By Peter Grier, of the Christian Science Monitor
“we also have fewer horses and bayonets…”
Does the US military still use horses and bayonets?
The Old Guard caisson procession arrives with a casket holding remains of a group of 11 World War II airmen missing in action since 1943 that have been recently identified for burial ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington, Virginia. ~ photo by Hyungwon Kang/
This question arises because of President Obama’s riposte against Mitt Romney on defense budgets in Monday night’s presidential debate. At one point Romney charged that the US Navy is now smaller than at any time since 1916. Obama came back with a smooth and perhaps pre-planned zinger.
“You mentioned the Navy … and that we have fewer ships than we did in 1916. Well, Governor, we also have fewer horses and bayonets, because the nature of the military’s changed.”
The phrase “horses and bayonets” subsequently spawned a flood of tweets, as “binders full of women” did in the second candidate face-off. But as the descendent of one of the nation’s last horse cavalry commanders, this Decoder writer wonders about the accuracy of Obama’s words. He said the US has “fewer” horses and bayonets, not “none.” Is that accurate? If so, where are these things now?
Well, the bayonet thing is easy to elucidate. The Marines and the Army both still issue rifle-mounted knives to serve as hand weapons, utility knives, saws, and all-around handy items.
Bayonet training is an integral part of the Marine Corps Martial Arts Program, which every recruit must pass. During such training, recruits fix OKC-3S bayonets underneath the muzzles of their rifles, effectively turning it into a spear. They’re taught thrusts, jabs, and slashes, according to a Marine public affairs account of such training. They then must use these techniques on a dummy-filled course intended to simulate close combat.
As for horses, there’s still at least one equestrian unit in the US Army. That’s the Caisson Platoon of the 3rd US Infantry, “The Old Guard.”
The Old Guard represents the Army in ceremonies throughout the Washington region and the nation at large. They’re the soldiers visitors see at Arlington National Cemetery and in presidential inaugural parades.
The Caisson Platoon uses horses for the solemn purpose of pulling caissons carrying caskets toward interment at Arlington. They also long performed in popular historic pageants such as the “Twilight Tattoo.”
A more recent use of these horses is to provide therapy for soldiers hurt in battle or suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. Since 2006, the Therapeutic Riding Program has used Old Guard soldiers and horses in once-a-week riding lessons for wounded warriors at a barn a few minutes from northern Virginia’s Fort Belvoir Community Hospital.
Old Army horses don’t just fade away, in case you’re wondering. The Old Guard offers up some Caisson Platoon veterans for adoption at the end of their careers. Currently a 17-year old gray Quarter Horse named Clyde is looking for a retirement home, for instance. So is Omar, a 21-year old black Standard Bred.
The Army keeps another batch of horses stabled near Fort Bragg, N.C., to help train Special Forces troops who might have to ride through rough territory. Horse-mounted US commandos played a pivotal role in the toppling of the Taliban-led government in Afghanistan in 2001.
Related articles
- Obama Flubs: U.S. Has More Bayonets Today Than in 1916 (whitehousedossier.com)
- Here’s The Reason Why The Military Still Has Horses And Bayonets (businessinsider.com)
- Funniest Wingnut ‘Fact-Check’ of the Day: The Military Still Has Horses and Bayonets! (supersaiyan.newsvine.com)
- Let the “horses and bayonets” meme begin (storify.com)
Categories: Horse News
Straight from the Horse's Heart 
My nephew was in special forces in Afganistan. Troops used horses and there is even a published book which I saw on the shelf in Barnes and Noble about the use of horses for transport in the Middle East conflict.
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I knew about the caissons and the black horses used in interment processions, but I didn’t know about the rest. Thank you.
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This story is right up my street,” Horses and Bayonets.” I heard these words from the President’s own lips on BBC News. If I could ask two questions to the President they would be (1) Between 1913-17 what did your Government do with the humendous amount of British pounds that filled the coffers from the sale of over 600,000 American horses and mules, mainly horses to the British Army for WW1. (2) If you are re-elected for another term, would you spend thousands and thousands of dollars to commemorate the huge sacrifice of all those American horses and mules by erecting a long awaited memorial to them before the Centennial of WW1 in 2014 arrives. These forgotten heros died honourably not only for their Native country, but for their european allies overseas. They deserve eternal recognition and their descendents free of pain and suffering. Failing to do so would be like a bayonet forever thrusted into their hearts and backbone, and an allied’s (me) disgust.
