Cass Sunstein- As Radical as they Come

On September 10th, while the Nation focuses on the health care debate, Cass Sunstein was confirmed as the Administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. If you think this Radical (with a capital R) was confirmed narrowly by a Democrat majority- look again- only 6 Republicans voted against him!

What is so Radical about Sunstein?
1. He has written a book advocating Animal Rights in which he suggests that animals should be allowed to sue human beings in courts of law.
2. He believes we should all be vegetarians
3. He believes hunting should be banned

He represents a segment of society who feels that Americans should be regulated more! People like him should NOT be in government.

The American Conservative Union started a website Stop Sunstein - looks like it didn't help.

Act Now: Ask your Senator to stop Sunstein's nomination for Regulatory Czar

Radical Animal Rights Attorney Cleared
To Become Obama’s Regulatory Czar

Dog Owners, Hunters, Farmers Urged To Ask
Their Senators To Stop Sunstein Nomination

by JOHN YATES
American Sporting Dog Alliance
http://www.americansportingdogalliance.org
asda@csonline.net


WASHINGTON (July 21, 2009) – Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) has lifted his “hold” blocking the nomination of Harvard Law School scholar and animal rights legal strategist Cass Sunstein for the post of regulatory czar in the Administration of his close personal friend, President Barack Obama.

Sen. Chambliss had blocked the nomination based on concerns of farm groups because of Sunstein’s strong animal rights beliefs, including support of stringent regulation of people who raise animals and a ban on hunting. Last week, however, Chambliss met with Sunstein and announced on the Senate floor that he had lifted the hold on the nomination. The Senator added that the way is now clear for the U.S. Senate to confirm Sunstein before its August recess.

The American Sporting Dog Alliance is urging all dog owners, hunters, firearms rights advocates, farmers and civil libertarians to take immediate action by urging the U.S. Senate to reject the Sunstein nomination to head the powerful Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) in the White House. Taking action now is of the utmost urgency.
Sunstein has the strong support of the Humane Society of the United States, which is the political arm of the radical animal rights movement, according to a July 15 statement by HSUS Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Michael Markarian in The Huffington Post. Referring to the regulations to implement the federal Animal Welfare Act, and new rules about animal fighting and importing dogs, Markarian wrote: “These kinds of legal changes are precisely why Americans need a regulatory czar like Cass Sunstein in charge of OIRA -- to make sure the federal agencies properly implement regulations to enforce these new laws.”
The Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) “reviews and alters regulations created by federal agencies,” according to Congress Daily.

Sunstein, who has published 15 books, would have broad powers to review, recommend changes and possibly engineer changes in all federal regulations, including those about dog ownership, farming, hunting on federal lands, and enforcement of gun control laws.

In his published writings and speeches, Sunstein has advocated:

· Giving animal rights groups the power to file lawsuits on the behalf of animals against their owners.

· Very strict regulations about animal ownership, farming and hunting.

· The elimination of hunting.

· The elimination of the individual right to keep and bear arms.

· Moving toward a vegan vegetarian society.

· Rewriting the Constitution and Bill of Rights.

· And restrictions on free speech.

Each of those assertions will be documented later in this report by direct quotations from Sunstein’s published books and speeches.

The American Sporting Dog Alliance believes Sunstein would have a severely negative impact on dog owners, farmers, hunters, gun owners and civil libertarians – Indeed, to all Americans!

This is underscored by Sunstein’s status as a close personal friend and advisor to President Obama since they met in 1992, when Sunstein taught law at the University of Chicago. This will give Sunstein unprecedented influence and access to the President.

It is further underscored by numerous mainstream reports that Sunstein is slated to be President Obama’s next nominee to fill a vacancy on the Supreme Court. This adds to the urgency of convincing the Senate that Sunstein’s beliefs are un-American and in direct contradiction to the basic principles outlined in the Constitution and Bill of Rights.

