Friday Hound Blogging

Now, we're not ones to take credit where it's undeserved here in the marbled halls of IM Central. Well, unless we think no one can check that is (Telling Tom Cotton the capitol of Iraq is Tehran so he'd make a complete fool of himself? Totally us. Just saying). Anyway our point is we feel we have to take some credit for revitalizing the overlord campaign against reality. Last week you may recall (if you don't really have a life) that we were lamenting the apparent surrender of the overlords to the inevitability that they were going to have to join the labor pool sooner rather than later. We can only assume that our cry fell upon the sleeping overlord hoards like poop from a flock of passing geese because no less an overlord than the oft mentioned Gary Guccione himself has this week stepped forward to once again raise the banner of clueless obfuscation and deliberate misrepresentation.

But before we inflict the febrile excreta that passes for thought in Mr. G's world on you we'd like to take a minute to comment on the accompanying photo of our designated interlocutor. To wit:

We're going to pass over the obvious resemblance to a mug shot as we suspect that might be the G man's primary experience with having his photo taken and just say Gary! You have really let yourself go man! We mean, check out this photo from just a few years ago:

Dude! What happened? Apparently being the primary spokesperson for institutionalized cruelty and heartless exploitation takes its toll huh? We can only imagine what changes the next few years might bring:

But back to our story:

The March 7 Viewpoint regarding greyhound racing in Florida was a typical animal rights hit job – long on misrepresentation and short on facts. Groups like Grey2K USA and the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals know that good animal care doesn't help them raise funds. There's big money in painting the industry in a negative light.

 OK, so open up by changing the subject. That's overlord strategy 3A we think. Right G? And about that "negative light" thing. Dogs are being injured and killed, abandoned and just generally mistreated. Any "light" at all on that is going to be fairly negative wouldn't you agree?

The fact is that greyhound racing has adopted rigorous animal care standards. Under the rules of the National Greyhound Association, people found guilty of mistreating or neglecting greyhounds or any other animals in their care are banned from greyhound racing for life, and others prohibited from doing business with them.

Hey, G man. Two words: Ursula O'Donnel. OK, two more: Herb Koerner. See a pattern here? 

It should be obvious to anyone with an ounce of common sense that greyhounds would not be able to perform as they do on the track if they did not receive proper care. For example, industry standards require that greyhound crates must be large enough to permit the dogs to stand, sit, lie down and turn around comfortably. It would be counterproductive to house the greyhounds in improperly sized crates, since it would affect their muscle health and impair their ability to perform when racing.

Let's see if we have this right. Your definition of "proper care" is to give the units a crate big enough to turn around in for the 18 - 22 hours a day they are in there, that about right?  But on the bright side, the dogs are only in those crates as long as they're winning. Stop winning and they're dumped and replaced by another helpless victim...er...we mean properly cared for dog.

Greyhounds are exercised for extended periods at least four times daily, probably twice as often as the average family dog. These canine athletes expend huge amounts of energy when they run, so when not racing, they prefer to rest.

Yeah, but like we said a couple weeks ago, when all you can do is stand up and turn around "resting" is about your only option. Come on now G it's starting to sound like you're phoning it in. Give us something new OK? 

The diet fed to greyhounds includes the same meat products found in most commercial pet foods, as well as vegetables and cereal. Although the meat is not suitable for human consumption, it is perfectly healthy and safe for dogs, whose digestive systems are quite different from ours.

Really? The food thing again? G! You're disappointing us dude. Cooking man, the commercial pet foods are cooked to kill the pathogens, not the crap you dump on the poor greyhounds.  Now we're depressed. We really expected more G man. After all, you're the G man! The executive director of the National Greyhound Association, the official registry of greyhound racing in the United States! The whole US bro! Act like it. The other overlords are looking to you for inspiration. Now get out there and show us your stuff!

Animal rights groups also deceive when it comes to injuries. Only a fraction of one percent of all racing starts result in injuries to greyhounds, and the vast majority

OK, OK G. G? We're going to stop you right there because we've heard all this before and it doesn't sound any different just because the executive director says it. We got to tell you man, we're feeling pretty let down. Like we said last week, we kind of miss the good old days when the overlords actually believed if they said it, that made it true, so when we saw your name on the editorial we were pretty excited, but this is stuff that could have been written years ago--probably was written years ago back when you had more hair and it's the same load of delusional obfuscation and deliberate missing of the point today that it was back then. It's over G. It's really over. Stick a fork in him Nolan, he's done.

Nolan is a one year old male who came with his sister Nelly. Nolan can live with cats or small dogs, but we don't yet know if he can be an only dog. 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 and here.