News Of The Absurd

It's been an exciting few days, what with the royal wedding, followed by the long-deserved extermination of osama bin laden. However, stupid doesn't take a holiday, as shown by the following stories.

Pets Are People Too

London, England - In a statement that gives a whole new meaning to animal rights, leading academics have called for pets to be renamed “companion animals”.

They say that rather than being a term of endearment, “pets” is an insult to the animals concerned, and their owners, who should be known as “human carers”.

The editors of a new journal devoted to animal ethics ... also want the terms “pests” and “vermin” to be dropped. Wild animals, meanwhile, would be referred to as “free-living or free-ranging”.

Even innocuous phrases such as “sly as a fox” and “drunk as a skunk” are seen as an affront to animals.

I asked our dogs what they thought about this, but they declined to comment.


It's not just pets. Trees are people too. (H/T to Power Line for the link; original story here.)

United Nations diplomats on Wednesday will set aside pressing issues of international peace and security to devote an entire day debating the rights of “Mother Earth.”

A bloc of mostly socialist governments lead by Bolivia have put the issue on the General Assembly agenda to discuss the creation of a U.N. treaty that would grant the same rights found in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights to Mother Nature.

Treaty supporters want the establishment of legal systems to maintain balance between human rights and what they perceive as the inalienable rights of other members of the Earth community -- plants, animals, and terrain.

It is not clear if Bolivia’s new tough environmental laws will actually go as far as to protect life forms like insects, but the legislation does include all living creatures.

Boliva is not alone. U.N. watchdog Anne Bayefsky, of Eye on the U.N., provides moral support. (Note that Ms. Bayefsky appears to be ignorant of the fact that, according to the story above, the term 'watchdog' is an insult to canines everywhere.)

“Western democracies are responsible for the world’s ills and developing countries are perpetual victims.”

The agenda also includes calls to end capitalism, imperialism, and colonialism. Other isms, such as socialism, communism, and environmentalism, are allowed.

What else should we expect from an organization that soaks up U.S. tax dollars like I soak up Shiner during a three-day weekend? After all, it's an organization where Syria is scheduled to be elected next month to the U.N.’s top human rights body, and Iran is on the U.N.’s top womens rights body.That tells you everything you need to know about the U.N.


Finally, we have the full weight and majesty of the Federal government being brought to bear on an Amish farmer for selling milk.

How in the world did humanity survive for millennia without the FDA minding your own business? From The Washington Times, this is what the federal government is doing while simultaneously letting terrorists through the Mexican border:

A yearlong sting operation, including aliases, a 5 a.m. surprise inspection and surreptitious purchases from an Amish farm in Pennsylvania, culminated in the federal government announcing this week that it has gone to court to stop Rainbow Acres Farm from selling its contraband to willing customers in the Washington area.

Raw milk being said contraband. You know - the stuff humanity has been consuming for all of history. The FDA's position? Raw milk that humans have been consuming forever is bad for us or something:

“It is the FDA’s position that raw milk should never be consumed,” said Tamara N. Ward, spokeswoman for the FDA...

I guess now that osama's been taken care of the feds can turn their attention to really important things...