Hippophagy.

What's so bad about hippophagy?

Blood donor dogs and cats.

At the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Veterinary Medicine’s Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital:

To do that, the hospital has its own Animal Blood Bank with a dedicated core [sic] of 12 dogs and 11 cats who serve as regular donors, many of them the animal companions of students or staff members at the UW-Madison School of Veterinary Medicine. “We actually have a waiting list of pets to become new donors,” notes Bach.

The typical canine blood donor is a healthy, larger dog — more than 50 pounds — that has been screened for blood borne parasites and diseases that affect the qualities of blood. Importantly, the dog donor possesses a good nature.

“We don’t sedate the dogs,” explains Bach, who says a typical blood draw from a dog takes about 7 to 10 minutes. “Cats are certainly different than dogs. Cats are a little more reclusive and sometimes have a little higher stress level in the hospital. They are sedated.”

Cats also need a more compatible blood-type cross match when they are getting transfusion.

They also do horse and cow transfusions.

Their most recent resident donor horse, Drive Thru, retired this fall after seven years of donating blood and serving as a calming presence and companion for any skittish equine patients at the hospital. In the hospital’s large animal practice, Drive Thru was a star, getting presents and mail from the children of clients and visitors and occasionally popping his head into the waiting room for peppermint candy, his favorite.

The resident cow donors are Maxine and Natalie, "beautiful and pampered Holsteins." How much blood goes into a cow getting a transfusion? 6 to 12 liters.

"If we cannot have moral feelings against homosexuality, can we have it against murder? Can we have it against other things?"

Justice Scalia is out and about, antagonizing — antoninonizing — students, this time at Princeton, with "a form of argument that I thought you would have known, which is called the 'reduction to the absurd.'"

Scalia said he is not equating sodomy with murder but drawing a parallel between the bans on both.

Then he deadpanned: "I'm surprised you aren't persuaded."

[The student] said afterward that he was not persuaded by Scalia's answer. He said he believes Scalia's writings tend to "dehumanize" gays.

Actually, he's humanizing you by crediting you with the capacity to comprehend rhetoric and engage in an on-the-fly verbal interchange. But it is easier to dehumanize your adversary. Afterwards.

What do they teach you at Princeton?

ADDED: Jaltcoh has 3 thoughts about this.

AND: David Lat reminds us about what Judge Posner said about horse meat: "a state is permitted, within reason, to express disgust..."

Is "horses and bayonets" Obama's new thing — after Big Bird and Binders Full of Women?

Salon's Mary Elizabeth Williams says these things aren't working:

Where are those glorious debate memes of times gone by?...

There was Battleship. And there was the night’s biggest winner, Obama’s smooth dis to Romney, “You mentioned the Navy, for example, and that we have fewer ships than we did in 1916. Well, Governor, we also have fewer horses and bayonets, because the nature of our military’s changed.” Faster than you could tweet “Oh, snap!,” the inevitable Tumblr was born.

Yet the whole thing felt less fun this time around, and a lot more forced. 

Big Bird and Binders Full of Women were words that came out of Romney's mouth. "Horses and bayonets" was inserted by Obama. It's one thing to have fun with Romneyisms, quite another to accept a faux-Romneyism cooked up by Obama... especially when Obama is making fun of the military and what comes out of his head is an old children's game — suggesting that he thinks this real-life killing and dying is some kind of game — and an image of the historical military — which seems to be about the movies he's watched, not anything that about Romney.

Bob Schieffer was a little doddering, but couldn’t match Jim Lehrer for FAIL worthiness. Josh Romney did not make with the crazy eyes. In short, as we all learned long ago from “Mean Girls,” you can’t make a thing a thing any more than you can plan for spontaneity.

Speaking of movies, I've never seen "Mean Girls." I don't get the reference. I'm not in your "we all." Is it the making a thing a thing thing or the plan for spontaneity thing?

But back to the landscape of Obama's mind — where kids fiddle with plastic Hasbro toys and old war movies play, from which he concocted a Romney gaffe that Romney never gaffed — why is there no picture there of the horse soldiers of the Afghanistan War?

The U.S. special operations teams that led the American invasion in Afghanistan a decade ago did something that no American military had done since the last century: ride horses into combat.