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Of dear interest, is the last remaining Mounted Color Guard in the Marine Corps today. **Marine Corps Mounted Color Guard**, as they use ONLY Mustangs>
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Marine-Corps-Mounted-Color-Guard/158721660845455?ref=ts&fref=ts
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The Government still uses and abuses Horses , they should have the utmost respect for them as most of the Soldiers have, most absolutely love their Horses , they are as much a part of their Lives as family ………….. They use them in ceremonies and the passing of all Major Government Officials , they the Horses give Real Glass to them the Horses are the real Royalty …………………… The Horses add Real Class to any event !!!!!!
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While I would not have been so specific as the author of this article was in identifying the special forces operations at Ft. Bragg, I was aware of this training and also aware that we did not want to draw too much attention to the nature of it. Had the current use of horses by the military would have demonstrated what wonderful creatures our horses are, I would have gotten information together and sent it to you, R. T. However, it was made clear to me that the special forces operations did not want to call attention to. And to a point, I intend to honor this.
Yet, the fact that I knew this training was going on made by blood boil when I heard the President’s dismissive and disrespectful remarks during this debate. He may have thought he was just ‘dissing Governor Romney, but to me as a horse lover, a North Carolinean, and someone who values substance over style, I felt insulted as an American citizen. Does he really think we are all as uninformed as he and his donors are trying to make us???
I guess if the media is not covering the assassination of our ambassador, two former S.E.A.L. team members, and another diplomat in Libya, he figures he can say what he wants and no one will call him out on it.
And the truth is that he is right. Not because the media is liberal, but because it has been bought. Why has the media ignored the story of our wild horse and burro herds disappearing from the West except in the most superficial of stories? Because our wild horses and burros are the canaries in the green machine’s wind farms. If the people in this country were to realize what the disappearance of wild horses and burro herds signifies is going on in this country, they would rise up and stop it. But we are blind little sheeple thinking that we are fighting the same forces we have always fought, but we are not. There is so much more at work here than meets the eye.
This President just hopes he can keep us distracted with Sandra Flucke, Big Bird, dogs on cars, and attacks on his challenger to get him through the election at which point he can issue whatevery Executive Orders that he so pleases. An Executive Order cannot be overturned unless you have 2/3 vote in the Senate.
After the Kyoto Treaty signed by President Clinton, West Virginia senator, long time wild horse and anti-slaughter supporter, Senate sponsor of the ROAM Act, the late Senator Robert C. Byrd, wrote about the danger of ever increasing use of Executive Orders by the Executive Branch of our government. He was concerned that President Clinton, a member of his own party, had assumed privileges that are constitutionally the power of Congress alone.
Senator Byrd put forth what is known as the Byrd-Hagle Resolution that prevents the President from being able to sign any treaty that put the United States at an economic disadvantage with other other countries. The Byrd-Hagle Resolution made it unlawful for a President to sign a treaty that could harm the US economically without bringing it home first and seeking and receiving Senate approval through debate, discussion, and a vote. That is the way we do it in America.
Thank God for Senator Byrd. This resolution is evidence that he saw even then that what is happening in our country right now could happen. It is certain that he recognized the connection that Senator Reid has to the person the person who now owns most of our media that prints what we know to be false about wild horses and burros, but we do not question what it prints about other issues. How is this logic?
I taught the Diary of Anne Frank for years. One of the questions that disturbed so many of my students was how the German people let this atrocity happen. The truth is that they were being conditioned by a very carefully controlled message machine, much as we are now. They did not have the Internet, but they had books and paper. Remember the Nazi’s collected all the books and burned them. They confiscated all the paper and writing devices they could find, so the people had no way to communicate with each other. Make anti-Hitler signs.
The UN is contemplating a tax and a grab for power of the Internet so it will have the power to attach its own (.com, gov, .org) labels to every person and organization in the world. So we might not even have this much longer if we do not recognize that our American way of life is under attack from within.