Although Sunstein’s nomination had been blocked by Sen. Chambliss until last week, Government Executive reported that he actually has been working at the job in the White House on a daily basis.
Sunstein’s potential use of power – and potential abuse of power – has been increased because President Obama redefined the role of OIRA shortly after taking office. The Wall Street Journal reported July 6: “In a significant, but little noticed, memo written 10 days after taking office, Mr. Obama ordered up a rewrite of how OIRA goes about its work, the first such revision since 1993. ‘Far more is now known about regulation -- not only when it is justified, but also what works and what does not,’ the president wrote. A regulatory review would make use of new tools and would ‘clarify the role of the behavioral sciences in formulating regulatory policy.’ "
The Wall Street Journal called the OIRA “obscure but powerful.”
The American Sporting Dog Alliance believes that Sunstein will use this position to influence President Obama’s directives to all federal agencies on how to write, interpret and enforce all federal regulations. This includes regulations about agriculture, raising animals, hunting on public lands, and gun law enforcement and procedures. This is a dangerous power to be held by someone of Sunstein’s clearly radical and unconstitutional beliefs.
Thus, we are urging every American to immediately contact both of his or her U.S, senators, and as many other senators as possible, to urge them to vote against the Sunstein nomination.
This link will provide a search engine to locate each state’s senators, and an alphabetical list of the senators to link to contact information: http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm. Each state has two U.S. Senators who represent all of the citizens of that state.
We recommend at least two forms of contact: Send an email as a first step, plus also send a letter or fax, and/or make a phone call. Please do this immediately, as a Senate confirmation vote could come at any moment.
In addition, please send this report to all of your friends and contacts and ask them to help, and post it on any message boards that you use. Also, please write a letter to the editor of your local newspaper and any other papers you read.
Here are some direct quotes from Sunstein to illustrate our concern:
1. "We ought to ban hunting"
- Cass Sunstein, in a 2007 speech at Harvard University

2. “We should focus attention not only on the enforcement gap, but on the areas where current law offers little or no protection. In short, the law should impose further regulation on hunting, scientific experiments, entertainment, and (above all) farming to ensure against unnecessary animal suffering. It is easy to imagine a set of initiatives that would do a great deal here, and indeed European nations have moved in just this direction. There are many possibilities.”
--Cass R. Sunstein, “The Rights of Animals: A Very Short Primer,” John M. Olin
Law & Economics Working Paper No. 157, The Law School, The University of
Chicago

3. “…(R)epresentatives of animals should be able to bring private suits to ensure that
anticruelty and related laws are actually enforced. If, for example, a farm is treating
horses cruelly and in violation of legal requirements, a suit could be brought, on behalf of those animals, to bring about compliance with the law.”
--Cass R. Sunstein, “The Rights of Animals: A Very Short Primer,” John M. Olin
Law & Economics Working Paper No. 157, The Law School, The University of Chicago

4. “But if, as a practical matter, animals used for food are almost inevitably going to endure terrible suffering, then there is a good argument that people should not eat meat to the extent that a refusal to eat meat will reduce that suffering. Of course a legal ban on meat-eating would be extremely radical, and like prohibition, it would undoubtedly create black markets and have a set of bad, and huge, side-effects. But the principle seems clear: People should be much less inclined to eat meat if their refusal to do so would prevent significant suffering.”
--Cass R. Sunstein, “The Rights of Animals: A Very Short Primer,” John M. Olin
Law & Economics Working Paper No. 157, The Law School, The University of
Chicago

5. “Less modestly, anticruelty laws should be extended to areas that are now exempt from
them, including scientific experiments and farming. There is no good reason to permit the
level of suffering that is now being experienced by millions, even billions of living
creatures.”
--Cass R. Sunstein, “The Rights of Animals: A Very Short Primer,” John M. Olin
Law & Economics Working Paper No. 157, The Law School, The University of
Chicago

6. “Everything depends on whether and to what extent the animal in question is capable of suffering. If rats are able to suffer, then their interests are relevant to the question of how, and perhaps even whether, they can be expelled from houses.”
--Cass R. Sunstein, Martha C. Nussbaum. Animal Rights: Current Debates and
New Directions. (Oxford University Press, USA, 2004). P. 12

7. “A system of limitless individual choices, with respect to communications, is not
necessarily in the interest of citizenship and self-government.”
--Cass Sunstein, arguing for a Fairness Doctrine for the Internet in his book,
Republic.com 2.0 (Princeton University Press, 2007), p.137

