At RESCUE’s 8th annual “Beauty to the RESCUE” fundraiser at the Mane Attraction on March 9, local artist Susan Barken spotted our dog Otto (a rescue dog himself) and thought he’d make a good subject for one of her paintings. Here are a couple of the photos she took of him on March 16. Susan donated a dog painting for RESCUE’s silent auction at the fundraiser. (UPDATE: here’s the painting.)
A Blackwater bodyguard shot and killed Hentish, the mascot dog of the New York Times that has lived its entire life in the U.S. Embassy compound in Baghdad. Blackwater claims Hentish attacked one of their bomb-sniffing dogs and had to be shot. Historical Comments Rafal Los (2007-12-21): That's classical resorting to 3rd grader tactics... you exposed me, so I'll shoot your dog.God help us. ...
Mike Huckabee’s problems continue to accumulate. There’s the little problem of his son David hanging a dog by its neck, slitting its throat, and stoning it to death–and the fact that Huckabee himself defends this animal cruelty (of the sort that’s often a precursor to serial killing of human beings) on the grounds that the dog was emaciated and had mange. (You may recall that Mitt Romney has a similar, though not nearly as nasty, poor record with dogs.) David Huckabee killed the dog when he was 17 and was never prosecuted, but in April he faced a weapons charge for trying to take a loaded handgun through airport security in Little Rock. Huckabee also claimed to Pat Robertson’s CBN that “I’m the only guy on that stage with a theology degree,” but he doesn’t have a theology degree–he only attended Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary for a year, he’s a theology-school dropout. Then there’s his role in calling for the 1999 release of convicted rapist Wayne Dumond, who was strongly defended by Baptist minister Jay Cole, a close friend of the Huckabee family. Some conservative activists apparently defended Dumond on the grounds that one of his rape victims was a distant cousin of Bill Clinton and the daughter of a major Clinton campaign contributor. Several victims wrote letters to Huckabee describing Dumond’s brutality, but Huckabee was quoted in a column by Steve Dunleavy titled “Clinton’s Biggest Crime–Left Innocent Man in Jail for 14 Years” saying that “There is grave doubt to the circumstances of this reported crime.” But as we know today, Dumond was guilty–he was released from prison in September 1999, apparently with some help from Huckabee, and he raped and murdered two women. Huckabee has refused to release his administration’s records pertaining to Dumond on grounds that they contain sensitive law enforcement information. In 1992, Huckabee called for AIDS victims to be quarantined, and refused to retract that position just recently, despite the fact that the disease is not spread through casual contact (which was also well known in 1992). On top of all of this, Huckabee appears to be genuinely dumb. While governor of Arkansas, Canadian comedian Rick Mercer fooled Huckabee into congratulating Canadians on preserving their capitol building, the national igloo. He is a proud disbeliever in evolution and has publicly supported creationism, though now he refuses to answer questions about it. He thinks that women’s role in marriage should be to “submit herself graciously to the servant leadership of her husband”. And in the December 11 Republican debate, Huckabee pledged to repeal the laws of thermodynamics, stating that “We ought to declare that we will be free of energy consumption in this country within a decade, bold as that is." Intrade currently puts Huckabee’s chances of obtaining the Republican presidential nomination at 16.8%, third behind Giuliani (36.0%) and Romney (22.0%) and ahead of McCain (8.8%) and Paul (8.5%). But it also puts him at the leading candidate for getting the Republican vice presidential nomination, at 28.9%, well ahead of Pawlenty (10.1%), Romney (8.6%), Thompson (7.6%), and Gingrich (6.5%). UPDATE (December 25, 2007): Mike Huckabee’s tied to Christian reconstructionists and thinks that the Ten Commandments are the basis of U.S. law (even though seven of the ten would be unconstitutional). ...
Our Fred is a contestant in the National Pet Idol contest. He needs your help to win! Each vote is only $1 and all proceeds go to AZ Rescue . The first round of voting starts today, October 24th through October 31st. Click here to vote for Fred! Thanks!!!
