Last night in Los Angeles, Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) president Wayne Pacelle showed why he’s been able to turn a group that sounds as if it’s all about protecting puppies and kittens into an animal-rights lobbying force with talons. He’s looking to sink those talons into people who have the audacity to eat or sell meat, wear leather, go to circuses, or enjoy hunting and fishing – in other words, 99 percent of America.

In front of a hand-picked crowd of HSUS supporters who attended last night’s “town hall meeting” at the Ebell of Los Angeles, Pacelle rallied the troops with a fight song:

"We have to create a clamor for change ... You can get further with a kind word and a gun than a kind word alone."

He attributed the latter quote to notorious gangster Al Capone, who seems like an odd inspiration for a supposedly peaceful movement. But animal-rights extremists are far from peaceful. One of Pacelle’s own staffers, Josh Balk, told the HSUS-sponsored “Taking Action For Animals” that “there are very few instances that companies just refuse to move with a friendly conversation … The animals can’t wait for people to come to a revelation themselves. Sometimes it does take force.”

HSUS sounds more and more like PETA and the terrorist Animal Liberation Front every day.

It’s been well documented that HSUS spends only a tiny fraction – less than four percent – of its budget directly funding animal shelters. If you’re wondering how it spends the other roughly $100 million in its budget every year, you might consider the cost of renting out the posh Wilshire Ebell Theatre, providing the supporters-only crowd with a catered coffee service, and hiring four burly security guards to keep out the riff-raff.