8. “In what sense is the money in our pockets and bank accounts fully ‘ours’? Did we earn it by our own autonomous efforts? Could we have inherited it without the assistance of probate courts? Do we save it without the support of bank regulators? Could we spend it if there were no public officials to coordinate the efforts and pool the resources of the
community in which we live?... Without taxes there would be no liberty. Without taxes
there would be no property. Without taxes, few of us would have any assets worth
defending. [It is] a dim fiction that some people enjoy and exercise their rights without
placing any burden whatsoever on the public … There is no liberty without dependency. That is why we should celebrate tax day …”
-- Cass R. Sunstein, “Why We Should Celebrate Paying Taxes,” The Chicago
Tribune, April 14, 1999

9. “Much of the time, the United States seems to have embraced a confused and pernicious form of individualism. This approach endorses rights of private property and freedom of contract, and respects political liberty, but claims to distrust ‘government intervention’ and insists that people must fend for themselves. This form of so-called individualism is incoherent, a tangle of confusions.”
-- Cass R. Sunstein, The Second Bill of Rights: FDR’s Unfinished Revolution and
Why We Need it More Than Ever, Basic Books, New York, 2004, p. 3

10. “[A]lmost all gun control legislation is constitutionally fine. And if the Court is right,
then fundamentalism does not justify the view that the Second Amendment protects an
individual right to bear arms.”
- Cass Sunstein, writing in his book, “Radicals in Robes”

11. “…[T]he Second Amendment seems to specify its own purpose, which is to protect the"well regulated Militia." If that is the purpose of the Second Amendment (as Burger
believed), then we might speculate that it safeguards not individual rights but federalism.”
-- Cass R. Sunstein, “The Most Mysterious Right,” National Review, November
12, 2007

12. In his 2004 book The Second Bill of Rights: FDR’s Unfinished Revolution and Why We Need It More than Ever, Sunstein claims that “citizens’ rights exist only to the extent that they are granted by the government.”
Those views are why the American Sporting Dog Alliance adamantly opposes the Sunstein nomination. His track record is frighteningly consistent.
Thank you for helping.
The American Sporting Dog Alliance represents owners, breeders and professionals who work with breeds of dogs that are used for hunting. We also welcome people who work with other breeds, as legislative issues affect all of us. We are a grassroots movement working to protect the rights of dog owners, and to assure that the traditional relationships between dogs and humans maintains its rightful place in American society and life. The American Sporting Dog Alliance also needs your help so that we can continue to work to protect the rights of dog owners. Your membership, participation and support are truly essential to the success of our mission. We are funded solely by your donations in order to maintain strict independence.
Please visit us on the web at http://www.americansportingdogalliance.org . Our email is asda@csonline.net .

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Obama Never Promised his dog would be from a shelter

President Obama never "promised" to get a rescued dog. He stated that he MIGHT get a mixed-breed and that he would PREFER it came from the shelter. As usual, the Human Society of the United States (HSUS) and other animal rights groups started putting pressure on the President and his family to make a COMMITMENT to this end.

In typical fashion these groups were attempting to MANIPULATE the president and even seek to REDUCE the First Families Choice for a family pet. Kudos to you President Obama for doing what was best for your family and not bending to extremest. Now we ask of you- don't let these extremest take away the same choices of the American public.

One campaign promise the President DID make was to end the strangle-hold Lobbyist have on Lawmakers. Lets hold his feet to the fire to up hold this campaign PROMISE.

The Obama family dog saga

Opinion (in the LA Times)
The Obama family dog saga
Why has it taken so long? Because the type of dog they want doesn't often turn up at the local shelter.
By Judith Lewis
March 15, 2009
In the first two months of his administration, President Obama signed an economic stimulus package into law, lifted restrictions on foreign family-planning clinics and drew up a plan for pulling troops out of Iraq.

But he has left one early promise unfulfilled: He has not yet acquired a family dog.

Late last month, the Obamas seemed closer to their goal when Michelle Obama told People magazine that, after studying which breeds were least likely to trigger daughter Malia's allergies, the family had settled on a Portuguese water dog. But the statement was almost immediately modified: The first lady had spoken too soon. The quest for a White House canine continues.

So what's the problem? Why has a task as simple as getting a dog eluded the Obamas for so long? Perhaps the answer can be divined in Michelle Obama's interview: She said she wanted not just any Portuguese water dog but a rescued one. An adult with a good temperament. Perhaps even house-trained.

