Monday, November 25, 2019

New Subscription Database Set To Smear Dog Breeders


Just when you thought you've had your fill of fake news and relentless attacks on animal breeders... a new website masquerading as a pro-dog breeder publication is resorting to disturbing tactics to disparage dog breeders, dog breeding, and the AKC.

Last week, a new publication launched called, The Canine Review. Sounds familiar, right? Not to be mistaken by Canine Review, Canada's oldest independent competitive dog show magazine featuring Canada's top canine handlers and dog show enthusiasts, founded in 1978.



An imposter, The Canine Review, was launched recently by an Emily Brill, former writer for BuzzFeed andThe Daily Beast. Emily Brill is not a credible source for issues surrounding the hobby and profession of dog breeding. Her organization and website is nothing more than an anti-breeder, animal rights hit job on dog breeders, while resorting to the all too familiar scheme of publishing lies and misinformation. 

In preparation for the launch of her dupe publication-website, Emily Brill called several individual breeders and interviewed them under the deceptively familiar-sounding name of The Canine Review. In HSUS fashion, Emily Brill twisted the truth, taking inspection reports and breeding protocol out of context and used it to smear these breeders on her new website. 

Ms. Brill makes access to these smear reports on her website to subscribers only. So, for $19.99 a year, anyone can pay to read the lies she purports. 

So much for transparency and legitimacy in Ms. Brill's new "publication."  

Brill Tweeted about the logo design for her new website which calls into questions whether there are copyright infringements with the name being almost identical to the Canadian publication, Canine Review. 

Brill has also posted an advertisement on the Berkley Journalism website seeking freelance writers to produce "feature stories for paid subscribers who will have access to a database of profiles of breeders and animal shelters across the country." 
This post is to serve as a warning to all dog breeders to avoid speaking with Emily Brill or anyone from The Canine Review.

The Cavalry Group will release an article soon which will set the record straight about the misinformation and lies that Emily Brill has published.

To those who are members, thank you for your membership and support.

Your friend in the fight,

Mindy Patterson
President
The Cavalry Group



Saturday, August 3, 2019

Animal Rights Whack-A-Mole in Kitsap County, Washington



Here’s something you may not know. The animal rights movement loses a lot. You probably think that animal rights activists are out celebrating their victories every night but the truth is that they are constantly defeated at the federal, state, and local levels.

How can that be, you ask, when they are constantly in the news? 

That’s because they are loud and obnoxious. They are the epitome of the squeaky wheel. Even when they are led off in handcuffs they are happy to video the scene and post it online so they can raise money for bail.

But animal rights activists are persistent. They play the long game.
If they lose with bills at the federal level – and they do lose with bills, year after year after year – they try to get changes made through regulatory agencies. If that doesn’t work to their satisfaction, they move down to the state government level and try to get what they want, one state at a time.

When they are thwarted by state governments, they go local. Activists can turn up in your city or town and start whispering in the ears of your local council members.

When a bill that would have banned the sale of puppies and kittens from breeders was defeated with the help of The Cavalry Group in Washington’s state capitol, animal rights activists began singling out individual pet stores in the state. That’s how Jack Munro found himself at the center of a fight in Kitsap County Washington. Jack, who used to show and breed Collies and Shelties, is the owner of Farmland Feed and Pets in Kitsap County where he’s been in business for 43 years.

In December 2018, just after Christmas, Jack says he got a call from a county council member telling him that in five days they intended to vote on a measure that would put him out of business. He was told that he could see the proposed ordinance online. He had no input in writing the ordinance. The ordinance would ban his store from selling pets unless they came from the local shelter or rescue group.

It took seven months, but the ordinance was finally passed on July 22, 2019. The Cavalry Group mounted several large e-mail campaigns on behalf of Farmland to fight the ordinance. The county council received thousands of e-mails asking them to reject the proposed ordinance. The council told Jack, “No more emails!” According to Jack, many people turned out on behalf of Farmland at each reading of the ordinance. When it came to the date of the final vote the council moved the vote several times. No public comments were allowed for the final vote.

Jack would originally have been required to stop selling his animals immediately but that has been amended. He now has a year to stop selling his puppies and kittens.

Jack says that he will never sell shelter animals in his store. He has had a decades-long positive relationship with a professional licensed and inspected dog breeder in Kansas who has supplied him with puppies for the store. Through Farmland he has sold puppies with a 5-generation pedigree that were DNA-tested. They came with pictures of the parents, a complete medical record, a health guarantee, a free visit to the vet, and they were microchipped. The kittens in his store come from local people who drop them off. He gets them for free or never pays more than $10 for the really cute ones. They don’t come from breeders. Yet critics claim that Jack is only selling puppies and kittens for the money.