"It was like out of the Old Testament," says Lt. Col. Max Bowers, retired Green Beret, who commanded the three horseback teams.

"You expected Cecil B. DeMille to be filming and Charlton Heston to walk out."

It was like a movie, but it really happened, and those men were heroes. Is it so hard to call them to mind, now — in these days of unmanned drones, who kill when you point at a name on a card, or hover overhead and watch as — it can't be real — our ambassador fights for his life for 7 hours?

"The Flathead County Sheriff’s Office received a report of a person pulling a horse trailer with a truck on Montana 82 traveling at 80 miles per hour or more in a 45-mile-per-hour zone."

Meade reads the newspaper out loud, here in Flathead County, Montana:

A resident of White Rabbit Lane reported she was being harassed by her neighbor. She reported someone put a trash bag full of fish guts in the bed of her pickup truck.

A man reportedly head-butted a woman in a vehicle on U.S. 2 East in Columbia Falls.

The windshield of an animal control officer’s vehicle was struck by an owl on North Somers Road.

An employee at a business on Hungry Horse Boulevard in Hungry Horse reported a group of four teenage boys kept coming in, being obnoxious and inappropriate, spitting everywhere and making obscene gestures.

A woman called with a question about how to deal with the fact that her 15-year-old son was using drugs....

A group of teenagers were reported drinking heavily....

The Whitefish Police Department received a call from a man who said he had been told by an officer that he could not have his guitar case open on the street downtown without a permit.

I'm most concerned about the owl, specifically targeting animal control. The animals do not want to be controlled. It could get ugly. Also: Teenagers. They are getting obnoxious and inappropriate. Things are collapsing all around.

"I have a horse that is going to be fighting for gold in London and I am very excited about that. Wow!"

"It has been a dream of mine for a long, long time, ever since I was a little girl."

Spoiler:

Rafalca is in 6th place after round 1 of the individual Dressage Grand Prix event.

"John Kerry was made to look effete in 2004 by Republican mockery of his windsurfing, his Turnbull & Asser shirts and his French fluency."

"Now Democrats have a chance to do something similar to Romney, with his Swiss bank account, his Grand Cayman and Bermuda tax havens, his multiple homes, his $10,000 bet, his friends who own NASCAR teams, and now the six-figure horses his wife imports from Europe. Nothing says 'man of the people' quite like horse ballet."

Dana Milbank — hey, isn't "Dana" an effete name for a man? — says it's payback time.

Want to see/hear Romney speaking that "fluent" French?



How fluent can that be? I could understand every word!

ADDED: Won't they backfire at some point — all these petty attacks on Romney... and his wife... and the horse she rode in on?

"The essence of dressage is we’re trying to show the power of the horse and the balance of the horse in total relaxation."

"You have to look powerful, but it cannot look forced. That’s our problem sometime. The good riders that make it look easy, that’s the point."

A very nice, long article in the NYT about Ann Romney's horse Rafalca, which will compete in the Olympics on August 2d.

“I know it sounds crazy. But she is so loving and sweet. She is so kind and knowing. You look into her eyes and you can see her soul. I don’t know if we’re ever going to have another horse like this again.”

"Should Ann Romney become first lady, perhaps she can promote the therapeutic benefits of horseback riding..."

"... and encourage a culture that funnels the countless unwanted or retired horses to riding farms where emotionally or physically distressed people can enjoy the special communion between human and horse."

Michelle Obama wants to take away your cheeseburgers, but with Ann Romney, everybody gets a pony!

By the way, attacking Ann Romney about her horses was a big mistake, and not just because of this MS/disability angle. Women and horses. It's a thing. Not for all women, but for some women. Do not interfere with a woman and her horse! There's a mystical connection there. Break it up and you create some dangerous energy.

Without question, there is a connection between women and horses. This bond lures both young girls and older women into a web of seduction.
My humble beginnings with horses has enlightened me not only to the ways and wiles of horses, but also to a greater understanding of how it is that women are so inextricably intertwined with them, for better or for worse, and why horses are so powerfully attractive to women.

For better or for worse! See what I mean?

... To say I had an interest in horses is a gross understatement, for if I had been able to transform myself into a horse, I would have gone to live with the herd in a heartbeat.

... I was very shy and quiet in my youth, but came to life with the horses.... While my parents were concerned that I never seemed to talk much, the dialogue with my herd mates was never-ending. My infatuation turned to a lifetime passion.

