Rush Is Wrong: Americans Lambast Limbaugh for Endorsing Animal Rights Group

FUR COMMISSION USA COMMENTARY, MAY 6, 2009

(Also available in PDF. Revised May 11, 2009)

Rush Is Wrong: Americans Lambast Limbaugh for Endorsing Animal Rights Group

By Simon Ward, Communications Director, FCUSA

America’s hunters in particular, and animal owners and caretakers in general, tend towards conservatism in their politics and lifestyles. They prefer meat with their potatoes, their dogs and cats are not fed vegan diets, and while they endorse animal welfare, they give little or no credence to the notion of animal “liberation”.

Now many are outraged that conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh has endorsed an animal rights group working for a world without hunters and fishermen, without cowboys, without pets, and without any other utilitarian use of animals.

On Apr. 14, two public-service announcements (PSAs) featuring Limbaugh began airing on the radio, one expressing support for the Humane Society of the United States’ war against organized dogfighting, and the other urging people of faith to stamp out animal cruelty by being “good stewards of God’s creatures.” Good goals. Wrong group.

Americans now flooding Rush’s mail box with complaints already oppose dogfighting and animal cruelty. All civilized people do. But they are also vehement opponents of HSUS, and believe Rush was hoodwinked into supporting a group with a larger agenda that would be abhorrent to him – if only he knew it.

More than that, they fear that as a public figure respected and trusted by millions of listeners, Rush’s endorsement of HSUS gives the group credibility it does not deserve.

“Stop helping HSUS”

Particularly vocal have been hunters who have long counted on Rush’s support for their Constitutional right to bear arms. In a letter from 28 groups representing millions of hunters, trappers, anglers and outdoors enthusiasts, Limbaugh was pleaded with to stop “helping [HSUS] to mainstream their image in the minds of reasonable people.”

“Despite a few programs designed to attract support from the general public, HSUS is in fact an organization that opposes hunting, fishing, and trapping,” the letter stated. “Its leadership has a long and established history of promoting legislation, litigation, and referenda to restrict the rights of American sportsmen and women.” Among the groups signing on to the letter were Ducks Unlimited and the US Sportsmen’s Alliance.

“The Humane Society of the United States is public enemy number one for sportsmen,” said Greg Lawson, a spokesman for the US Sportsmen’s Alliance, in a separate letter. “We believe firmly that they’re against all forms of hunting. We actually battle them in state after state, and they back all types of different legislation, ballot issues, that seek to restrict the rights of hunters.

“The concern we have with what Rush did is not so much the actual content of the new public-service announcements. … It’s the very fact that he recorded anything for that group because of their agenda against the sportsmen community.”

Scott Sutherland, director of governmental affairs for Ducks Unlimited, echoed the sentiment. “Supporting HSUS implies an endorsement of an anti-sportsman agenda.”

Rush’s “implied endorsements” of HSUS are “a real coup for their cause,” he wrote.

“With America’s most prominent conservative spokesman on board, they have the opportunity to make inroads into a new cross section of our country. You are helping them to mainstream their image in the minds of reasonable people. Your collaboration furthers the anti-hunting and anti-fishing agenda of HSUS, which will undermine the great success of conservation and threatens the economies of small towns and rural states across our nation.”

Pacelle to the rescue

Anticipating the passions that would be stirred by Rush coming aboard, HSUS’s announced the PSAs by denying it was stirring up a political hornets’ nest.

“The animal protection movement should never confine itself to the Left or the Right in American politics. Opposition to cruelty and the embrace of the human-animal bond are universal values, and people of every background and point of view should find common purpose with the work and programs of The Humane Society of the United States and its affiliates. The animals need skilled advocates, and the cause deserves the widest audience. There are no political litmus tests when you sign up with us to help advance the cause.”

But the act of denial was an admission of guilt; HSUS knew exactly what it was doing. Within days of the PSAs airing, HSUS president Wayne Pacelle was in the media spotlight, feigning bemusement as he fought to defend the animals and his new champion.

“I’m embarrassed for them that they would criticize Rush for amplifying our message that dogfighting and other malicious forms of animal cruelty are unacceptable in society,” he told the Washington Times. “I think the folks that are criticizing it are unbelievably knee-jerk – I guess they want to provide comfort to dogfighters? It just doesn’t make any sense. … There are certain things that civil society should agree on.”

To others, it made perfect sense.

Campaign of Confusion

“It’s not a case of ‘you’re either with us or against us’,” said Teresa Platt, executive director of Fur Commission USA. “Just because someone opposes dogfighting doesn’t automatically mean he or she must support HSUS. That would be knee jerk.

“People are not criticizing the message. They’re criticizing HSUS’s exploitation of Rush, and the apparent ease with which he’s allowed himself to be exploited. It’s a transparent attempt to confuse the public into thinking HSUS shares all the same goals they do. In reality, many of HSUS’s policies on animal use are opposed by veterinarians and wildlife managers, cause hardship to humans, and often cause great suffering to animals.”(1)

Pacelle also tried to further his campaign of confusion through the Washington Times, reportedly stating that “his group absolutely does not oppose all hunting”. It would have been more truthful to say that HSUS absolutely opposes almost all hunting. The only kind of hunting it does not actively oppose is small-scale subsistence hunting, such as the catching of seals by the Inuit of the High North, provided they don’t engage in commerce. Needless to say, the Inuit don’t appreciate this gesture of “support”.