If you have followed my comments in the past, you will note that I have refrained from making the analogy of the government’s destruction of our willd horses to Nazi Germany. That is because having taught some literature about this time period, i have thought that it was too great a leap to make and while there may still be a divide, it grows narrower by the day.
But most chillingly of all, the person who is buying our country has referred to the time he worked for the German occupation (perhaps taking the personal belongings of the Jewish people as they were conscripted and tattooed) as the “best time in my life”.
By the way, he owns property in the Rocky Mountains, including Nevada. Maybe he was Senator Reid’s real “Nevada” problem.
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Thank you for your very appropriate comments concerning this subject. I tend to “dumb it down” myself so that I don’t have to answer questions that are not supporting our country and it’s ability to remain sovereign. Sometimes, though, giving a brief as you have done, puts a light on so that others may be able to understand some of the complexities of the situation(s) when it comes to dealing with government agencies that intertwine. The worst possible time for these things to have to be explained and to put up with these sorts of comments are during election times when some of us just have to put a piece of tape over our mouths; however, we do have other recourse, just not the media and public communication. Thank you. And, I have been researching many things concerning the era and WWII also. It is very much like that – people never expected what happened and thought mainly that they couldn’t do anything to stop what was happening. That was the tragedy for those who did try – they were alone. Thanks, again.
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How and why our wild horses and soon our domestic horses will be fewer than they have been, and how this President has assured that this is the case.
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https://secure.wilderness.org/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=2501&JServSessionIdr004=mp9uelg494.app331b
if you are receiving messages like these as I am, you probably think that you are helping our wild horses and burros when you sign them.
Not true.
These groups have not offered to help the wild horses and burros because they do not want them or us on the land.
Just one more way, that our thoughts are being controlled.
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I’m not sure of the point of this particular article, back in 1916 we didn’t have air craft carriers and submarines, we had horses and bayonets. That was Obama’s point. While reading this was interesting, if it was a dig against Obama, and I’ve noticed that many horse and wild horse advocates are pro-Romney and think he will somehow magically fix everything, you’d better do some research on Romney’s comments about our public lands – like how he doesn’t understand why we have them or why the states don’t own these lands – to make the states $money$ from drilling and mining, and a politician from NM stating that Romney is with him on transferring these lands over to the states. Do we think the states would better manage and protect wild horses than the federal government? As bad as the DOI & BLM are now, I’m pretty sure states would be much worse, and without federal lands the 1971 Act will be history, all legal protections will be gone. As far as the economy goes, after little to no incoming work since 2007, I now have more work than pre-crash, which to me indicates that despite the Republican’s #1 priority for the last 3.5 years of making Obama fail, and in turn America fail, the economy is turning around. I’d hate to see that screwed up by going back to Bush policies, on steroids.
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We try to remain as neutral as possible and keep the focus on the horses but it never fails that someone swings the perspective around to make a political statement. An OpEd is brewing and either you are going to love it or hate it but if in your wildest dreams you feel that our wild ones can survive another 4 years under the destructive hand of chief cow company secretary Ken Salazar then you have another thing coming.
R.T.
Sent from R.T.’s iPhone
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You are right RT, niether one of these two give a rats ass about the Precious Mustangs, this is and always has been A Horse Holocaust , Because Ken Salazar can !!!!!!!! nothing more , nothing less……………………..
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This comment is to Teri W.. I just read your post that you have more work now than before 2007 and to you that indicates that the economy is turning around. The one thing that you did not say was, where you live and what you do. Well, I will say this for you; that’s great. I’m glad that you have work because I have a daughter, and 2 son-in-laws that are looking at a possible lay-offs on January 2 if the Senate doesn’t correct the problem with not approving a budget for our Country before the end of the year. If they don’t, 1/2 of all of our military will automatically be put out and will be out of a job on January 2, 2013. On top of that, Terri, ALL of the Government Contractors who have a contract with the Government whether they build planes, tank, or computers for the military, will be laid off as their contracts will be void on on January 2, 2013. Do you know someone who works for Boeing, Northrup Grummond or Lockheed Martin? Well, on January 2, they won’t have a job. Does that sound like the economy sound like it’s turning around to you? My husband is a long haul truck driver and his runs have gotten fewer each and every day. He’s a flat bed hauler too, so he hauls steel, lumber and shingles so when his stuff slows down the economy slows down. He sees all the big buildings standing empty in the small towns and the big cities. Oh and this thing about NOT RAISING TAXES ON PEOPLE MAKING under $250,000.00 well, that’s a bunch of BullS**t!!! I know this first hand as we make under $200,000.00 and our taxes have gone up every year by $2,500 the first year he came into office, then $5,000.00, the next year and I don’t know how much this year because they haven’t done them this year. Before Obama took office we had never paid this much in takes at all!!! Now we’re looking at possibly loosing our home because of all of these taxes!!! But you would rather let the 35 – 54 million people who are without jobs stay without jobs and let things get much much worse because of Obama’s policies, because you have much more work. Isn’t that just a little bit selfish on your part? Oh, and what about the horses? Because if he stays in for another term, there won’t be any more Burrors or Mustangs left to worry about. But this is my opinion.