It wasn't until I was a young adult that I began to question where my connection to horses came from and how I had gained the ability to understand horses so well. How was it that I knew the things I knew about horses that no one had ever taught me? Was it genetic memory? Was I born with some sort of sixth sense or mystical ability that allowed me to communicate with horses in a way that others couldn't grasp?

This essay, by  Julie Goodnight, goes on and on in that vein. Skipping ahead, we get to a fascinating feminist viewpoint:

On a deeper level, I believe women can connect with horses from a shared understanding of what it is like to be a prey animal. In spite of the fact that humans are considered to be predators and, in fact, the number one predator of horses for more than 150,000 years, women are more accustomed to being prey than being predator. Throughout history, women have been oppressed and victimized by individual males who are physically stronger by nature.... Both women and horses understand what it means to be vulnerable and I think that as a result, the psyches of both horses and women are connected deep within as strong, spirited animals with true vulnerabilities that lie just below the surface. As women, we know what it is like to have our rights infringed upon. We know what it is like to fear for our own safety and survival. In some cases, we understand what it is like to be captive and powerless to determine our own fate....

Got that? The attack on Ann Romney's horse activity is part of a War on Women!

Freudian analysis of the day: Do women hear "whores" when they hear "horse"?

"Today Show Covered Benefits of MS Patients Riding Horses Same Day O'Donnell Mocked Ann Romney For It."

NBC stumbles into some bad luck as Jack Osbourne — Ozzy's son — comes out with an announcement of MS, causing some un-Romney-related coverage of the disease.

The theme of the opening ceremony for the London Olympics is "green and pleasant."

We will see a representation of "the mythical British countryside: meadows, maypoles, picnicking families, toiling farmers, cricketers on the village green. There will be twelve horses and three sheepdogs. There will be Elgar, and the world’s largest harmonized bell, inscribed with the line 'Be not afeard, the isle is full of noises,' from 'The Tempest.'"

It will be — by design — quite the contrast to the big show they did in Beijing back in 2003.  It will be "a bit warmer, and more inclusive, and more involving."

What do you think of the "green and pleasant" approach?
	Lame! Step it up, Britain. Outdo China. Don't abase yourself.
	Lovely! The truest and best answer to loudness is quiet.
	Let the English be English, and if that's what it is, so be it.
pollcode.com free polls

Bad "Luck."

A third horse dies, and the HBO show is canceled.

A city-wide horseback riding event supposedly "fits with this entirely laudable notion that streets don't have to be the sole province of gas-guzzling, carbon-emitting cars and trucks."

According to Chris Rickert, contemplating something like the "Ride the Drive" bike-riding event where major streets in Madison are closed to cars so people can bike all over the streets (instead of just in the bike lanes, which are everywhere, and the bike trails, which are excellent).

But horses? Do horses even do well on concrete? And riding horses can't possibly be more energy efficient and clean than cars.

Fortunately Rickert has a brother-in-law who knows about horses. (He's a farrier.) He tells him that shod horses slip on pavement. Yes, leave the poor beasts alone.

Horse the Drive... what a horrendous idea. And yet... so Madison. There's this restless need to do things... to add amenities. Hey, let's have a trolley! Proposals spring from fuzzy heads. Pure romanticism. It seems environmental. It's environmental and about nature and a love of animals. Except if you look at the actual facts, it doesn't align with any of the values it resonates with inside your head.

"A-Rod must go!"

Says Trooper York:

A-Rod struck out with the bases loaded. He struck out to end the game. He failed miserably as he has done for most of his career. Did you see his face when he struck out with the bases loaded? He was a tight lipped tight assed mess. He froze. He choked. His disgraced the uniform. He might have Hall of Fame numbers but he is a drag on the team. As he has been since the day he got here. We would have been a lot better off without him. His bloated salary and his off the field antics have only brought trouble to the Yankees. He is a disgrace to the uniform.

IN THE COMMENTS: Maguro says:

Don't hate on ARod, the man has a painting of himself as a centaur hanging behind his bed. You gotta respect that.

He links to an article that doesn't have an image of the painting. I'm forced to do an image search. Hmmm. There's this. Or is it this?

ADDED: Here he is with Madonna.