As we set off to take our dogs for a walk down the Highline Canal this morning, we ran into this hound dog coming towards us in the opposite direction. He has a collar, but no tags. He’s friendly and well-fed, and (surprisingly for this neighborhood) a neutered male. We’ve put him in our front yard and given him water, and put his photo up on Pets911.com. With any luck, his owners are somewhere nearby. (If they’re close enough, they should be hearing his distinctive hound bark…) UPDATE (1:30 p.m.): His owner put a “lost dog” ad on azcentral.com that we just found, and came and got him. He normally has tags, but they came off when he got out about a week ago. ...
I’d like to know what happened after this clip ends. Bambi-Scruffy - The funniest videos clips are here
When Kat got home from work and let the dogs out, she heard an additional dog barking in the backyard. It turned out to be this puppy, perhaps two months old, which somehow got into our fenced yard. Einzige (2007-10-16): That's odd! Do you suppose that whoever left it had some idea that you were associated with RESCUE?Is the puppy healthy, at least?He's definitely cute. ...
Maricopa County Animal Care and Control and the Arizona Humane Society regularly euthanize animals, not just because they are terminally ill, critically injured beyond the possibility of saving, or displaying uncorrectable aggressive behavior, but to make space for more owner turn-ins. (Another group which regularly engages in euthanasia of healthy animals is People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, a group which is very good at getting free publicity, raising funds, and polarizing opinions, but not particularly good at directly improving the welfare of actual animals. On occasion they indirectly improve the welfare of animals when they successfully stop cases of severe abuse.) Tuesday’s San Francisco Chronicle reports on the content of Nathan Winograd’s Redemption: The Myth of Overpopulation and the No Kill Revolution in America, a book which claims that there isn’t a dog and cat overpopulation problem or lack of demand for them as pets, but that most animal control and animal shelter operations are simply not taking the most effective steps to care for their animals. Winograd’s book and his organization, the No Kill Advocacy Center, argues that by using effective volunteer animal fostering programs and behavior rehabilitation programs, and partnering with local animal rescue groups, there should be no need to euthanize any healthy, adoptable animals. He’s not just talking about it, he’s successfully done it as director of operations for the San Francisco SPCA and for a rural animal shelter in upstate New York. The No Kill Advocacy Center promotes the “No Kill Equation," a set of ten programs that it identifies as mandatory for any animal control or shelter operation to reduce euthanasia to a minimum: ...
Arizona RESCUE has gone through a website redesign, and the new design now features photos of our dog Otto and our former foster dog Ollie. The front page cycles through photos of rescued dogs and cats at the top right; Otto is the black and white dog with the ball in his mouth and Ollie is the bassett hound. Both can be seen simultaneously on any of the other web pages, such as the “About RESCUE” page, where Otto’s second from the left and Ollie is third from the right. Kat previously blogged about Ollie almost a year ago. Also check out RESCUE’s donation page…
Bully is about 4 years old, approximately 40-45 pounds. For most of his life, Bully and his caretaker have been homeless. Bully currently is kept outside, behind the store where his caretaker works. He has little shade or other comforts, and does not get the love and attention he deserves. I keep tabs on him and his ‘owner,’ but I’d like to find Bully a better home if possible. We tried to adopt him about 1 ½ years ago, but after two perfect months in our house, he began to attack one of our dogs. Neither dog was ever injured, but we could not trust Bully around our dogs. Other than that, he is a great dog. He loves attention and belly rubs, will come when called, won’t chew inappropriately, and never had an accident in the house. Despite his rather tough life, Bully always has a smile on his face and is happy to see you. Bully is: affectionate, lap dog, house broken, neutered, eager to please, unknown behavior with children, extremely intelligent, unpredictable aggression towards other dogs. In his ideal home he would be the only pet. As I have never seen him around children, I’d only want him to go to a home where any children are 16 or older. A prospective adopter home inspection is required. No adopters farther than 300-400 miles outside of Phoenix will be considered, as I will be unable to travel to inspect your home on Bully’s behalf.