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R.T. and others,
One of the solutions to any crisis or any problem in a democracy like ours is the political one. My purpose in life has paralled yours in that I have tried to look at this issue from many different perspectives.
I have been reviewing this whole issue of Agenda 21 since the night we got news that perhaps maybe, wonderfully, miraculously horse slaughter ceased. What I have learned since which is an enormous amount of information, in addition to what I learned from Debbie Coffey’s articles and the site democratsagainstunagenda21.com has taken on new meaning in the context of such information
However, the tipping point came when the Huffington Post printed an article alleging that Agenda 21 was just a Tea Party attempt to make a harmless little environmental movement in a non-binding treaty into a political issue.
What was so ominous about that? The Huffington Post is owned by the man who is funding all these initiatives to bring the “CHANGE” that the President’s administration is working to implement. This is thoroughly documented and publicly searchable, but you have to have at least a working knowledge of the terms that need to be connected.
Debbie Coffey, a member of your board, is the real expert on this. However, I am clearly a news/information junkie who has paid attention to almost any detail remote or otherwise that might have a bearing on the wild horse and burro question. This is the one that makes the most sense given the publicly observable actions of the actors in question.
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Believe it or not we will eventually run out of oil, and I guess there will always be wars. Prey there will be horses enough to help mankind as they once did before oil.
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horsedrag…I think you mean, “Pray there will be…” not “Prey…”.
Been in the military off and on for over 30 years….I HAVE ALWAYS KNOWN about equines in the military…why are so many gobsmacked?????
As part of my commitment to service and country, I will not discuss it.
What the Prez (whether you will vote for him or not is….) said was we ain’t in 1907 any more.
You want to discuss cavalry, caissons…etc…..begin. Please…make my day.
I do agree… the Prez dis’s equines in the US.
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Denise, I agree with what you are saying about the President’s intent, but honestly we are not in middle school any more. I used to see this kind of stuff every day in the hall ways—these type of cheap shots. Surely, the Governor knows what modern warfare looks like. He’s been studying up on this. I think the President makes himself look bad when he says things like that. He should be aware of the fact that he is a role model.
When I was in the classroom with students—particularly children who were from tough back grounds I made it a point never, never to say the SU to them. Sometimes they said it too each other. I am sure that I might have gotten them quiet faster a couple of times, but I wanted them to see that as an adult I did not have to lose my cool with them and behave in ways that are uncivil and contrary to my own nature. I had an opportunity to model behavior and to help them learn to be more respectful with each other. If kids see you even once start behaving on their level, you have lost your authenticity as the adult.
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Hoofhugs:
You are missing my point.
Equines and bayonets are used, but nothing like they did in 1907.
I won’t say more.
My problem is that the Prez doesn’t understand the plight of domestic and wild equines…nor their value in the military/government sector.
He doesn’t KNOW and his policies are poisoning humans and brutally killing equines. The opposing candidate would be just as bad or worse.
I am hardly posting from a middle school mindset….the candidates talk to us/US like we ARE middle schoolers, however.
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Denise,
I am sorry that my comments are too long for you. I am trying to explain how what is happening to our horses is related to what is happening in our country. It is hard to explain because the media is not only not covering it; they are covering it up and denying it.