Certainly that should satisfy the activists agitating for the Obamas to adopt a stray. The rescue-only crowd insists that every dog purchased from a breeder is a death sentence for a stray. They make no distinction between responsible breeders who nurture sound-tempered dogs and puppy-mill operators who crowd breeding bitches so tightly into cages that they chew off each other's legs.


Rescuing a dog is indeed a noble gesture, even if there will never be enough humans to save every abandoned dog. But for the health of their daughter, the Obamas want a purebred dog. And last time I checked, Portuguese water dogs weren't turning up at the pound with any regularity.

Most of the purebred dogs that end up in shelters come by way of reckless backyard breeders or puppy mills, where dogs are routinely inbred, bred so narrowly for looks that they can't breathe properly, or bred with no thought for their health at all. Responsible breeders track their puppies assiduously and take them back if they don't work out. They don't put their dogs up for rescue, they "re-home" them.

If the Obamas find a Portuguese water dog in need of re-homing, good for them -- no doubt it will be theirs for the asking. But that dog won't qualify as a rescue. And it shouldn't have to.

For the record, I rescue dogs. I rescue, in fact, the kinds of dogs that end up in shelters in droves: Yippie, wild-eyed terriers and the much-maligned American Staffordshire (pit) bull terriers. I take them in, train them and keep them with me for longer than a decade; I work through their tendencies to bolt or their fears of men in baseball caps until they accept the compromises of life with humans. I am well set up for the task: My tolerant, dog-loving husband and I have no children; I love dogs that would drive sane women mad; and I have the tenacity to work with them.

But I also love purebred dogs and the whole notion that we humans have bred dogs for certain tasks. I love Newfoundlands that save drowning children, border collies that live to herd, brave terriers driven to hunt rats. And I despair that we may be heading into a world in which breeding dogs to do what dogs do -- work with, and beside, and indeed even for, human beings -- is considered, by some crooked measure, cruelty to animals.

There is something far worse than a family acquiring a dog from a conscientious breeder, and that's a family rescuing a dog that turns out to be fundamentally unstable or just plain unsuited to life with a family.

Childhood dogs shape attitudes toward animals for life; they can make kids lifelong advocates for animal welfare or create in them an ineluctable fear. A family that adopts a dog that incorrigibly nips children's hands, eats expensive furniture or lunges at other animals might at best end up investing in an expensive trainer. At worst, the dog ends up back in the shelter or on the street, leaving a family forever wary of canines.

In January, one month after the death of a beloved pit bull I rescued from the pound 13 years ago, I took in a 5-month old American Staffordshire named Tabitha. She is, from what we can tell, sane and hearty, a natural retriever, psychologically stable enough that neither ear-pulling nor toe-fondling nor the taunts of her Cairn terrier housemate, Thomas, faze her.

But Tabitha is still a puppy, and having lived with dogs -- seven in total -- nearly all my life, I know that puppies harbor secrets in their DNA. What we know about Tabitha is all good, but we could scribble it on a sheet of notebook paper. What we don't know could fill volumes.

We don't, for instance, know what her parents were like. We don't know if she harbors the gene for a debilitating neurological condition called ataxia that is common in her breed. Will she continue to put up with our ambushing cats? With the squeals of our friends' children? We think so, and we will work with her no matter what. If we had children to worry about, however, it might be different.

Symbolically, it would be nice if the Obamas could rescue a dog. But to insist that the only good dog is a rescued dog is to relegate our future with the canine species to random relationships in which humans are forced to settle for whatever renegade breeders produce and fail to care for.

And let it be said that the reason there exists such a thing as a Portuguese water dog at all, or any dog with a hypoallergenic coat and a game temperament, is not a happy accident but a triumph of the selective breeding humans have been practicing with canines for millenniums -- the very practice so many people who claim to care about dogs would prefer to see turned into a crime.

Judith Lewis is an environmental journalist and contributing editor to High Country News.

