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Michael Vick’s new spokesman says ‘You are a monster too!’

Wayne Pacelle, the CEO of the Humane Society of the United States and spokesman for the most notorious animal abuser of our time, is digging himself into a deeper hole. The head of the nation’s wealthiest animal “protection” group is now arguing in newspapers across the country, including San Francisco’s, that we should forgive Michael Vick because we are all “sinners when it comes to animals.” Is Pacelle really that desperate that he now says we are all monsters like Vick? Or perhaps, in a bit of Freudian repentance, he is talking about himself: about how he lobbied the court to kill Michael Vick’s canine victims even as he was fundraising off of them? The slaughter of the dogs and puppies at Wilkes County, NC? Or the mass killing in Tangipahoa LA? The round up and kill of cats in Randolph, IA? Or any of the innumerable places Pacelle and HSUS minions have chanted ‘kill, kill, kill’ in the face of proven, successful, reasonable No Kill alternatives?

As for me, I’ve never stomped, electrocuted, hung, shot, drowned, or strangled dogs, nor have I watched them tear each other to shreds and laughed. But Michael Vick did, and he’d still be doing it to this very day had he not been caught. [Read “Riding on Michael Vick’s Bloodstained Coattails” by clicking here.]

Kathleen McGarr of Fix San Francisco, a group which has been trying to reform the city’s kill-oriented animal control and SPCA, says that when she read Pacelle’s claim that she is a monster like Vick, “I nearly fell off my chair.” McGarr’s group has been fighting Pacelle who opposes their No Kill campaign in San Francisco. In short, Pacelle says that No Kill is warehousing, leads to animal suffering, and that San Francisco shelters should be allowed to continue killing. Who is the monster here Wayne?

The Op Ed piece by Pacelle comes on the eve of his planned visit to San Francisco where he will try to convince animal lovers that the most notorious animal abuser of our time should be embraced. Here’s my article about the visit from the examiner:

Wayne Pacelle is coming to town
From the examiner: http://bit.ly/3gBFK7
October 16, 2009

As  the Humane Society of the United States  embraces the most notorious animal abuser of our time and fights a proposal to save San Francisco’s neediest animals, the head of HSUS is coming to the City to raise money for his Washington D.C.-based group.

The controversial head of the nation’s largest and wealthiest animal protection organization in the United States is coming to San Francisco for an October 28 “Town Hall” meeting. Wayne Pacelle, the CEO of  the Humane Society of the  United States, will  discuss, among other things,  his new spokesman: dog-killer Michael Vick, the most notorious animal abuser of our time.

Can anyone imagine the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence embracing wife killer O.J. Simpson as a spokesman? Can anyone imagine the National Organization to Prevent Sexual Abuse of Children embracing pedophile John Geoghan as a spokesman? Can anyone imagine the Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network embracing rapist Josef Fritzl as a spokesman? It is unthinkable. And yet  Wayne Pacelle is asking  animal lovers in San Francisco to  embrace  our movement’s  version of Simpson, Geoghan, and Fritzl as a spokesman. It is beyond obscene. It is unthinkable.

Pacelle says he will answer questions from San Francisco animal lovers about this and other topics.

I have a number of other questions for Pacelle. Why did he, through HSUS:

  1. Participate in the slaughter of some 150 dogs, including puppies, in Wilkes County, NC?
  2. Lobby to stop No Kill legislation in King County, WA?
  3. Support breed discriminatory legislation in Indianapolis, IN that would have led to the round up and killing of Pit Bulls?
  4. Tell USA Today and Newsweek that killing in shelters is acceptable and that No Kill was warehousing?
  5. Mislead the public about an epidemic of dog bites to convey the view that trying to save Pit Bulls was irresponsible and put children at risk?
  6. Tell the court to kill Vick’s victims even as he was asking people to give HSUS money so he could “care” for them?
  7. Leave New Orleans with tens of millions given to HSUS for the victims of Hurricane Katrina even while those animals were still suffering?
  8. Legitimize the slaughter of virtually every animal at Tangipahoa Parish animal control?
  9. Tell people not to adopt animals during the holidays, effectively accepting the deaths of 1,000,000 animals as the alternative?
  10. Tell the Randolph, IA community that HSUS does not have a problem killing stray cats?
  11. Claim that rescued dogs in Missouri should face a “pretty certain death”?

And especially important for San Francisco animal lovers, why is he opposing a No Kill San Francisco? Pacelle recently sent a letter to San Francisco’s Animal Control & Welfare Commission equating No Kill with hoarding and opposing shelter reform legislation that would save San Francisco’s neediest homeless animals.

Unfortunately, Pacelle has long been an apologist and enabler of shelter killing.

In the end, the real reason behind the “Town Hall meeting” might just have nothing to do with animals. This “town hall” format is often little more than a fundraising ploy which has been successfully used by other organizations to sap money from local donors and thus away from local rescue groups, and into the bank accounts of national organizations. And for HSUS, money doesn’t appear to be a means to the end of saving animals. It is the end in and of itself, the animals be damned.