HumaneWatch

Sacramento is (as one political writer recently quipped) "where good ideas go to die, and where bad ideas kill them slowly." It's also an iron-clad lobbying stronghold of the Humane Society of the United States.

On Saturday, the paper of record in California's capital published our op-ed about the politics of eggs in the Golden State. Here's a taste:

What's really at stake here is that word: "humane." HSUS seems to want a monopoly on it, even though other animal welfare-oriented groups – and plenty of scientists – disagree with its agenda. And that agenda is where the rubber meets the road: HSUS is run by vegans who don't believe anyone should eat eggs, regardless of how or where they were produced.

Most recently, HSUS has opposed attempts by California lawmakers to specifically define the standards mandated by Proposition 2. The very vague language that California voters approved in 2008 gives HSUS's enormous legal team enough wiggle room to hassle farmers who don't see things HSUS's way.

Of course, enriched chicken cages could be furnished with couches, Jacuzzis, treadmills and iPads, and activists who believe in "rights" for birds would still complain about them. HSUS is among them. And its vision of what's "humane" is outside the mainstream.

Click here to read the whole essay.

Disclaimer: No one at HumaneWatch is a constitutional lawyer. We don’t even play them on TV. So if any genuine legal eagles out there have a smarter or more cogent analysis of this, we’re all ears.

Maybe California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has forgotten about all those thermoses full of raw eggs he used to gulp down in his bodybuilding days. Or perhaps he’s still mad at the anonymous protester who hurled a raw egg at him during a 2003 campaign stop. (Schwarzenegger shook it off and said “this guy owes me bacon now.”)

But for whatever reason, the Governator signed a bill into law earlier this month (“AB 1437”) which could “Terminate” the concept of cheap, plentiful eggs in his state. The new law, heavily promoted and lobbied by the Humane Society of the United States, will extend the reach of Proposition 2—the 2008 ballot initiative requiring egg farmers to give their chickens far more precious real estate. AB 1437 requires eggs imported into California to follow the Proposition 2 standards imposed on in-state farmers.

Both Proposition 2 and this new companion law will take effect in January 2015. So we can expect four more years legal wrangling over just how much wing-flapping room the law requires for each bird.

Oh, goodie.

With “Governator” Schwarzenegger signing an HSUS-backed bill extending "Proposition 2" egg requirements to out-of-state farmers selling eggs in California, one thing seems clear: HSUS will continue proposing policies that drive up the cost of eggs, and then fight tooth and nail to get them implemented.

One California egg producer has already spent $3.2 million on changes to its facilities just to comply with Proposition 2’s future requirements. And HSUS is saying that it’s not enough.

Why? Because the company upgraded its cages to add more room. (The result is known as “enriched cages” or “furnished cages.”) HSUS wants all California egg farmers to go completely cage-free.

So is HSUS being a bunch of uncompromising ideologues, or is this one egg producer trying to skirt the rules?

Consider a few things: The American Humane Certified program, run by the American Humane Association, took the position last month that enriched cages for egg-laying are indeed "humane." Animal welfare specialist Temple Grandin—yes, the Temple Grandin, herself oft-quoted by HSUS leaders—thinks these new cages are a big improvement over the old ones. And enriched cages will be standard in most of Europe in 2012.

Somebody is left out on the fringes here, and its initials are H.S.U.S.

Following HSUS’s farm animal push in Ohio and California, it’s worth examining what the group believes about eating—especially since campaign director Paul Shapiro recently claimed HSUS “does not have an ‘anti-meat’ agenda.”

If you don’t read Animal People, the animal rights movement’s unofficial newspaper, you might want to. It provides a lot of “inside baseball” about movers and shakers in the movement—such as this note that Wayne Pacelle “hypothetically proposed a three-way merger of HSUS, the Fund [For Animals], and PETA as long ago as 1988.”