Per the local humane society, some 6,000 dogs were rehomed in Kitsap County in 2018. Three-thousand of them came from out of state. Thousands of dogs are brought into Washington from out of state by “rescue” groups every year, not all of them legally. Jack sells about 400 dogs per year at Farmland and only 3 percent of them ever have a problem. That’s 12 dogs. And Farmland’s dogs have a health guarantee and a contract.

Puppies at the local humane society in Kitsap County are $350. Purebred dogs are $250-$500. Kittens are $175. Before you can get any pet at the humane society you have to fill out an application and you have to be “approved.”

Jack is well-liked and some local people in the community, even people who do not particularly like commercial dog breeders, have said that they felt bad about this ordinance and putting Farmland out of business. According to Jack, even the local council members told him that they didn’t like forcing a local business to close.

Local ordinances banning pet stores from selling puppies from breeders, like the one that is forcing Farmland to close, are being passed all over the United States. Local governments are often pressured by animal activists to pick winners and losers in business because the activists are pushy and outspoken. Sometimes proposed ordinances are hidden so the public doesn’t know about them until after they are passed; votes are moved at the last minute; people who oppose an ordinance are not notified of changes; people affected by ordinances and their supporters are not given timely access to proposed drafts. This is the worst kind of dirty politics and it’s being played in our hometowns, affecting our animals and our businesses.

These ordinances can be passed anywhere and affect any of us. Today it’s pet stores but tomorrow it could be an ordinance to ban dog breeding or whether you can own pets at all. Good people are being driven out of business because of the animal rights agenda. This is not fair or honest government. Local government should not be agenda-driven and it shouldn’t pick winners and losers in business based on animal rights ideology. We all need to stand up to these bad ordinances and bills when they appear. We need to fight together and protect our rights.
  
Carlotta Cooper is vice president of Sportsmens’ & Animal Owners’ Voting Alliance and a regular contributing writer for The Cavalry Group, a member-based company working to defend the private property rights of animal owners and animal enterprise nationwide. Follow The Cavalry Group on Facebook, MeWe, Instagram, and Twitter.




Tuesday, April 2, 2019

Going On Offense To Protect Working Animals

Imagine having your livelihood banned by a small group of lawmakers because your legal business doesn’t align with their ideology or, perhaps, they just don’t like what you do. 

The businesses getting banned, outright, legislatively, at the local municipal level might surprise you. Businesses such horse-drawn carriages, pony rides, elephant rides, educational zoos, and exotic animal exhibits at fairs and circuses. All legal businesses, heavily licensed, regulated, and inspected. 


For the past eight years, our team at The Cavalry Group has had a front row seat to the animal rights-driven onslaught of 67 exotic animal exhibiting bans and transport bans at the local level in 28 states, negatively impacting those who exhibit at fairs, circuses, and educational venues.

In addition, 14 horse carriage bans have passed at the local city council level throughout the United States in recent years. 
Why, you ask? 

Look no further than the animal rights movement.  "Animal rights," not to be confused with animal welfare, is a political agenda chipping away incrementally by altering Americans’ views about animal ownership and animal use through media, through our schools, through legislation and even through litigation. Their goal is to end animal use in every possible capacity.

The animal rights movement is an ideology that has gradually gained a foothold in universities and government throughout the past 50 years.  What was once a radical, ragtag group of extremists is now a multi-million-dollar coalition of organizations that raise money under the guise of running pet shelters and ultimately, spend that money on the promotion of increased regulation on animal ownership and animal enterprise.  

Namely, these organizations are the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA), Direct Action Everywhere (DXE), and the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) to name just a few.   There are hundreds of off shoot organizations with animal-friendly names that exist with the same motive and mission. 

The most insidious way in which the animal rights strategy has taken form has been in the subversive way these organizations pressure, infiltrate, and influence government. Hence, the way in which local legislators in city and county councils have been persuaded to ban, outright, these legal businesses utilizing working animals. 

The animal rights extremists have found that it is easier to promote their agenda to inexperienced legislators at the local city council or county council levels, persuading these lawmakers with false information and propaganda. 

It is because of this onslaught that The Cavalry Group worked with Missouri State Representative, Bryan Spencer to create legislation with the intent to slow down the animal rights steam roller at the local level. Accordingly, the Working Animal Protection Act was written and introduced and is moving through several states in the 2019 legislative session. 