Lobbying and the Influence Peddling in Washington

This morning on National Public Radio, Renee Montagne spoke with Bob Kaiser, the author of the book So Damn Much Money: The Triumph of Lobbying and the Corrosion of American Government. During this interview, Kaiser stated that at times it is the special interst groups that are the ones actually writing the legislation.
We have experience that ourselves - examples include
* the Mass. debarking Act that is currently being proposed
* HSUS's agenda for the Obama Administration
* And direct responses from the special interest group- after you have contacted an elected offical.
These are just three recent examples.
It is important to understand how our government is currently working if we are to make a difference.

HSUS Maps Agenda For President Obama

HSUS Maps Agenda For President
Asks President And Congress To Federally Regulate
Dog Hobbyists, Name Animal Rights Legal Advocates

by JOHN YATES
American Sporting Dog Alliance

This article is archived

WASHINGTON ­ The Humane Society of the United
States is asking President Barack Obama and
Congress to require everyone who raises dogs and
cats to be regulated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, documents show.

HSUS also is asking for the creation of an animal
protection division within the U.S. Department of
Justice that is “similar to the Civil Rights
Division, to ensure strong enforcement of federal
animal protection laws,” thus granting animals
rights similar to humans. HSUS also calls for a
new position of animal protection liaison in the White House.

A fourth provision calls for a ban on hunting on new public lands.

Those are only three of the 100 recommendations
that HSUS has sent to Obama in what is called a
“change agenda for animals.” The American
Sporting Dog Alliance has obtained access to this
document, which has been sent to animal
protection organizations asking for their support.

HSUS is a radical animal rights group. Despite
its name, it does not operate a single animal
shelter, but exists only as a political
organization. The long-range goal of HSUS is to
gradually eliminate all animal ownership and use,
including their use as companion and food animals, and to ban hunting.

The 100 goals sent to Obama reflect many issues,
but this report will concentrate on the issues
that most directly affect dog owners, with added
emphasis on the sporting breeds.

However, we urge our readers to read the full
HSUS document, which includes a crackdown on
alleged farm pollution, tough animal and poultry
husbandry and slaughter rules, and many
environmental and wildlife management measure.
Here is a link the actual document:
http://www.hsus. org/web-files/ PDF/change- agenda-for- animals-1- 14-09.pdf.
Please read this document.

In a letter to a New York horse owners’
association that was made available to the
American Sporting Dog Alliance, HSUS President
Wayne Pacelle asks for support of the 100-point agenda.

“With the changing of the guard at the White
House comes the prospect of new possibilities for
moving our goals forward, and to mark this latest
transfer of power, the HSUS and the Humane
Society Legislative Fund (HSLF) are advancing a
100-point ‘Change Agenda for Animals,’” Pacelle
wrote. “ Never before has the animal protection
movement so carefully articulated a vast array of
critical animal protection reforms in the domains
of so many federal agencies—Agriculture ,
Interior, Commerce, Defense, Health and Human Services, State, and others.”

Dog Breeding Regulation

A top priority of HSUS for several years has been
to require federal regulation of everyone who
raises dogs and cats. Under current law, only
commercial breeders who sell puppies and kittens
on a wholesale basis are federally regulated.
Hobby breeders who sell puppies or kittens
directly to the public are not required to be federally licensed or inspected.

HSUS wants everyone who raises and sells puppies
to be licensed and inspected by the USDA, and
also wants to see much tougher regulations and standards for animal care.

About four years ago, the HSUS-sanctioned Pet
Animal Welfare Act (PAWS) was defeated in
Congress by a narrow margin. PAWS would have
imposed federal licensing and inspection on all hobby breeders.

Last year, U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, who
has very close personal and political ties to
President Obama, introduced a bill he called PAWS
2, which echoed many of the provisions of its
predecessor. When PAWS 2 stalled, Sen. Durbin
attempted to attach it as an amendment to the
2008 Farm Bill, but failed to get enough support.
Durbin came back with a similar bill in late
2008, dubbed “PUPS” or “Baby’s Bill,” which is
formally called the Puppy Uniform Protection Act,
but Congress adjourned without taking action.

These bills all originated from HSUS, and all of
them clearly were aimed at hobby breeders.

The 100-point agenda says HSUS wants to “require
all dog and cat breeders to comply with AWA
(federal Animal Welfare Act) requirements,
including those who sell directly to the public….”

It is PAWS all over again.

