Center for Consumer Freedom on its Battle with Humane Society
If you're on any of the many e-mail lists maintained by the Humane Society of the United States, you probably saw a desperate plea for money last night from HSUS president Wayne Pacelle. There's nothing unusual about that -- HSUS sits up and begs for dollars countless times each year. But what made this piece unusual was that it consisted almost entirely of ridiculous attacks on the Center for Consumer Freedom. Go ahead and look. We want you to read it. It's one of the best examples we've seen of the kind of scorched-earth politics this so-called "humane society" practices.
But don't feel bad for us. Frankly, we're flattered that Wayne and his $100 million-per-year operation, with a $162 million balance sheet, nearly $38 million in annual salaries, and over $2.5 million in pension funds socked away (in one year alone), with 30 lawyers on its payroll -- we could go on but you get the picture -- are spending their time attacking us.
Our entire annual budget is less than what Wayne's HSUS puts into pension funding! (Read that again.)
Make no mistake: This is a David -vs- Goliath story, and we're the ones with a pocket full of pebbles.
Is HSUS's leader getting nervous about our little research outfit? Is he concerned that we've figured out how (according to a national survey) Wayne has convinced Americans that HSUS uses most of their contributions to rescue and shelter stray and unwanted dogs and cats -- while it actually gives less than one-half of one percent of its budget to hands-on pet shelters? (That's according to documents HSUS itself files with the IRS.)
Is Wayne worried that we might tell HSUS donors how much of their "$19 a month" (from the group's ubiquitous TV ads) never reaches pet shelters -- the hard-working organizations that actually do the heavy lifting to protect the cats and dogs in those weepy commercials?
It could be that Wayne Pacelle is upset because we participated in an Atlanta ABC television news story last year, which exposed how much of his organization's money is diverted away from pet sheltering. Or maybe it's because we surfaced a story about how the Louisiana Attorney General investigated HSUS after it collected more than $34 million by using the Hurricane Katrina disaster as a fundraising gimmick
Perhaps -- just perhaps -- the fat cats at our nation's sorry excuse for a national "humane society" are just upset because someone has realized that self-proclaimed watchdogs need to be watched themselves.
Stay tuned. Visit www.HumaneWatch.org throughout the week. And keep an open mind.
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This wouldn't happen to have anything to do with all of HSUS puppy mill , factory farm and animal poison lab hell hole expose's lately? I notice in the last few years the "responsible breeding" community and the "responsible animal poisoning community" and the "responsible slaughter community", really seem to have their noses up the rear of CCF . They enthusiastically flock to the boards to whine and tear up about the "poor puppies" !
Oooooo HSUS and PETA are soooo mean! Why don't they leave us alone!!!
It's disgusting, these shills whining about "the shelters" while they suck up to the puppy mill slime and rake in millions keeping their animal hell holes chugging along... destroying health, animals and the environment .... CCF should be shut down by the IRS for impersonating a "non-profit" and banned from the internet .. Who ever heard of a "consumers group" funded by billion dollar corporations like Tysons Food, Cargill, Monsanto, Phillip Morris, Dean Foods, Wendy's and Outback Steakhouse?
OMG, Somebody ordered the spinach lasagna instead of a McDonald's torture burger! How dare those ACTIVISTS talk about my BIG MAC that way ... MY RIGHTS ARE BEING INFRINGED UPON! 10 billion land animals killed for food every year in the U.S. (over a million an hour) AND THEIR STILL NOT SATISFIED! How blood thirsty can you get?
If your corporate slug employers didn't spend 24/7 brutalizing animals, people and the planet, we wouldn't need animal and human rights advocates.
Tyson has been brutalizing both it's animals and employees for decades... It's been videotaped, and sworn to in signed affidavit by employees, that cows are regularly gutted and skinned alive... still kicking, struggling (and sometimes injuring the not much better off employees in the process). Employees which Tyson has beat up on and attacked while on strike for better or at least safer, working conditions ...
Monsanto and its dog poisoning labs like Huntingdon Life Sciences, kill 500 animals day... but you had better not be concerned about it or else you might be accused by CCF of having the dreaded ANIMAL RIGHTS AGENDA! Their sugar daddy, Phillip Morris , started them off with the initial funding... Phillip Morris, whose testing laboratory Covance is the largest importer of primates in the U.S. and the world's largest breeder of laboratory dogs. The way they torture these poor animals over tobacco and toxins, is enough to make your blood run cold...
92 % of all animal testing fails human trials, according to the FDA in 2004... It's done for purely legal and financial reasons...(and because that way, company's like Monsanto can PROVE that their poisons and chemicals are SAFE (until they kill enough people to take them off the market)... Ever wonder why no drugs are ever around for more than 10 or 20 years? If it weren't for Covance Laboratories tobacco would have had labels in the 50's...
But Richard Berman and David Martosko only want to protect the defenseless consumer against rabid vegetarians!
THEY CARE ABOUT PEOPLE!!! That's why when they're not slandering animal and health activists... They're busy trying to make sure their billionaire, sociopath employers don't have to raise minimum wage a penny... or contribute a nickle to work men's comp when their employees get sliced open or fall into manure pits... I think most people would puke their guts out if they had to visit one of YOUR CLIENT's HELL HOLES.. But isn't that the real problem? Not radicals or VEGETARIANS trying to force their values on you... But exposure...
What a happy day when that bloated sociopath David Martosko keels over from a Wendy's induced coronary... Until then, his sugar daddy's and mommy's are cackling all the way to the bank. No less than 8 members of the Cargill-MacMillan meat packing family are Forbes 400 Richest Americans.
Cargill MacMillan, Jr. - net worth 4.3 billion.
Whitney MacMillan - 4.3 billion
Marion MacMillan Pictet - 4.3 billion
Pauline MacMillan Keinath - - 4.3 billion
James R. Cargill, II - 1.6 billion
Mary Janet Morse Cargill - $1.6 billion
Marianne Cargill Liebmann - $1.6 billion
Austen S. Cargill, II - 1.3 billion
400 Richest Americans - Forbes 2009
CEO Don Tyson was paid $20.9 million in 2003. When his company was demanding wage and benefit cuts from impoverished meat packing workers, his annual compensation nearly tripled. He is worth one billion dollars and growing. Don Tyson has paid over $2 million in SEC fines for misleading disclosure of personal benefits.
Eric Schlosser Tyson's Moral Anchor, The Nation, June 24, 2004
400 Richest Americans - Forbes 2009
Wendy's/Arby's Group annual salaries
Roland C. Smith - CEO - 3.22 Millon
J. David Karam - CEO - Wendy's - 2.12 M
Stephen E. Hare - CFO - 1.29 M
Nils H. Okeson - General Counsel - 1.06 M
Sharon Barton - Chief Admin Officer - 1.23 M
Wendy's/Arby's Group, Yahoo Finance 2009
Wow, looks like they've managed to sock away a few bucks paying their employees minimum wage!
Change your name to Inhumane Society. It's much more honest than "Center for Consumer Freedom".
In fact, the Human Society probably does a lot more good for consumers than this shameless lobby. They maintain some standtard for treatment of pets , and help with the care of and provision for pets when they can.
And their employees do real work , even.