I would never say that the President is the devil. That would be far too simplistic. I only know that he has had the opportunity to call a moratorium on wild horse gathers. He chose not to. He has had an opportunity to call a ban on the slaughter of US horses. He chose not to.
He’s been asked to fire Ken Salazar; he chose not to. Thousands of us have written to him for 3 and a half years and he chose not to respond to any of us.
If we elect Governor Romney and he has the opportunity to save our horses and he did not, then he would be no better. If we elect Governor Romney and he has the chance to prevent our carcinogenic or parasite infested horses from being slaughtered to feed humans and animals, and he chooses not to prevent this, then he will be no better. He told President Obama in March that the President needed to fire Ken Salazar, so that already makes him better.
This is bigger than horses, and it is bigger than me or you. Crackle, Spark, Flambe
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I was wondering if everyone caught that comment. You all know that we have sent letters to the President, and even if he didn’t read them, someone on his staff did. The fact that he is trying to use this as a political agenda “we don’t have as many horses and bayonets anymore” theme is suppose to be using our horses as hostage? What a really disgusting way to live; and a person who is like that inside must be terribly miserable. Sure, it makes us all mad, upset, and angry wondering what we can do about it. Actually, the U.S. President just told the American people that he can do whatever he wants to do and there isn’t a darn thing we can do about it just like the Sec. of Interior, Ken Salazar has been doing all along. The amazing thing is there is something very sinister about this whole thing. This is not just about horses. In fact, it is about making sure that they control where people live and what they have; and who can live there. Yes, this is about horses, but there is so much more to this story. The money and greed from killing is nothing to people like that. They don’t even think about it no matter what you do or teach them about the safety of food, of why we could never use horse meat as part of a healthy diet. That has nothing to do with what they are doing – it never was. It has been about the land, the ability to control what goes on, the greed, and the ability to buy people’s loyalty. Sometimes I don’t understand how people can even vote…we have been given choices of people who care to the level of their world – not to the level of reality. Anyone of these people have refused to allow the real world to enter their mind. They pay others to do that for them; give to charity; or start organizations. A few have been able to fulfill their dreams of having large ranches and making the best they can for these horses – but they are not politicians. And, actually, we only get reprieves but no answers. Mostly, it’s the politicians actually letting us know that there is nothing we can do about it. Ok, now I will go kick and scream, not that it will do any good….
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Jeannie, you said right at the beginning of your post that you knew that the President didn’t read all of “our letters but one of his staff had to”. You know, I do hope that you are right. Because right after he took office and all of the BIG roundups started and everyone was calling for us to send letters, fax, email or call the White House and ask the President to stop the roundups. Well, I did call the White House and a young black woman answered the phone and asked “How can I help you?” and I politely said, “Would you please ask President Obama to …..” and she hung up the telephone on me. Now I’m not saying she was prejudiced against me because you can tell I’m from the South when I speak and you can tell I am white as well. But I didn’t give her any reason to hang up on me before I even asked her to ask the President to stop the Mustang roundups. But from that one instance, if I had to trust my gut, I would say that they threw them in the trash and never read them. But I will say a prayer that you are right that he did have someone read them. But also, if I had to guess just going on his actions up to today, I would still have to say they were thrown away. But that is in my opinion. I hope that it will get better soon.
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For all of us who love horses or love living on our farms or near farms where our horses live, UN Agenda 21 would drastically alter our way of life. I do not know what the fate would be for horses under this plan, but I do know the goal of the plan is to have the government and corporations own all of our rural land, People, other than the elite few, would not be allowed to own land. We would be living in mixed use cities where stores would sit below apartments. This isn’t a totally new concept. Lots of small towns have shops where the shop keepers and a few tenets lived upstairs. But the goal is to move people off the land, move them into population centers where hopefully we would not even need cars. We could bike everywhere.
People who bike have become an important lobbying group. They are for “smart growth”, getting cars off the roads (more space for them to ride), and it may be that since so many people who ride bikes do not need land to keep a bike, they may not be as disturbed about living stacked in vertical housing in the cities.
However, as I have read more about this plan’s end game, small farmers would be virtually nonexistent. This is necessary because if we all have enough land to grow food on, we will not be dependent on the government to provide it for us.