Now, however, HSUS has a much stronger hand in
Washington. In the November election, HSUS
strongly endorsed President Obama and had a
95-percent success rate in re-electing the
congressional candidates it endorsed. A
questionnaire obtained by the American Sporting
Dog Alliance showed that the President aggressively sought HSUS endorsement.

The American Sporting Dog Alliance continues to
believe that President Obama and many members of
Congress will listen to the concerns of dog
owners, but only if we stand up in large numbers
to defend ourselves and our rights, and take an
active role in the political process.

If we do not stand up and be counted in large
numbers, we expect HSUS will get its way on most
of the measures in the 100-point agenda. Dog
owners will have no one to blame but themselves
for being relegated to the legal status of
second-class citizens. The Bill of Rights and
personal freedom always are the first victims of HSUS policy.

The American Sporting Dog Alliance will be
working hard to defeat these HSUS legislative
proposals, but we need your help if we are to
succeed in turning back these challenges. We urge
all dog owners to join and support the
organization of their choice, and also to support
farmers, hunters and other allies in the fight
against the HSUS version of a “brave new world.”

The Rest Of The Story

Here are some other parts of the 100-point agenda
that pertain to dog owners in general, and also
owners of the sporting breeds in particular. HSUS
is calling on President Obama and Congress to:

Create an animal protection division in the
Justice Department to act on behalf of animals by
aggressive prosecution of people who violate laws
about animals. In essence, this gives animals
legal status, and the federal government will act
as their advocate. HSUS likened it to the Civil
Rights Division, which advocates for aggressive
protection of human rights. Animals thus would be
given the same legal status as people in the Department of Justice.

Create an animal protection liaison in the White
House, which would mean that HSUS will have
direct access to President Obama and his top
advisors to advocate for animal rights groups on
policy, regulatory and legislative issues.

Immediately strengthen enforcement of
USDA-regulated commercial kennels and other
animal owners covered by the Animal Welfare Act.
(AWA). Increase USDA budget and staffing for this
purpose, and make fines and penalties more
severe. Include all vertebrate species under the AWA.

Completely implement the ban on importing dogs
from other countries that HSUS succeeded in attaching to the 2008 Farm Bill.

Focus on non-lethal methods to control wildlife
populations, which means lessening the use of hunting as a management tool.

Mandate the use of microchips for companion
animals, and all other animals covered by the AWA.

Do not open any new public land or national wildlife refuges to hunting.

Transfer all wildlife programs away from the
USDA, and put them under the jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior.

Ban hunting on shooting preserves, which HSUS
labels “canned hunts” and calls “cruel.” Also ban so-called Internet hunting.

Make it a crime to show anything that HSUS calls
animal cruelty in films, on television, in books
and magazine, or on the Internet. Require the
Department of Justice to collect and analyze data
on animal cruelty cases and create a separate
crime database for this information.

Require the U.S. Census Bureau and the Center for
Disease Control to include questions about the
animals people own when surveying the public, in
order “to assess impacts on human health and
well-being, develop more effective approaches to
community animal control, and ensure appropriate disaster preparation.”

Allow foreign animal rights groups to have an
official advisory role in the United States.

Ban the mail shipment of any kind of birds or
animals through the U.S. Postal Service,
including for “agriculture and sport.” Baby
chicks were specifically mentioned, and this also
would apply to gamebird chicks, adults and eggs
that are used by sporting dog trainers and in field trials.

The American Sporting Dog Alliance represents
owners, breeders and professionals who work with
breeds of dogs that are used for hunting. We also
welcome people who work with other breeds, as
legislative issues affect all of us. We are a
grassroots movement working to protect the rights
of dog owners, and to assure that the traditional
relationships between dogs and humans maintains
its rightful place in American society and life.

The American Sporting Dog Alliance also needs
your help so that we can continue to work to
protect the rights of dog owners. Your
membership, participation and support are truly
essential to the success of our mission. We are
funded solely by your donations in order to maintain strict independence.

Please visit us on the web at
http://www.american sportingdogallia nce.org. Our email is asda@csonline. net.

