Breed specific legislation made easy: legislate breeds
“Unbelievable” was the reaction from PetPAC today after Members of the California State Assembly voted 41-38 to outlaw the existence of mixed-breed dogs and cats in the Golden State.
Assembly Bill 1634, authored by Los Angeles Assemblyman Lloyd Levine, will allow only select purebred dogs and cats to breed. Pet owners who don’t sterilize their mixed breed pets by four months of age will face a $500 fine and possible criminal penalties.
“This crazy measure will end up costing families heartache and taxpayers billions,” said Bill Hemby, Chairman of PetPAC, an organization dedicated to the rights of pets and owners. “California will be the poster child for an invasive and overreaching government mandate that is impossible to fund, administer or enforce.”
AB 1634 will blanket all 58 counties in California with an expensive forced spay/neuter law that not all shelters want – or need. According to the State of California, dog impounds have fallen 86% over last 30 years. Puppies and kittens are already being transferred between counties to alleviate a shortage of adoptable pets: San Francisco and Marin Counties need to bring pets in from other areas to be adopted locally. In San Diego County – which has no mandatory spay/neuter law – only one adoptable animal was euthanized in 2004-05.
All dogs share about 99% of their genes:
a few distinct differences account for the different breeds. However, some supposedly different breeds have been found to be genetically identical. And some dogs are genetically closer to wolves than other dogs.
And the wolf kept locked in its genome everything that was necessary to make a Pekingese to a Great Dane.
But then given how politicians typically deal with dog issues, I don’t find this sort of stupidity surprising.
Update: And who exactly determines pure breds? There’s only about two dozen registering entities.
June 8th, 2007 at 12:31 pm
What. The. Fuck?
I used to have a couple of cats. They had a very specific purpose, namely to cheerfully slaughter every rat and mouse within a 100 yard radius of the house. They did it very well. They were moggies, as we call them in England. Farm cats, of no discernable breed, but from a long line of cats kept for rodent control. Not so much mixed breed as no breed at all. Most domestic cats over here are much the same. I believe it’s generally accepted that mongrel dogs are healthier and live longer.
And now California intends to legislate such animals out of existence for no particular gain. Some laws are just moronic.
June 8th, 2007 at 12:37 pm
Don’t look for logic.
The peta’tards want to ban or heavily regulate pet ownership. This is just a step in that direction. The only reason “purebreds” are exempted is to prevent people with money and time from opposing this.
June 8th, 2007 at 12:45 pm
Leave it to California to get all “racial purity” on us. Sometimes when you swing too far to the left, you loop around….
June 8th, 2007 at 1:10 pm
Thanks for bringing this up. This kind of short-sighted, restrictive legislation should never have been allowed the light of day. Nanny staters are getting their wish!!
June 8th, 2007 at 1:18 pm
It’s California; that explains everything…
June 8th, 2007 at 1:27 pm
[…] with Mrs. Wigglebottom, The Cats — Aunt B. @ 12:27 pm Y’all, via Say Uncle, news so stupid I only hope it turns out to be a hoax. The California House has just voted to, in effect outlaw […]
June 8th, 2007 at 1:41 pm
I can’t even comprehend what legitimate interest the state could have in the types of dogs people are choosing to breed. It isn’t like people are breeding dingos or wargs.
I guess now that they have driven all the gun owners and car modders out of the state, they have to get to work on the pet owners.
I wonder which hobby will be next? Skydivers? Homebrewers? Cigar smokers?
June 8th, 2007 at 1:47 pm
Sounds like a new web business opportunity: breed definition and registration.
E.g., German Black Lab: Mother a German Shepard, Father a Black Lab (or both parents are German Black Lab).
Could be a pretty low overhead business if certificates are issued electronically (i.e., downloadable).
June 8th, 2007 at 4:17 pm
[…] SaysUncle started the conversation with this post wherein he mentions a little bill in California. Assembly Bill 1634, authored by Los Angeles Assemblyman Lloyd Levine, will allow only select purebred dogs and cats to breed. Pet owners who don’t sterilize their mixed breed pets by four months of age will face a $500 fine and possible criminal penalties. […]
June 8th, 2007 at 4:29 pm
“Sometimes when you swing too far to the left, you loop around….”