The end game is not to make the environment better, but to control us by beng able to control our environment. However, we were not supposed to find out about this yet. As the video below states, when the plan was first conceived, it was expected to take at least 100 years. They are way ahead of schedule.
We would not be able to have horses because we would not be allowed to have land. Furthermore, horses represent freedom and if we had horses we coud escape the government’s supervision and possibly live free.
The people behind this plan realized that the United States had large amounts of publicly owned land that was full of natual resources. The came up with a plan to steal our wealth and give it to those who had less. The problem was these people represented non-governmental organizations seeking to make themselves wealthy in the name of saving the planet.
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Another point to consider is this. I know that access to public land use has been almost a birth right to those of you who live in the Western states where the government owns the land. I know that there is a fear that the land will be sold or that energy producers will force the closing of public lands to citizens.
Our founding fathers were against the government owning property because they feared that if the government owned too much land, the government would become a tyrant. (Are we there yet?) The idea was that if the government owned the land and the people didn’t, then the people would become serfs and serve the government. That is why they believed that it was a right of US citizens to own property.
Our federal lands, as a lot of you are aware, are being sold right under our noses right now, but we do not always know about it. However, you have people interested in the natural gas, oil, and minerals energy buying public land. These are wealthy people who have many different types of business investments.
The fact that Nevada is 87% federal land has made Senator Reid a king. He has considerable influence about who is able to buy land, water, and other parts of Nevada. If the land in Nevada were privately owned, he wouldn’t have a kingdom to sell.
The other piece of not having so many millions of acres of federal land to manage is that it would allow the US government to rid itself of an agency that has simply refused to fulfill its mission for 40 years while consuming billions of federal tax dollars.
I think I would like to see ranchers have the opportunity to buy some of the land they use to graze. It would be better for the land because the ranchers really would have to learn how to care for the land without the federal government’s efforts to refurbish it. However, I would also like to see the small farmers and ranchers who have struggled so much the past few years have an opportunity to buy land as well. If land were privately owned, we would not be under the same kind of threat we are under now.
However, Agenda 21 also has a plan to take privately owned lands from people who do not live in areas where there are a lot of public lands. A number of farmers who improving their land, so that they can become conservation areas and they plan to leave them to a conservation company upon their deaths. What will happen is that the land will be held in trust for a while by the conservation service, but it is eventually to be sold with the profits going to the government or the government may choose to keep it for its own use.
If you go to You Tube search for either UN Agenda 21 or Rosa Koire. Rosa does a nice job of explaining how this may be working at your local level. We can stop this, but we need to be informed and we need to act.
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The President’s point was that battles are not fought the same way there were in 1917. Horses and bayonets are not used to the extent they were back in 1917, nor are the ships used the same way nor do we have the need for those same ships. There was nothing disrespectful to horses when he made that statement, it is the truth. The horses the military does use now are used more for ceremonial purposes, horses have been used in afganistan because they can go where truscks cannot go in the mountains.
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Jo Claire, I did not mean that the President insulted horses. Considering the effects his policies have had on their welfare and subsequent deaths, the horses are simply beyond his power to insult. I know you have spent a lot of time rescuing horses from horse slaughter and advocating against slaughter. I have spent some time doing that as well. However, my disillusionment has come from three and a half years of watching his DOI destroy our wild horse families, sell our horses for slaughter, treat advocates with disrespect, endanger the life of a TV camera man, ignore the hundreds of thousands of letters, phone calls, faxes, post cards, and emails that have been sent to him in the White House, even the personal trips advocates have made on behalf of horses have been totally ignored by the President. His policies are exceedingly cruel. Rounding up terrified horses by helicopter is so unnecessary. Tying baby horses up and leaving them in front of the trap site for incoming terrified horses to run over, running baby horses over 9 miles of rock and tundra so that they hooves slough off, then boarding these babies on a cold metal truck, driving them for five hours, taking them off and putting them in a back coral where they like on the frozen ground for three days until someone decides to shoot one to put him our of his misery. Laura Leigh begged the manager to let her take the horse home until his feet could heal. She called while she was gone and was told he was fine. Then when she came back, she learned they shot him. Helicopter pilots hit our horses with the skids. They have contractors that don’t know how to set up the metal pens (like round pens) correctly, so the horses get injurred on the fence, they don’t bother to get enough water for the horses on a horse summer day if the horses drink it all, these people use cattle prods. They take perfectly happy, healthy horses that were perfect as God made them, run them over rocks, hot sand, or tundra, down steep hills always at a gallop, hands stand over a stallion so panicked he hit his head on the gate and broke his neck. When he went down and couldn’t get back up, they stood over him with sticks with white plastic bags—you know how comforting that is to a horse—they have no sense, no horse sense, no conscience, but every plea for mercy for these horses has been ignored.