If passed, Missouri HB559 would amend the Missouri state agriculture statute, Section A. Chapter 262, prohibiting an outright ban by any political subdivision at the 
any LEGAL business utilizing working animals in education, transportation, exhibition, and entertainment. This legislation DOES NOT take away local control. It simply states that these legal businesses utilizing working animals cannot be banned, outright or have regulations imposed that would lead to a ban. 


On Monday, April 8, 2019, Missouri HB559, the Working Animal Protection Act, is going to be voted on in the Missouri House of Representatives. We look forward to seeing it pass the full House in Missouri and move on to the Senate (SB416)!  

The Working Animal Protection Act is an effort to go on offense to protect animal enterprise across America -- to protect legal businesses, but also to protect our American way of life and heritage by keeping animals in our lives!

Stay up to date on the progress of the Working Animal Protection Act in Missouri and other states by going to www.workinganimalprotectionact.com 

Please help us by supporting our efforts and donate below!

Mindy Patterson
President
The Cavalry Group






Saturday, March 23, 2019

OPPOSE HR 1380 Big Cat Public Safety Act

As the saying goes, elections have consequences. Animal-related businesses involved with big cats are about to experience the negative consequences of the Republicans losing the House in Congress in just a few days.

With the Democratic majority now controlling the House, Congressman Raul M. Grijalva (D-AZ), is the newly appointed Chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee. It didn't take him but a few short months into the new 116th Congress to bring the Big Cat Public Safety Act (HR1380) up for a hearing this Tuesday, March 26, 2019. 
Congressman Raul M. Grijalva (D-AZ)
Chairman, Natural Resource Committee


This deceptively named bill is designed by animal rights groups to severely restrict all legal possession, breeding, and commerce involving Big Cats. 

The Big Cat Public Safety Act has the potential to curtail existing legal business activity without providing any information about the resulting adverse economic impact while offering significant challenges for enforcement. 

The severe limitations on breeding and continued possession imposed by this bill not only impact the prohibited species already legally maintained but almost certainly ensure the extinction of some of these species in our parks and zoos. 

The bottom line: The Big Cat Public Safety Act is a recipe for extinction of big cats. 

With 81 co-sponsors in the House, 77 are Democrats and the 4 Republican co-sponsors are the usual suspects who are, sadly, in the pocket of the Humane Society of the U.S.  

These four (4) Republicans are: 

Congressman Matt Gaetz (R-FL)
Congressman Brian K. Fitzpatrick (R-PA)
Congressman Lee M. Zeldin (R-NY)
Congressman Michael Turner (R-OH)

Three things you can do to help!

  1. Send your emails to Members of the House Committee on Natural Resources to OPPOSE HR1380 by CLICKING HERE
  2. You can make phone calls to Members of the House Committee on Natural Resources.  CLICK HERE
  3. If you're on Twitter, click to Tweet!  CLICK HERE
THANK YOU!



Thursday, August 23, 2018

Equine are Livestock, Not Companion Animals


In today's animal rights driven legislative reform working through at the local, state, and federal levels, it is important to understand why the legal definition for all domesticated equines to remain as livestock and oppose the current social trend of referring to them as pets or companion animals. 

The horse has long been considered livestock in the United States and throughout the world and changing the legal definition of horses to companion or other non-livestock animal would adversely affect not only the owners, but the animals themselves.

On the federal level, the care and regulation of horses and horse related activities come under the purview of the United States Department of Agriculture. It is the responsibility of the USDA to improve and maintain farm income and to carry out agricultural research. The USDA provides technical expertise and monetary support for research into the prevention of many equine diseases. The USDA is also responsible for the development and enforcement of the Horse Protection Act and the Safe Commercial Transportation of Equine to Slaughter Act. 

On the state level, each state department of agriculture is charged with the regulation of horse related activities and assists the horse industry through research and regulatory programs. Changing the livestock status of horses could result in losing financial support for research, regulation and disaster relief on both the federal and the state levels.

Livestock anti-cruelty laws are usually written to ensure humane treatment and care while still providing for the use of the animal. If horses were to be legally considered non-livestock, these laws would no longer apply. This status change would also have a major impact on limited liability laws and would no longer provide the much needed protection for stable owners, equine owners, event organizers and service providers.

Currently, under federal tax law, commercial horse owners and breeders are treated as farmers. Certain tax ramifications could be changed and have a negative impact if horses were not considered as livestock. In addition, horse owners and breeders are treated differently by state excise and sales taxes because horses are now considered livestock. These advantages could be lost. 