Rust: I assume you are referring to the old “Nazi = Right Wing/Fascist = Righ Wing” meme. Incorrect– the Nazis were socialists and the Fascists were dedicated Marxists. There’s no correlation there to what we call Conservatives in this country at all. Zero. As with most assertions coming from the Left, reality is exactly the opposite in this case. Stop it. Learn your history.
On to my comment: It sounds like some legislator has a close relative in the Veterinary business.
June 8th, 2007 at 5:29 pm
is there a lot of money in purebreed puppy sales, to perhaps finance a lobbyist or three? i wonder.
June 8th, 2007 at 5:34 pm
off topic, but… the staggering historical illiteracy in that comment quite stands on its own. does its author rather bad credit, as well.
the former east germany referred to itself as a democratic republic; was it either one? should political movements be judged by what they call themselves, or by what they do? judging the fascists (and the nazis can be fairly counted as such) as anything but right-wing totalitarians, based on their actions, would take willful blindness. do, indeed, study history!
June 8th, 2007 at 7:00 pm
Fascism: An authoritarian political ideology (generally tied to a mass movement) that considers individual and other societal interests subordinate to the needs of the state, and seeks to forge a type of national unity, usually based on ethnic, cultural, or racial attributes.
You will note that the definition doesn’t say anything about economic policies.
The Nazi Party, the NSDAP, was an acronym for, in English, the National Socialist German Workers Party. In fact, Nazi germany’s economic policy was mostly socialist, corporations had to submit to central planning under Albert Speer, and full wage and price controls were in effect.
There was a reason Stalin was in bed with Hitler …. and it wasn’t just convenience.
June 8th, 2007 at 7:15 pm
Uncle, thanks for the dog blogging and the gun porn; that’s most of what i read your blog for, and you always deliver quality.
along with it, i also keep getting reminders of why right-wingers can’t be communicated with, and that’s useful to me, too. i mean, when you’d have to drag a person through high school history classes (likely kicking and screaming) before you could even get them to square one of any reasonable political discussion, what’s the point? i wouldn’t necessarily mind talking politics with y’all — i’m opinionated and proud of it — but there’s limits to how much of your homework i’m willing to do for you before you could even find the page i’m on. and that’s why i don’t talk politics with right-wingers, full stop.
keep up the dog blogging and the gun porn, though. it’s appreciated.
June 8th, 2007 at 7:26 pm
I think we’ve had this discussion before and concluded it’s also why I don’t have same discussions with the left.
But, as kristopher noted, the nazis were economically socialist which is, matter of factly, more leftist than right. Authoritarian is neither right nor left and sometimes both. Like the dude said: i don’t care if the boot at my throat is left or right.
June 8th, 2007 at 7:41 pm
There is a fundamental difference in the processes at work in the economies of communist societies and fascist societies.
As to their effect on liberty or human rights, they are identical.
Now, Nomen, that you think you have established your intellectual superiority, can you tell us what that fundamental difference is?
If not? Just say so, and I will tell you.
June 8th, 2007 at 7:46 pm
…yeah, sure. that’s why they banned labor unions, famously came for the union organizers first, capped and reduced wages while raising taxes through the back door, and encouraged corporations to employ slave labor.
what color is the sky on a planet where such policies are socialist in nature?
i’ll concede that authoritarianism doesn’t care about the political spectrum; the communist and stalinist totalitarian experiments prove that well enough. but to blithely equate everything totalitarian and authoritarian with your political opponents and with nobody else — which is what i’m reading between the lines here — well, there’s just no way somebody who does that can be put right, no matter what anybody else says. and then communication is truly impossible.
damn, now you’ve gone and driven me into my habitual the-republic-is-dead and america-is-beyond-help miserable funk again. i try to avoid talking politics just so i won’t have to get those blues, y’know.
June 8th, 2007 at 8:32 pm
labor unions replaced with governmental controls is not right wing. neither is controls on wages and prices. slave labor is neither right nor left, imo. it’s just dickeshness. So, two of three i will state are more socialist in nature (i.e., gov control and not the free market).
well, sadly, that is the case. from all sides of the spectrum. Sadder still, is they are both equally wrong and equally right.
And don’t get the blues. Paris Hilton just went back to jail!!!! And that’s what’s important.