Every year, Animal People publishes a Watchdog Report about various animal rights nonprofits like HSUS. And the 2009 edition includes this interesting little gem. Since 2005 (one year after Wayne Pacelle took over), HSUS has had this official food policy:

At HSUS internal events where food is served and to which staff and/or guests have been invited to participate, HSUS will purchase vegan fare and we will strive to have organic products…External events under the control of HSUS should also provide for the purchase of all non-animal products.  If this is not possible, events should be vegetarian—no meat (including fish and shellfish). For events sponsored by HSUS with other organizations, strong efforts should be made to serve all vegan or vegetarian food. Partnering organization are to be informed that vegan options should be available and that they are preferred. Any animal products served at co-sponsored events should be Certified Humane, in keeping with HSUS support for this program.

In other words, slipping in a little bacon into a BLT could be a firing offense in HSUS-land. No wonder the only food HSUS officially endorses is "Tofurky."

Everyone makes mistakes. My initial analysis of yesterday’s HSUS “Buckeye Compromise” was a hasty first impression, written immediately after the late-day press conference. (Who holds a press conference at 4:30pm anyway?) Since then I’ve heard from a number of people in a variety of walks of life, essentially all saying “yes, but…” on one point or other.

So now that more details of the deal have emerged, it seems like a good idea to revisit the issue with a bit of hindsight—or at least to analyze what happened a little more thoughtfully. In short, I think the self-congratulatory language (from everyone) in the press conference effectively camouflaged the substance of what we’re seeing today on paper. Sticking my customary skepticism in a drawer was my mistake, and mine alone.

Here’s what has emerged in the last 18 hours, and a bit of what the proverbial “devil in the details” could end up meaning:

Update: This post was, in my own judgment, a bit hasty. I've since reconsidered much of it, given that the actual text of the "Buckeye Compromise" isn't entirely consistent with what was presented at Wednesday's press conference. It turns out my enthusiasm was, in many ways, premature.

The next time I buy a house or consider a job offer, I want Ohio Farm Bureau vice president Jack Fisher as my negotiator. (That's him above, at left.)

A little over an hour ago, Fisher stood with Ohio Governor Ted Strickland (center) and Humane Society of the United States CEO Wayne Pacelle (the guy looking displeased) for a press conference, announcing that HSUS will be pulling out of Ohio. Call it a case of campaignus interruptus.

What the heck happened? Did the Farm Bureau fold like a tent and concede victory to HSUS, as other states’ farmers have done? (I’m talkin’ to you, Colorado and Michigan…)

Nope. Despite a self-congratulatory press release from HSUS, the group got practically nothing that it wanted from Ohio’s farmers. Instead, Pacelle has agreed to abandon HSUS’s whole “Ohioans for Humane Farms” front group in exchange for the equivalent of $24 in blue beads.

Let’s take a look at what each side in the HSUS-versus-Buckeye-farmers battle got. It’s not pretty.http://www.journal-news.com/o/content/shared-gen/blogs/dayton/ohiopolitics/entries/2010/06/30/kasich_has_narrow_lead_in_new.html

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

HUMANE SOCIETY OF THE UNITED STATES SLINKS AWAY FROM OHIO IN FACE-SAVING MOVE

In a surprising move today, Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) CEO Wayne Pacelle appeared with Ohio Governor Ted Strickland and a vice president of the Ohio Farm Bureau to announce that his organization will not pursue its planned ballot initiative in November. The measure, aimed at Ohio’s livestock farmers, would have wrested control of livestock handling standards away from the Livestock Care Standards Board, which Ohio voters approved by a wide margin during the 2009 election.

According to the announcement made at today’s 4:30pm press conference, HSUS has agreed to abandon its effort to control how Ohio’s farmers raise animals. In exchange, Pacelle secured only a few weak promises from Governor Strickland concerning animal-welfare measures that had nothing to do with the reasons the group gave for coming into the Buckeye State; moreover, these concessions consist only of recommendations which will depend on the uncertain approval of Ohio’s legislature.