Kandour, the magnificent police horse.

This video was recorded on June 12th, during the Walkerville protest on the Capitol Square here in Madison. The reason for posting it today is revealed in this edited version, and you can read more here.

SPOILER ALERT: Watch the video before reading any comments.

"We all remember that classic scene from The Godfather where the movie producer Jack Woltz wakes up with a horse's head in his bed."

So begins a TPM post, where you know without glancing ahead that it's some damned analogy for the debt-ceiling deal. Predictably:

... Mario Puzo's description of Woltz's ensuing panic oddly parallels that of the Democratic debt negotiators when they realized the Tea Party idealogues [sic] really were willing to risk default.

Um. Okay. That reminds me. I've been meaning to ask... And I don't want another post about the debt deal. In that scene in "The Godfather"... we just see the guy slowly waking up and finally noticing there's a bleeding horse head in his bed. It's great cinema. You never forget it. But what the hell kind of a heavy sleeper was Jack Woltz anyway? I'd love to see the missing part of the story, where guys holding a giant, dripping horse head open the bedroom door, walk across the room, peel back the covers — I guess they'd have to set the head down — put the head in the bed, gently replace the bed clothes, and sneak back out of there. All that time, Woltz is snoozing peacefully.

The cinematic trick is: You're so preoccupied with the startling thing you've actually seen as you discover the horse head along with Woltz that you have no mental space remaining in which to ask how'd they get that thing in there? You might ask: What sort of people would do a thing like that? — which is the aspect of the scene that TPM invokes in its absurd analogy. But you're not supposed to think: No way could they do that. In fact, if you're inclined to ask questions like that, you probably don't enjoy movies too much.

"No one was cleaning the street, and there were large pools of urine accumulating and festering."

"It was extraordinarily bad — bad enough that people would avoid the corner walking by... It seems like a small thing until you realize how prolific horses can be. We’re talking gallons."

But...

"Horses are not like automobiles. You just don’t put ’em in neutral. You have to hold on to the horse with one hand with passengers in the back of the carriage and spray this stuff down. Maybe one time out of a hundred with passengers in the cab, the horse might get scared, run off and hurt passengers and things. This will be a disaster.” And they say horse urine "doesn’t have much of an odor, since horses are vegetarians and 'don’t drink Coke or beer.'"

Please don't get sidetracked into the general topic of the smell of the urine of a vegetarian. Spare us your asparagus anecdotes. This is about horse piss and city traffic.

"A 63-year-old man... was arrested... after police were informed he was seen touching a female horse in what appeared to be a sexual fashion.... The animal looked to be in pain during the incident."

For touching a horse, a man is arrested, gets his picture in the paper, and will be mocked for the rest of his life. 

Some bystander reported that the horse "looked to be in pain during the incident"? I was going to ridicule the notion of expression on a horse's face, but I Googled "horse face expression pain" and didn't come up empty. I'm no horse expert, but I tend to think there's a lot of subjectivity involved when people look at an animal's face and think they perceive the animal's feelings. And do I even need to mention the difficulty of distinguishing expressions evincing sexual pleasure and those that express pain — even on human faces?

I care about cruelty to animals, but the man had his pants on. I would leave him alone, even if he had his hand somewhere that unsettled an onlooker. Don't the police have better things to do? Putting this poor guy's picture in the paper with this story is the real cruelty.

At the Litter & Poo Café...

... did you Obamadisonians clean up after yourself as well as the Tea Partiers do?

The clock on the mantle ticks, Teddy Roosevelt is a faded image of military readiness, the VP bows his head in (pseudo?) prayer...

... and the grim ladies in coral and turquoise look to their leader, Barack Obama...


(Enlarge.)

... who seems to be making a very precise point. Look at his hands:



And let's get a closer look at those BP executives (BP CEO Tony Hayward, BP Chairman Carl-Henric Svanberg, BP General Counsel Rupert Bondy):



Svanberg, especially, seems capable of overmatching the President's determination.

But, of course, they are all posing. Including the usually lethargic Janet Napolitano — at the right, turned from the camera, dressed in electric blue — who seems roused for action. Not as roused as Teddy Roosevelt and his horse... and think about how difficult it would have been for a horse to pose for a painting like that. It's all phony of course, all the way down to TR and the horse he rode in on.