PLEASE CROSS-POST AND FORWARD THIS REPORT TO YOUR FRIENDS

The American Sporting Dog Alliance
http://www.american sportingdogallia nce.org
Please Join Us

Alarm Bells Ring- Key Obama Job Goes to Animal Rights Supporter

1/20/09
Harvard Law Professor to Head Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs

The new head of a federal office with review authority over all agency
rules has an extensive record supporting animal rights and even calling
for the banning of hunting. This raises the possibility of pro-
hunting, fishing, and trapping rules being deep sixed before they ever
get a chance to move forward. The new head of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) will be law professor Cass Sunstein. Picked by President Obama from his perch at Harvard, Sunstein’s long time positions on animal rights
immediately ring alarm bells for sportsmen.

Sunstein has been an unyielding advocate for the animal rights movement. He has written extensively on the subject and shown a strong dislike towards hunting, going so far as to say that “we might ban hunting altogether, at least if it’s sole purpose is human recreation.”

He also has suggested that it makes sense to begin “allowing suits on behalf of animals.” As the editor of a well known 2004 book on animal rights, Animal Rights: Current Debates and New Directions; he compiled legal arguments made by numerous leaders of the movement. You can read some of Sunstein’s thoughts on animal rights by Clicking Here.

The concern over Sunstein’s views stems from the authority he will have as the head of the OIRA. While few people have ever heard of it, the OIRA has significant power over regulations coming from federal agencies.

A part of the federal budget office, the OIRA has been given extensive authority to perform data based cost/benefit analyses of all new federal regulations. Though not allowed to issue opinions on the merits of any proposed regulations, the OIRA can block rules if it considers the supporting data not strong.

It requires little imagination to envision an ardent opponent of hunting finding numerous technical reasons to put the kibosh on pro-hunting regulations for years to come.

The USSA will continue monitoring these developments.

Obama promised "special interests won't run the White House"- or will they?

http://www.prweb.com/releases/Cass-Sunstein/Animal-Rights/prweb1868134.htm

http://tinyurl.com/83pu42


Obama 'Regulatory Czar' has Secret Animal-Rights Agenda, Says Consumer Group
Washington, D.C. (Vocus/PRWEB ) January 15, 2009 -- The nonprofit Center
for Consumer Freedom said today that Cass Sunstein, the Harvard
University Law School professor tapped by President-elect Obama to head
the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, has a secret aim to
push a radical animal-rights agenda in the White House. Sunstein
supports outlawing sport hunting, giving animals the legal right to file
lawsuits, and using government regulations to phase out meat consumption.
In a 2007 speech at Harvard University, Sunstein argued in favor of
entirely "eliminating current practices such as … meat eating." He also
proposed: "We ought to ban hunting, I suggest, if there isn't a purpose
other than sport and fun. That should be against the law. It's time now."
Sunstein wrote in his 2004 book "Animal Rights: Current Debates and New
Directions" that "animals should be permitted to bring suit, with human
beings as their representatives … Any animals that are entitled to bring
suit would be represented by (human) counsel, who would owe
guardian-like obligations and make decisions, subject to those
obligations, on their clients' behalf."
The Center for Consumer Freedom's Director of Research, David Martosko,
is available to discuss Cass Sunstein's likely impact on typical
elements of American life that involve the use of animals. Sunstein's
work could spell the end of animal agriculture, retail sales of meat and
dairy foods, hunting and fishing, biomedical research, pet ownership,
zoos and aquariums, traveling circuses, and countless other things
Americans take for granted.
Mr. Martosko said: "Cass Sunstein owes Americans an honest appraisal of
his animal rights agenda as America's top regulator. Americans don't
realize that the next four years could be full of bizarre initiatives
plucked from the wildest dreams of the animal-rights fringe. Think about
every outrageous idea PETA and the Humane Society of the United States
have ever had, and imagine them all having the force of federal law.
This doesn't look good for hunters, ranchers, restaurateurs, biomedical
researchers, or ordinary pet owners."
For an interview with Mr. Martosko about how Cass Sunstein's appointment
will serve the radical animal rights movement's agenda in the White
House, or for more information, contact Sarah Kapenstein at 202-463-7112.

Agriculture Committee Chair Peterson Announces Agriculture Committee Members

News from the House Agriculture Committee

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Thursday, January 15, 2009

Media Contacts:
April Slayton (202) 225-6872
Scott Kuschmider (202) 225-1496

Agriculture Committee Chair Peterson Announces Agriculture Committee Members

WASHINGTON - Agriculture Committee Chair Collin C. Peterson of Minnesota
announced the Members of Congress selected to serve on the
House Agriculture Committee for the 111th Congress today.