The historical record certainly makes the line, “absolutely does not oppose all hunting”, hard to swallow:

“If we could shut down all sport hunting in a moment, we would,” Pacelle was quoted as saying in “Impassioned Agitator,” Associated Press, Dec. 30, 1991.

“Our goal is to get sport hunting in the same category as cock fighting and dog fighting. Our opponents say that hunting is a tradition. We say traditions can change,” he told the Bozeman Daily Chronicle, Oct. 8, 1991.

“Only 7% of Americans are hunters,” he informed Full Cry Magazine, Oct. 1, 1990. “That means there are more of us than there are of them. It is simply a matter of democracy. The majority rules in a democracy. We are going to use the ballot box and the democratic process to stop all hunting in the United States. … We will take it species by species until all hunting is stopped in California. Then we will take it state by state.”

As recently as Apr. 21 this year, Rebecca Aldworth, director of HSUS’s affiliate, Humane Society International – Canada, told a press conference:

“… we are opposed to commercial trade in wildlife products because commercial trade in wildlife products leads to extreme cruelty, industrial scale slaughters that often compromise the populations of the animals.”

Opposing trade in wildlife products, of course, is just another way of opposing hunting, since the first cannot take place without the second. A “no take” policy for wildlife would also shut down every commercial fishery in the land.

Animal ag abolition

Meanwhile, other animal groups are joining the outcry of consternation.

Livestock producers, for example, know full well how confusing HSUS’s message can be to the layperson, and what it really means. With one hand, it campaigns to ban traditional livestock practices, or have them replaced with prohibitively expensive “free range” ones. And with the other hand, it campaigns to ban the ultimate in “free range”, the taking of meat from the wild. It takes little imagination to see the ultimate goal here.

“Understandably, the name – Humane Society of the United States – sounds like a respectable organization,” wrote Dr. Elizabeth Walker of the agriculture department at Missouri State University to Limbaugh, “but in fact, they are a misleading group and animal rights activists that just happen to dress well and try to avoid dressing in suits of lettuce like their ideological friends at PETA. In fact though, both groups have similar agendas – the abolition of American livestock production agriculture.”

“Mr. Limbaugh as a life long fan of you and your ideals I wish to inform you that I believe you have been mislead into believing the Humane Society of the United States is a worthy organization,” wrote Trent Loos, a sixth-generation farmer and radio commentator in Loup City, Nebraska. “They have two missions: to abolish animal agriculture and end hunting in the United States. In fact Wayne Pacelle has openly admitted they want to be the ‘NRA’ of animal rights.”

Both of these statements are true, but they are also understatements. Abolishing animal agriculture and hunting are still only stepping stones towards establishing a vegan society with no human use of animals whatsoever.

That’s right. Even pet-owners who sometimes coddle their animals more than they coddle humans are in HSUS’s cross-hairs. And that’s a lot of people: a recent survey found 39% of US households own at least one dog, and 34% own at least one cat.(2)

Yet when he was asked once whether he envisioned a future without pets, Pacelle responded, “If I had my personal view, perhaps that might take hold. In fact, I don’t want to see another dog or cat born.”(3)

Limbaugh: “Who?”

The ball is now in Rush’s court. He can stand by the public service spots, and face the music from his loyal fan base. Or he can retract his support of HSUS.

Or there’s a third option which he currently seems to favor: close his eyes and ears and hope it all goes away.

Reported the Washington Times:

Mr. Limbaugh did not answer requests for comment and has had little to say about his tacit endorsement of the HSUS. In an interview by Greta Van Susteren on Fox News last week, he was asked by the host, “Who do you admire and why?” As Mr. Limbaugh paused, citing “brain freeze,” this exchange occurred:

“You like the Humane Society,” Mrs. Van Susteren said.

“Who?” Mr. Limbaugh asked.

“The Humane Society.”

Laughing, the radio host, who spends three hours a day talking politics, said, “Well, now, you’re getting into politics,” and quickly moved off the topic.

NOTES:

(1) The latest example of an HSUS brainchild that is harmful to animals is California’s Proposition 2 concerning the confinement of veal calves, egg-laying hens and pregnant pigs. Following its passage in late 2008, America’s leading animal welfare organization, the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA), issued a statement condemning it as inhumane, saying it “contains livestock confinement standards that may hurt the animals they are intended to help” and “ignores critical aspects of animal welfare that ultimately would threaten the well-being of the very animals it strives to protect.” For a specific comparison of the health of conventionally caged chickens vs cage-free chickens, see “More scrambled claims from animal activists,” Center for Consumer Freedom, May 5, 2009.

(2) Source: The American Pet Products Manufacturers Association 2005-06 National Pet Owners Survey.

(3) Quoted in Bloodties: Nature, Culture and the Hunt, by Ted Kerasote, p266, 1993.

See also:

FCUSA Press Kit special feature: H$U$ Resource Center.

H$U$ watch: Fund-raising on “factory farming”, siphoning cash away from real animal issues. FCUSA commentary, May 4, 2009.

In their own words: Revealing quotes from the mouths of HSUS.