June 8th, 2007 at 10:25 pm
This is not off topic, as we’re discussing tyranny.
Nomen: But I need to educate you, and several others here:
Oh I get it– you consider “Right Wing” as equal to “Totalitarian”.
Lets be clear on definitions then. What do I call a government that makes the people’s private choices for them, under threat of retaliation? I don’t know about you, but in my book that’s socialist, Marxist, communist (I use the terms interchangeably, since the minor distinctions between them are irrelevant to the advancement of Liberty). I also call it, as do most Americans, “Left Wing” and I and millions of others can easily demonstrate that today’s American “Left” are more in tune with socialism, and farther from the opposite end of the spectrum– from Liberty (though they go ballistic when you point out this fact to them).
By that definition, the Nazis, the Rusky-Commies and the Fascists were all “Leftists”. They not only studied and believed in the principles of socialism (Mussolini was a devout disciple of Marx) but they practiced them as well. I have no interest in what they called themselves, but in the ideology that they put into practice, which is the ideology of “government knows best how to run your life and we’ll smack you if you disagree”. That is where we are headed with ideas like these insane dog laws, The Great Society, smoking bans, seatbelt laws, carbon credits, and Universal (socialist/communist) Health Care, and it is the American “Left” (socialists) leading us in that direction and away from Liberty, with some needed help here and there from the Republicans.
Now what do you call a government that holds to the ideals of Thomas Jefferson and the other Founders (as do I)? What is “Right Wing” if not the opposite end of the spectrum from the “Left Wing” /socialist/Marxist/Communists?
I don’t care what you call “Right Wing” but if its not the opposite of the “Left” You’ll have to do some real bending and twisting (“looping”) to explain it.
Hence, when I see someone saying that if you go far enough to the “Right” (toward Liberty) you somehow end up at Hitler & Mussolini, who were extreme Leftists, I have to correct the gross (though very common) error in their ways.
June 8th, 2007 at 11:50 pm
The nazis were the national socialist german workers party. That’s what the name of the party was. Nazi is just an abbreviation.
And you guys who think that anything anti-union is therefore not socialist are deluding yourselves. What use is a union when you have socialist central planners in charge? When you have a state owned or controlled business, the relationship between the state and the workers is the same as that with a business owner, even in a socialist system.
The workers are always going to want more pay for less work and the group controlling the factory (whether a fascist, pure socialist or capitalist) wants what the factory produces at minimum cost. There is an inherent tension here between the two groups that doesn’t magically go away because you switch to socialism. In fact, unions and the idea of striking were treated much more harshly under centrally planned economies because the strike breaking wasn’t constrained by a fear of government response if they used too much violence. Anyone who refused to do what they were told in Stalin’s time was just shot as an example to the next person they would give the order to.
June 9th, 2007 at 11:04 pm
Nomen, what you said is true, though unresponsive to the issue I put to you. What are the fundamental differences in the processes between fascist and socialist or communist?
Did you not understand the question or were you dodging it?
By the way, this country has never been, nor is it now in danger of real socialism or communism, however, our risk comes from facism. If you delve into why I say this, you just might discover the fundamental difference.
Our leftists and socio/communists are just useful idiots.
Try again, or ask and I will tell you. Although I would rather you derived the answer on your own, since you view us as opposed, I would rather not have to overcome your emotional attachment to winning the debate. I would prefer you to discover the truth of your own analyses, so that we can dispense with all the emotional “my dick is bigger than yours”.
June 9th, 2007 at 11:06 pm
One hint: look at what organizations survived the destruction of Germany or Japan in WWII. Look at what orgs. here remain totally untroubled no matter the political scenery or social trends.
June 12th, 2007 at 10:12 am
[…] Uncle points to a story about how your favorite pooches and kitty-cats may just soon become illegal in California “Unbelievable” was the reaction from PetPAC today after Members of the California State Assembly voted 41-38 to outlaw the existence of mixed-breed dogs and cats in the Golden State. […]
June 12th, 2007 at 7:46 pm
Does it surprise anybody that the entire list of folks who voted FOR this abomination have a “D” after their names.
Has anybody ever tried to explain hybridization and the benefits that has for species to these people?
Never mind. I used the word “explain” when discussing Democrats. Not possible.