The House Democratic Steering Committee, including 11 freshmen Members and
17 returning Members, to serve on the House Agriculture
Committee. The House Republican Conference has named 17 Republicans to serve
on the Committee and has left one seat vacant.

"The Agriculture Committee is responsible for issues as varied as farm
programs, commodity markets, nutrition, conservation,
renewable energy, and rural development, so the diverse experiences of these
Members will bring new ideas and energy to our work on
these important issues," Chair Peterson said.

The 28 Democrats who will serve on the committee are:

. Chair Collin C. Peterson of Minnesota
. Representative Tim Holden of Pennsylvania
. Representative Mike McIntyre of North Carolina
. Representative Leonard L. Boswell of Iowa
. Representative Joe Baca of California
. Representative Dennis A. Cardoza of California
. Representative David Scott of Georgia
. Representative Jim Marshall of Georgia
. Representative Stephanie Herseth Sandlin of South Dakota
. Representative Henry Cuellar of Texas
. Representative Jim Costa of California
. Representative Brad Ellsworth of Indiana
. Representative Timothy J. Walz of Minnesota
. Representative Kirsten E. Gillibrand of New York
. Representative Steve Kagen of Wisconsin
. Representative Kurt Schrader of Oregon
. Representative Deborah L. Halvorson of Illinois
. Representative Kathleen A. Dahlkemper of Pennsylvania
. Representative Eric J. J. Massa of New York
. Representative Bobby Bright of Alabama
. Representative Betsy Markey of Colorado
. Representative Frank Kratovil, Jr. of Maryland
. Representative Mark H. Schauer of Michigan
. Representative Larry Kissell of North Carolina
. Representative John A. Boccieri of Ohio
. Representative Earl Pomeroy of North Dakota
. Representative Travis W. Childers of Mississippi
. Representative Walt Minnick of Idaho

The 17 Republicans (with one additional vacant seat) who will serve on the
Committee are:

. Ranking Member Frank Lucas of Oklahoma
. Representative Bob Goodlatte of Virginia
. Representative Jerry Moran of Kansas
. Representative Timothy V. Johnson of Illinois
. Representative Sam Graves of Missouri
. Representative Mike Rogers of Alabama
. Representative Steve King of Iowa
. Representative Randy Neugebauer of Texas
. Representative Virginia Foxx of North Carolina
. Representative K. Michael Conaway of Texas
. Representative Jeff Fortenberry of Nebraska
. Representative Jean Schmidt of Ohio
. Representative Adrian Smith of Nebraska
. Representative Robert E. Latta of Ohio
. Representative Phil Roe of Tennessee
. Representative Blaine Luetkemeyer of Missouri
. Representative Glenn W. Thompson of Pennsylvania
. one vacancy

The House Agriculture Committee has jurisdiction over a wide range of
agriculture and rural development issues. These areas include
renewable energy, disaster assistance, nutrition, crop insurance,
conservation, international trade, futures market regulation,
animal and plant health, agricultural research, bioterrorism, forestry, and
others.

Congressman Peterson has served as chair of the Agriculture Committee since
2007.

###


The U.S. House Committee on Agriculture web site
http://agriculture.house.gov has additional information on this and
other subjects.

Thank You Vice-President Elect Joseph Biden

Thank You Vice-President Elect Joseph Biden for choosing a purebred puppy from a BREEDER!

AP Malia and Sasha Obama apparently aren’t the only ones who were promised a puppy if they stuck it out through the presidential election.

Vice President-elect Joe Biden picked out a German shepherd pup last weekend from a breeder near his Delaware home, according to a local newspaper report.

Biden was reportedly promised the post-election dog by his wife, Jill, who would tape pictures of different dogs on the back of the seat in front of Biden on his campaign plane.

The vice president-elect picked out a month-old male German shepherd from a breeder in Chester County, Pa., according to the Daily Local News. The breeder told the paper Biden wanted a family dog that was social and obedient and said Biden's granddaughters will name him.

The puppy will be delivered to the Bidens at the vice presidential residence after the Inauguration and after the breeder trains him, the paper reports.