DawnWatch: Washington Times editorial page against horse slaughter 7/25/06
July 25th, 2006 7:31 pm by Kelly Garbato———- Forwarded message ———-
From: DawnWatch – news [at] dawnwatch.com
Date: Jul 25, 2006 4:32 PM
Subject: DawnWatch: Washington Times editorial page against horse slaughter 7/25/06
Once again, the Washington Times editorial page has come out strongly against horse slaughter and those who pervert the democratic process in order to maintain the practice.
The July 25 editorial, headed, “Stop Horsing Around” (Pg A 16) opens:
“If horse slaughter is ever banned in the United States, it won’t be for lack of obstruction on the part of supporters of this barbaric practice. The latest maneuver in this ongoing tragedy is Rep. Bob Goodlatte’s attempt to hold up a floor vote on Rep. John Sweeney’s bill to ban horse slaughter. Without getting into specifics, Mr. Goodlatte essentially hijacked the regular committee process by invoking a fuzzy parliamentary procedure whereby his Agricultural Committee would be allowed to consider the Sweeney bill before it can go to the floor.
“It is only the latest in a long list of anti-democratic abuses employed by opponents of the ban to keep them in good standing with their rancher buddies, who for inexplicable reasons view the campaign to end horse slaughter as somehow threatening to their cattle interests.”
The piece reminds us of the events last year, when a ban passed overwhelmingly and was signed into law, but was met with the Agriculture Department’s legal analysis which said that the amendment “does not prevent horse slaughter at all.” The Washington Times editors write: “Having thus ignored the will of Congress, the department went on to perform some hilarious legal acrobatics to make their ridiculous assertion square with the law.”
The editors write that they do not align themselves with the animal rights lobby, but “what we’ve seen from the cattle ranchers and their legislators is nothing short of a perversion of democracy. Whether one particularly cares about the slaughter of horses, every American should care deeply when lawmakers and agencies obstruct the lawmaking process or choose to ignore the law all together. And for what? The self-interest of a few Belgian and French horse eaters.”
It ends by referring to “the ethically challenged practices of the ban’s opponents.”
You can read the full piece on line at washingtontimes.com/op-ed/20060724-083922-5089r.htm and send letters to the editor at www.washingtontimes.com/contact-us/
Choose “letter to the editor” from the pull-down menu.
Yours and the animals’,
Karen Dawn
(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at www.DawnWatch.com. To unsubscribe, go to www.dawnwatch.com/cgi-bin/dada/dawnwatch_unsubscribe.cgi
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