think it is relevant. But you certainly know more than me.
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Yes, Laura. I know Chris is working as hard as he can. We all need to contact our friends, family members and co-workers and encourage them to send their comments. Its really important that they hear from all of us from all parts of the country. Can we do something like Madelien Pickens has done? I am not computer saavy so I don’t know the specifics on how to set something like this up. Also, everyone send the questions regarding the Wild Horses & Burros to
Mr George. If enough of us send the questions, I’m sure George will have to ask him about it. Each Representative and Senator keeps a file of the issues at hand and is filed appropriately. This is done by sending letters and flooding their offices with emails, It also takes time, but get a list of all the legislators in your state and call them. Call the members on these committees as well even though you are not from their state. We also need to continue to support those Senators and Representatives who are going forward for us. When you reach your Legislators make sure to ask them to jump on board as a sponsor.
When I sent my question to George about the Wild Horses and Burros, I also make reference to the organizations such as Straight from the Horse’s Heart and the Wild Horse Freedom Federation. So we will see what happens?
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“What question would you like to be asked to President Barack Obama?”
Today, we will present an exclusive interview with the President, conducted by George Stephanopoulos of ABC News and presented live on both Yahoo! News http://news.yahoo.com/ and ABCNews.com http://www.abcnews.com/ at 2:35 pm ET.
Submit your questions here. Yahoo! and ABC News will pick several and put them to the president live.
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/answer?qid=20111003024220AAavzyB
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It seems to me that the anti-slaughter AND the Wild Horse and Burro advocates have everything in common and every reason to unite. We ALL love Horses and Burros. I’ve always seen a unity and campaign for both. We all know that once captured, they disappear. As has been said before….it’s not rocket science to firgure out where many of them end up. We’re pushing against big money and our dollars go in so many different directions, as Laura states. Lawsuits, Field Work (documentation is essential) and Rescue. There are people working furiously to get those that have been captured to safe places before they disappear. The fact that we have accomplished so much in such short a time is nothing short of amazing and THAT is why “they” are in such a hurry and why “they” are so reckless. We must be getting very close to the quick.
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There is only one answer to the horse slaughter issue and that is to ban all US horses from being slaughtered anywhere, and to make it a felony with large fines and prison time as well as the suspension or loss of a license if it involves a veterinarian or violations of US transportation laws
However, the wild horse issue is much bigger and we may need multiple solutions. I’ve come to the point where I do not believe the BLM with its agency wide pro-cattle culture, but more than that, its arrogance, is the organization that should be in charge of our wild horses and burros. Everything we have seen from this agency as it pertains to the wild horse and burro program is either false of unverifiableWe need to go back to the original HMA’s designated in 1971 and designate them as wild horse preserves, parks, etc. Craig Downer should be involved in this process to help make sure that while the horses would be the primary grazers in the preserves, other wildlife and grazing animals needed to balance the ecosystem would be present in appropriate numbers.
Congress might also be willing to look at using the horses with wildfire prevention through their grazing habit of preventing tall dry grasses to take over large areas as well as doing some studies using wild horses to try to reforest some of our public lands that were once covered with trees to see if creating areas with more tall grass and eventually more trees would help reduce carbon emissions.
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Denise,
The other thing we have to keep in mind is that there are over 500 members of Congress. When you start adding agencies such as Interior and DOA you are adding even more people to the mix of people who may or may not be being contacted. We think of the BLM when we think about Wild Horses and Burros, but USFWS is a part of that, too.
Congress persons from my state may be using their equine chips this year to get HB 306 Corolla Wild Horse Protection Act passed. These horses are considered a state natural treasure and a vital economic resource in this areas of North Carolina. People throughout North Carolina want to preserve these animals, and I think they would rather see the elected representatives assure the protection of this state’s wild horses before they become involved with the horses out West.
What I hope is that through the process our representatives will start to connect the dots in Interior’s “How do I make you extinct, let me count the ways…” sadistic sonnet—and see for themselves what some of them have been hearing from advocates.
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Don’t forget the Wild Horse and Burro National Advisory Board. They need to hear the flack early and often.
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Saving Mustangs and burros is our passion and our common goal. The BLM Wild horse & Burro Program must change to achieve that goal. Achieving that goal will be impossible without roundtable discussions between the advocate community and government officials to exchange ideas and come up with a workable plan for the future.
Please read, sign, and circulate this petition to President Obama as soon as possible. Thanks for your consideration.
“Reform Federal Wild Horse & Burro Management Programs and Related Policies”
“Affirm federally protected wild horses & burros are living symbols of the American West, held in trust for the American people. Urge Congress to repeal the Burns Amendment to the 1971 Wild Free-Roaming Horse & Burro Act for lack of ethical procedure. Place a moratorium on wild horse & burro removals, except in verifiable emergencies, until Interior & Agriculture Secretaries provide complete, accurate information on all related matters since 1971, roundtable meetings conclude, and the BLM website posts all materials in easy access formats. Meeting criteria: voters divided equally between government and wild horse & burro advocates, including peer-reviewed experts, plus one neutral party; held at convenient times/places; majority rules. Post all minutes and a final report in a timely manner.”
https://wwws.whitehouse.gov:443/petitions/!/petition/reform-federal-wild-horse-burro-management-programs-and-related-policies/KlDTT2ls?utm_source=wh.gov&utm_medium=shorturl&utm_campaign=shorturl
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