Friday Hound Blogging

We're coming to you today from the Department Of Logical Extensions here in the marbled halls of IM Central. the DOLE is a division of the One Of These Things Is Not Like The Other Corporation, a wholly owned subsidy of Any Port In A Storm, Inc.

Recently, the overlords were confronted, yet again with the fact that leeching their despicable existence off the backs of innocent living creatures means that sometimes, said creatures are injured or killed.

Greyhounds sustained a total of 175 injuries while racing at Iowa’s tracks between January 2011 and July 2012, says a national greyhound protection organization. Twenty-four greyhounds were euthanized, the organization reported.

Now, usually when someone points out that the dogs have nothing to gain and everything to lose as they strive to make the overlords' trailer payments, the more articulate members of the industry rush to point out that commodifying living creatures for profit is a "sport," and as with many sports sometimes the participants sustain injuries.

OK, accepting the "sport" premise for a moment, the overlords have a point. Why just last week Harry Douglas, a wide receiver for the Atlanta Hawks injured his ankle and may not be able to play this weekend. We say may not be able to play because Mr. Douglas is being tended to by the team trainers, receiving rehabilitative therapies, whirlpools and massages to help his ankle heal.

Of course greyhounds have trainers too, one of whom is named Lee Haynes and whenever one of his units..erm...dogs goes down this trainer springs into action as was the case recently when Pat C Rasputin broke his leg in a race.

"The trainer requested euthanasia since it was a male dog. This was declined as not medically necessary."

 Now in Mr. Haynes defense, we can't say for certain that Mr. Douglas's trainers didn't discuss euthanasia when he hurt his ankle, so while the response to injuries in the NFL and in greyhound racing seems pretty different on the surface, who knows what really goes on in the coach's office when a player is hurt.

Besides, you can't condemn a whole "sport" because of a few injuries. Think of the fans. The average Monday night football game draws an audience  a little over 14 million viewers, not counting the people in the stands. The average greyhound race only has the people in the stands because no one would put it on television and that crowd amounts to about 3.2 million. Umm...that's 3.2 million for the whole year. For all the races. Combined. Total. The whole enchilada.

Hey, you know, something just occurred to us. You go to the average NFL stadium and it's a freakin' palace man, but the average greyhound track? Sort of reminds us of post apocalyptic devastation in a run down sort of way. Maybe if the facilities were upgraded a bit more people might show up. Gonna need some help for that though. What do you say Council Bluffs State Representative Mark Brandenburg, help a brother out? 

A Council Bluffs lawmaker said he would support closing the city’s greyhound racetrack because it’s no longer a viable business. “There was a time they had people there, but there is no real demand for it anymore,” Rep. Mark Brandenburg said. “It’s not a viable venture anymore.”

Well that's not helpful.  The industry is suffering right now Mr. Brandenberg, like Pat C Rasputin. What are you trying to do, euthanize it? You have any suggestions Amy?

Amy is three years old. She raced 79 times, all in Alabama. She won eight times, the last being July of this year, racing once after that and placing second. It is unusual for a dog to be pulled so suddenly when they are finishing in the money, but as near as we can tell, it's not because of an injury. For more information about this dog, and other rescued racing greyhounds looking for homes, go here. If you don't know about the plight of racing greyhounds go here.