I received this press release from Farm Sanctuary this morning:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact:
Tricia Barry, Farm Sanctuary, 607-583-2225 ext. 233,
tricia@farmsanctuary.org

Farm Sanctuary Issues Statement on the Swine Flu Outbreak

Gene Baur: “Factory farms are…a prescription for disaster”

WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. – April 28, 2009 – Farm Sanctuary, the nation’s leading farm animal protection organization, today issued a statement from Gene Baur, president and co-founder, regarding the current global outbreak of swine flu originating in North America:

“For more than 23 years, Farm Sanctuary has warned that cramming thousands of animals into factory farms is not only bad for the animals. These stressful, filthy, disease-ridden confines are also bad for humans. Animals packed by the thousands in unnatural conditions suffer immensely and these unhealthy, overcrowded operations are a breeding ground for disease. For too long, agribusiness and the USDA have failed to adequately address animal and human health risks – swine flu, avian flu, MRSA, e-coli, salmonella, mad cow disease – the list goes on. Factory farms are nothing less than a prescription for disaster.”

Through its Anti-Confinement Campaign, Farm Sanctuary is urging the introduction and passage of legislation that would eliminate the use of some of the most common confinement systems in place on factory farms – gestation crates for breeding pigs, battery cages for egg laying hens and veal crates for calves. The organization is also urging passage of federal bills H.R. 1549 and S. 619 that would eliminate the use of sub-therapeutic antibiotics on factory farms. More information on pending legislation can be found at http://www.farmsanctuary.org/issues/legislation/.

Note: Photos and video b-roll footage of pig factory farms from Farm Sanctuary investigations are available by request. Please contact media@farmsanctuary.org.

About Farm Sanctuary

Farm Sanctuary is the nation’s leading farm animal protection organization. Since incorporating in 1986, Farm Sanctuary has worked to expose and stop cruel practices of the “food animal” industry through research and investigations, legal and institutional reforms, public awareness projects, youth education, and direct rescue and refuge efforts. Farm Sanctuary shelters in Watkins Glen, N.Y., and Orland, Calif., provide lifelong care for hundreds of rescued animals, who have become ambassadors for farm animals everywhere by educating visitors
about the realities of factory farming. Additional information can be found at farmsanctuary.org or by calling 607-583-2225.

One of the worse commentators on CNN has to be Roland Martin, and this week he did nothing to change my mind. I don’t want to rehash the whole Miss USA gay marriage answer debacle. If you’re against gay marriage, you might be thrilled at the answer Miss California gave, even if she sounded as inarticulate as she did. If you’re for gay marriage (or rather against state sponsored discrimination when it comes to marriage), you were probably appalled by both her answer and Perez Hilton’s douchey demeanor afterwards. Personally, I think beauty pageants are idiotic, and Perez Hilton is a lowlife purveyor of celebrity gossip trash.

However, it did indeed make news, so I’ve had to listen to a lot of gabbing about it on CNN. Today I noticed a commentary on how he appreciated the honesty of her answer (http://bit.ly/GWiQC). He defends her by comparing her position to Hillary Clinton, Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, and Joe Biden, calling them the four of the biggest liberals in the country.

Yeah, whatever, Roland. I’m sure if she had said “The Bible tells me the races shouldn’t mix, so I’m against interracial marriage” you would be smiling and celebrating her honesty. Please. You’d be calling her a small minded racist Republican emblematic of the continued race problems in the United States. Because of your own religious beliefs, however, you’re just smiling and thanking her.

Look as a libertarian, I don’t think the state should have anything to do with marriage, however, that pipedream isn’t going to happen. The state has been in the business of regulating marriage too long to go back, so gays should have the right to marry, period. I don’t care what anyone’s particular translation of a 2,000 year old arbitrarily chosen set of fictional books says, gays have the Constitutional right to be treated equally under the law. If you don’t like that, well, you have some soul searching to do, because it was just two generations ago that people used the Bible to argue against interracial marriage, and even just interracial dating. As repulsive as that sounds now, I hope opposition to gay marriage sounds as repulsive when I’m old and gray and long retired.

Reference:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/04/22/martin.miss.california/index.html

I’m horrible about keeping in contact with my family. I’m of the generation who doesn’t believe in calling home or writing letters. I’m all about instant messaging and email…and I’m bad at doing that as well. So, I’m going to attempt to keep family members up to date with the old blog here. Most of you (you dont’ have to tell me Josh) will this boring I bet, so I’m just warnin’ ya.

So..what have I been up to?

Well, my job always has me busy, and it’s almost been twelve years since I started my current job. It seems like a long time to be at one job these days, but working in online world, the business and technology changes so much, I’m always doing something different and learning new stuff. I might have the same boss as I did twelve years ago, but I don’t have the same job.

At home, Kelly and I have finally gotten around to purchasing some major items for inside the house. We bought our new sectional for the living room. It seats 7 or 2 people and maybe 8 dogs. The dogs love it because they can all sit on the couch with us, and because it’s very comfortable. We also purchases shades for our office. We have three large windows that face directly west, and while we love the view, when the sun comes down, it sucks. My laptop overheats all the time, and the glare is horrible. So yesterday, we had three roman shades installed that block the sun completely. They work great. In full sun, I can even play games without losing anything to glare (I consider it a good test of glare to play a game with darkly lit scenes). My second office/studio also has a newly installed roller which covers the entire window, and allows me to work in there as well.

We’re also working on our garden. The weather hasn’t cooperated so much, as we’ve had a lot of rainy weekends. However, it’s looking like this week we’ll be able to get it setup. We’re using a combination of cardboard and carpet to keep the weeds at bay. Combined with the series of soaker hoses we have, we’re hoping this year is the year we achieve little or no weeding and easy watering. We have great soil and had a good crop last year (we still have stuff left over and frozen) and hope this one does as well.

Also, all the dogs and cats are doing well.

Well, that just about sums it up for this week. Enough of the familial Ambien!

Larry King is an enigma to me. He has somehow become an institution on CNN despite being one of the world’s worst interviewers and continuing to book peddlers of nonsense. He has given reptiles like Sylvia Browne a far bigger platform than someone of her (barely passable) cold reading skills deserves. This Friday, though, old Larry is reaching a new low. He is having Dr. Jenny McCarthy and Dr. Jim Carey on his show to talk about autism. Oh, wait, did I say doctors? Sorry, I meant, actress Jenny McCarthy and actor Jim Carey. It’s so hard to tell doctors and actors apart after all.

Thanks to the anti-vaccine movement, we are now seeing pockets of measles and polio rise out of places that had previously been free of those diseases. Nigeria, a country suspicious of western medicine, has had immunization boycotts and now is an exporter of polio to countries around it. In the United States, the only people who die of tetanus are those who aren’t vaccinated.

There is little debate in the scientific community that the world wide vaccination efforts mark one of the greatest achievements in modern medicine. Just a couple generations ago, smallpox, polio, measles, etc were commonplace. Our lifespan has increased because of this.

And now, we have Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carey, armed with nonsense and enough scientific sounding jargon to appear reasonable, telling parents to reject one societies greatest accomplishments. There isn’t a single study that I could find that has ever, ever linked vaccinations to autism. The one study, back in 1998, that got everything started has been debunked and discredited. Study after study since then has shown there is no link between vaccines and autism. None. Please, let’s get past this.

Now Jenny and Jim will be on Larry King, being interviewed by someone who probably won’t bother to read anything about vaccines, who will toss softballs all night, and who will unlikely challenge any of the drivel Jenny and Jim spout. Enough of this garbage from Larry King. Time to let him go off to pasture. Time to fire Larry King.