The US Agricultural Secretary Tom Vilsack, former governor of Iowa, spoke recently to press the importance of forest conservation and stressed his agency’s commitment to its future in the United States. His comments sought to point out that forests are crucial in supplying clean water, sheltering wildlife, and mitigating the effects of climate change. He went on to say that the sky might in fact be blue.

Vilsack is perhaps best known for his strong support of biofuels and while serving as governor was a strong supporter of Ethanol additives. I’m still not sure how I feel about biofuels as it seems a little shortsighted to take two things as vital as energy and food and combine them into one item of such importance.

Back to the issue at hand. Key among Vilsack’s policies is reversing former president Bush’s forest planning rule of 2008 and also seeking to reinstate former president Bill Clinton’s ‘Roadless Rule’ which had imposed halts on road construction, among other development, on 58 million acres of national forests.

I firmly believe that deforestation is one of the largest threats facing the world today. And it’s great to see a member of the presidential cabinet taking such a strong stance. Smokey would be proud.

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Millions of animals lay dead today after Australia’s worst ever wildfires. The state of Victoria has been the hardest hit but there are several groups doing everything they can to help. Whether it’s treating the animals for scorched paws, or special vaporising tents to help with scorched lungs.

These groups need donations to keep doing their work, so send a few Dollars and help a wallaby, you’ll feel better about yourself.

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I went to the Singaporean Zoo not too long ago. It’s a beautiful zoo with a lot of animals, and the overall theme of zoo is that of animal conservation. But in true capitalist style they have corporate sponsorships of the animal exhibits.

Now I don’t care if Pepsi decides to sponsor a penguin, because for all I know Pepsi has never done anything to birds in general. But it is not cool that KFC was the sponsor of many exhibits at the zoo. Those are the same people that slam chicken’s heads into walls for fun. Not even joking:

http://www.kentuckyfriedcruelty.com/

To make matters worse the zoo actually had a KFC on the premises. A zoo that professes a love for animals & then accepts the money of KFC is an oxymoron. The zoo should have vegetarian dining, or at least have like a Quizno’s or something.

I sent a strongly worded letter to the zoo but my complaints fell on deaf ears. I even sent them a link to Kentucky Fried Cruelty but they still weren’t convinced. But never fear! I’ve forwarded this issue to PETA. If I know those guys & I think I do, this is the type of stuff that gets their panties in a bunch. I just hope they’re not too busy with their new campaign to rebrand cows as ‘land seals’.

Meanwhile write the Singaporean zoo and see if they’re even aware of their hypocrisy.

info@zoo.com.sg

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PETA has undergone a promotional campaign to make people more empathetic towards fish by calling them ’sea kittens’.

“PETA thought that by renaming fish sea kittens, compassionate people who would never dream of hurting a dog or a cat might extend that sympathy to fish, or sea kittens,” PETA campaign coordinator Ashley Byrne says.

However when asked why they didn’t just rebrand kittens as ‘land fish’ PETA had no comment.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=99249669

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Fashion designer Karl Lagerfield recently defended the fur industry saying; ‘it is justified as the beasts fur comes from would kill us if they could’.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/fashion/fashionnews/4075783/Karl-Lagerfeld-defends-fur-industry-saying-beasts-would-kill-us-if-we-didnt-kill-them.html

Silly me, I wasn’t even aware that large primates were in a mink’s diet.

In seriousness though, he does have a point when he says; “In a meat-eating world, wearing leather for shoes and clothes and even handbags, the discussion of fur is childish.” I think that’s true, if you criticize someone for wearing fur & then order a steak dinner, you’re a hypocrite.

I also understand what he said about the media’s exaggeration of models being too skinny. If we’re saying that skinny women can’t be in the public eye because it might make 1% of girls too skinny. Then I am saying take all fat people off of television because it has made 30% of people too fat. And obesity is one of the greatest health crises of our time.

But still, ‘kill us if they could’, really?!

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A new study has finally brought light upon the harm that exfoliating soap does to the world’s oceans.

The exfoliation power of the soap comes from little plastic beads. These beads wash down the drain and find themselves in our oceans where they are a hazard to sea life.

Remember plastic doesn’t biodegrade so it’s best to limit its usage, especially in something like soap where the waste is inevitable. So buy a different type of soap.

http://www.slate.com/id/2193693/

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You Can Help Stop Global Warming Today
The most effective way to fight the global warming crisis is to stop eating meat, eggs, and dairy products. Please also take a few moments to encourage Al Gore, the most prominent voice in the fight against global warming, to add “going vegetarian” to his list of solutions to our climate crisis.

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Wasted Resources
Vast tracts of land are needed to grow crops to feed the billions of animals we raise for food each year. Of all the agricultural land in the U.S., nearly 80 percent is used in some way to raise animals—that’s roughly half of the total land mass of the U.S.10 More than 260 million acres of U.S. forest have been cleared to create cropland to grow grain to feed farmed animals.

The U.S. certainly isn’t alone in its misuse of land for animal agriculture. As the world’s appetite for meat increases, countries across the globe are bulldozing huge swaths of land to make more room for animals and the crops to feed them. From tropical rain forests in Brazil to ancient pine forests in China, entire ecosystems are being destroyed to fuel our addiction to meat. According to scientists at the Smithsonian Institute, the equivalent of seven football fields of land is bulldozed every minute to create more room for farmed animals.

In the United States and around the world, overgrazing leads to the extinction of indigenous plant and animal species, soil erosion, and eventual desertification that renders once-fertile land barren. Livestock grazing is the number one cause of threatened and extinct species both in the United States and in other parts of the world. Philip Fradkin, of the National Audubon Society, states, “The impact of countless hooves and mouths over the years has done more to alter the type of vegetation and land forms of the West than all the water projects, strip mines, power plants, freeways, and subdivision developments combined.” As more and more land both in the U.S. and around the world is irreparably damaged at the hands of the meat industry, what little arable land does remain may not be enough to produce crops to feed the burgeoning world human population.

Overgrazing leads to the extinction of indigenous plant and animal species, soil erosion, and eventual desertification that renders once-fertile land barren.

While factory farms are ruining our land, the commercial fishing industry is pushing entire oceanic ecosystems to the brink of collapse. Commercial fishing boats indiscriminately pull as many fish as they can out of the sea, leaving ecological devastation and the bodies of nontarget animals in their wake. Fishing methods like bottom trawling and long-lining have emptied millions of miles of ocean and pushed some marine species to the brink of extinction.

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