Friday, January 06, 2012

Friday Hound Blogging

Ah, the first FHB of the new year and what better way to start off  than with a visit to two of our favorite people, the Ever Delusional Gary Guccione, and Well Known Animal Rights Wacko Caryn Wood.

Now, for those of you watching at home, here's how it goes, a newspaper or tee vee station somewhere will run a story about greyhounds, most always something along the lines of greyhounds living in horrific conditions, or how greyhounds are regularly injured and killed, or how people who have souls are so aghast at the whole enterprise that even those as clueless as state legislators realize they've got to get out of the greyhound racing business.

In other words, for the overlords business as usual.

Now, this will prompt WKARW Caryn to pen a missive to the aforementioned newspaper or tee vee station in which she points out that you sort of have to expect this sort of thing is going to happen when living, breathing sentient creatures like, say for instance greyhounds are reduced to commodities whose only value is their ability to earn a couple of bucks for a class of so called people so bereft of compassion they make a black widow spider look like Mother Theresa.

So the letter gets published and eventually makes its way to overlord headquarters where one of the two staffers who can read brings it to the Ever Delusional Mr. Guccione. After it is explained to him that the author is showing greyhound racing in a less than positive light, he digs through his desk looking for the rumpled copy of talking points, he calls Things To Say When The Truth Gets Out which he usually finds under the self improvement CDs he listens to like "Embark on a Fascinating Career as a Parking Lot Attendant," or "From Busboy to Dishwasher: Climbing the Ladder of Success in the Restaurant Industry," grabs his dictionary and the Word-a-Day calendar and heads down to the local library to use their computers.

Which brings us to his latest effort which we reproduce for you below in its entirety:
A letter from Caryn Wood, board member of GREY2K USA, about greyhound racing was full of the misinformation and hyperbole for which that organization is famous (“Dogs are pawns,” Jan. 3 Letters to the Editor).
Almost 95 percent of all racing greyhounds are either adopted or returned to the farm when they retire. Between reduced breeding and increasing success with adoption programs, we hope to achieve the goal of 100 percent placement of all greyhounds suitable for adoption in the near future.
Wood distorted the facts on greyhound care as well. Racing greyhounds are among the best-cared-for animals in the world, because they must receive excellent care in order to perform at their best on the track. On the rare occasions when industry members fail in their obligation for responsible greyhound care, the penalties are harsh and long term. People who violate animal-care standards are banned from the sport for life, and others prohibited from doing business with them. That’s because we take greyhound welfare very seriously.
GARY GUCCIONE
Communications coordinator
American Greyhound Council
Abilene
Now, the first thing we notice about the letter is it's shorter than the E. D. Mr. G's usual rebuttal. This could be for one of two reasons: either the effort of trying to remember the correspondence between the letter on the key and the resulting letter that appears on the screen when you push the key is getting to be too much for him, or the library staff got tired of him messing up the screen with erasure marks every time he made a typing mistake and kicked him out. Or both, but let's talk a look at what he says.

He starts, unfortunately, with the math gambit. Oh, Mr. G. We've had this talk before. Mathematics is not your friend. In fact if you moved into the same neighborhood as mathematics, mathematics would move away in the night and not leave a forwarding address. Once, for Christmas, G was given a calculator, but he returned it soon after. When the clerk asked him what was wrong, he replied that it must be broken because he had tried on several occasions to call a pizza shop to order dinner and had not been able even to get a dial tone. The other thing you need to realize about mathematics, Mr. G is that if you want to end up with numbers that are, you know, true, you have to start with numbers that have some connection to reality...and...uh...you ain't got 'em. Even your fellow overlords know that.
No cumulative annual records are available that we're aware of on disposition, whelped, where they race, where they end up, etc.
Now, if you'd like we can set up a meeting between you and the overlord who wrote that, let's see, what's his name?  Oh yeah, that was you. Looks like you've got one too many voices in  your head again.

From here the E. D. Mr. G moves on to the issue of care and how "Racing greyhounds are among the best-cared-for animals in the world." Especially the ones who are crippled and blind. Then he gets to the big finish about how if an overlord is mean to his or her greyhound, that overlord is cast into the darkness from which they can never return. Well, unless it happens to be Herb "Dutch" Koerner or Ursula O'Donnell  then...ah...not so much.

On the bright side though, they take greyhound welfare very seriously. You can attest to that huh, Lady?


 Lady is outgoing, exuberant, very energetic, playful and puppy-like. She is affectionate. She will try to crawl into your lap to cuddle when you are sitting down. She likes to be near you. She wants to be petted all the time. She is very sweet—loves affection. She likes to play with toys and will sometimes throw her toys in the air. She likes to roll on her back.  Lady would do well in a working family home with well-mannered children, 8 and older. Sometimes she plays rough with other dogs, so would do best with a young, energetic dog as her companion. She will bark when she is excited, so she may do best in a single family home. She would do best in a home with someone who knows about dog training because she is young and needs guidance and would probably be best in a home that would exercise her regularly. For more information about these dogs, and other rescued racing greyhounds looking for homes, go here. If you don't know about the plight of racing greyhounds go here.

KB Update:  Booyah! That didn't take long. KB finds a permanent couch in eastern Michigan. Welcome to the pet life, dude. Enjoy!

1 comment:

Tom Grady said...

Love It! - Especially the references to the level of reading comprehension and math skills from those within the racing industry.
They also seem to have a total lack of logic as well.

From one hound blogger to another - "great blogging."

Tom "Pack Mentality Blog" Grady