If horses were no longer livestock, horse breeding would no longer be an agricultural endeavor and federal and state taxes for horse operations could increase.

The terms livestock and companion animal are becoming interchangeable by the media and even in veterinary literature. Words are power and as we become accustomed to the flip-flopping of the terms and the hijacking of words by the animal rights movement.  First the public takes hold of the new term, then the legal community will come to accept the status change and the legal classification might follow.  We must understand why equine must remain classified as livestock in order to protect this classification. It all boils down to ownership of private property.

It is for these reasons that The Cavalry Group opposes any efforts to change the status of horses from agricultural livestock to companion animals.

Please be alert of any legislative efforts in your area at the local and state level to change this classification and notify us immediately. 

Mindy Patterson
President
The Cavalry Group




Monday, March 26, 2018

Is Conservative Talk Show Host Laura Ingraham Friendly With Radical Group, PETA?


The popular conservative political radio and television talk show host, Laura Ingraham, has been a powerful force for the conservative movement in America. For the past two decades, Laura Ingraham has said on air what I've often been thinking from matters relating to the decline of our American culture to the election of President Trump.  


Imagine my disappointment last week when Laura Ingraham welcomed a representative of the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) onto her television show to discuss their absurd rationale behind opposing a bill in the state of Ohio making the Labrador Retriever the official state dog of Ohio.  (View Clip) Currently, Ohio Representative,  Jeffrey Rezabek, who is the sponsor of the legislation, simply believes the popular breed would represent Ohio values well because it's a wonderful family dog and many are trained to be therapy, rescue, and police dogs. 


PETA objects to this legislation because let's face it, they never want to let a fundraising opportunity go to waste! They stated on the Ingraham Angle that if this legislation were to pass, there might be a huge influx in popularity of the Labrador retriever breed and promotion of the purebred breed, they claim, would create an influx in labrador retrievers being purchased "on a whim" from breeders and subsequently relinquished to shelters.

While I certainly support consumer choice whether Americans obtain their canine companion at the local shelter or from a breeder, Laura Ingraham, along with many Americans need to understand that PETA is promoting the lie that pet shelters across the U.S. are overflowing with owner relinquished purebred dogs. According to a 2015 study by National Animal Interest Alliance (NAIA), less than 5% of dogs in shelters are purebred dogs. This percentage includes pit bulls and chihuahuas, two breeds that make up most of the purebred breeds in shelters. So purebreds in shelters, such as Labradors and other breeds, would be closer to 2%-3%.

More importantly, I expect better from Laura Ingraham who should acknowledge that PETA is nothing more than a well funded radical animal rights organization that knows little, if anything, about the care of animals.  Laura opened her segment with PETA by saying, "We all know PETA, their very name is pro-animal, right?"  Wrong, Laura!! PETA kills 97% of the animals in its care including those it accepts from members of the public who expect the group to adopt out the animals. There is nothing ethical or humane about PETA. 

PETA's connection to domestic terrorism is very real with direct ties to underground groups like Animal Liberation Front (ALF) and Earth Liberation Front (ELF). I can attest to PETA's threats first hand, as they have been terrorizing several of our Cavalry Group members relentlessly using bully tactics and intimidation against legal, law-abiding animal businesses with the hope that they will surrender to PETA's demands. 

Whether it's PETA, the Humane Society of the United States, American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, or the dozens of other animal rights organizations out there, they are all deceptively named because that is the only way they can raise money to achieve their true goal.  Animal rights extremism is a political agenda incrementally chipping away at our right to private property by altering Americans' views about animal ownership, animal use, and what is considered "humane" through media, through our schools, through legislation, and even litigation. Their goal is to END animal use in every possible capacity from food, biomedical research, entertainment, sport, rodeos, zoos, fairs, 4-H, fishing hunting, and even pets. 

Whether Laura Ingraham is uninformed or turning a blind eye to the domestic terrorism part of PETA's bio, any amount of support for a group like PETA is simply not in line with Laura Ingraham's dedication to the message of liberty.  Like all animal rights organizations, PETA has banked on the American public remaining unaware of what is truly behind their emotionally charged propaganda which is often nothing more than a fundraising tactic for their radical agenda to destroy legal animal-related businesses. 





Mindy Patterson is the President of The Cavalry Group, a member-based company protecting and defending the Constitutional and private property rights of law-abiding animal owners, animal-related business, hunters, and agriculture concerns nationwide. Follow Mindy Patterson and The Cavalry Group on Twitter: @cowgirlathart and @TheCavalryGroup