The truth is that this President doesn’t give a didly flip about our wild horses and burros nor does he give a flip about our domestic horses. When he is finished implementing his plans, we probably won’tbe able to have horses because no one will be able to have anything that no one else has.
The insult was directed at Governor Romney. But, in my opinion, this made the President look very small. Since I am aware of the horses and training of them at Fort Bragg for non-ceremonial use, I was angry because I thought his attempt to make Mitt Romney look like he didn’t understand modern warfare actually revealed more about what the President did not know. There are always going to be situatons when modern technology is not going to be exactly what is needed. These horses that were used in Afghanistan were in great danger. Because horses have served in war for centuries, we sometimes forget what it means when a horse is willing to run into battle for us—-they go against their nature which is telling them to flee.
These high fear animals summon great courage and their mighty hearts as they did in Afghanistan, and the President is so dismissive of them. Maybe most people don’t know how the military still uses horses, but they are used in more than one branch of service. At the Parade of Roses several years ago there were several military groups riding their horses.
Yes, the President is correct. Bayonettes and horses are used less frequently that they were in the past, but there are still used in some combat situations and for other purposes other than ceremonial. I live in the georgraphic finger print of Ft. Bragg, and know a little bit about the horses being there, but that is all I am going to say.
When the President made this remark, he reminded me of the know it all kid in middle school who is always trying to make himself look superior by making other people look, and thus, feel badly. I tried to create a respectful attitude in my classroom where all students would feel safe, and had this behavior occurred in my classroom I would have addressed it. Therefore, it bothers me that our President who is a powerful role model for many people, but especially for young people makes such mean spirited remarks for all the world to see. There seems to be a lot more meanness in the world these days, but the last person who needs to be schooling children on how to be mean and insulting to someone with whom you disagree is the most powerful man in the world. He has the power—he doesn’t need to be the bully.
And when he acts like that, how authentic is his anti-bullying credibility? Maybe he is not who we thought he was. Maybe he really is the mean spirited man he showed himself to be in the third debate. If he thinks it is appropriate for him to be so openly hostile the Governor in front of 50 million people, maybe he thinks it is perfectly fine to treat our generous hearted, courageous, horses without compassion. If he is so dismissive of Governor Romney at such a moment, I guess it explains how he can be so dismissive of all of the wild horse and burro advocates and the anti-horse slaughter advocates who have tried to contact him for 3 1/2 years.
He can call the Pimp With a Limp, but he can’t take a moment with DeClan Gregg, or for R. T., Terry, and Jerry, especially after R. T. flew all the way from China to deliver those letters.
Sorry, but I don’t think wild horse and burro advocates are part of the 100% of Americans he says he is concerned about as President. He pledged to be President of all of Americans, but he has been deaf to our petitions. When my seventh graders wrote to President Clinton and President Bush, they got a response to their specific issue—nothing long or detailed, but at least an acknowledgement. This President, nada, nothing, —-Maybe MTV could put Ginger, R. T. John and Sonia Meadows or you be on an episode, not tell the President, and maybe he’d show up.
Disappointed and disillusioned, much.
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JoClaire, are you aware that we are currently in the Strait of Hormuz and the Mediteranean Sea with fleets of ships – which by the way are the one mode of transportation that moves vast amounts of military equipment around the world as needed. To the point of stressing the reason why the President’s comments were not appreciated by me is because some people have been in this fight for decades; and some of these people have lost their lives only to know that others will continue the fight for horses and burros. The President is well aware of the issues concerning what he said; but, the wild horses and burros don’t have a lobbying campaign and therefore do not count as the “farmers and ranchers” do. The idea of selling public lands to farmers and ranchers, as to the previous remarks, is a bad idea. They already keep the grazing lands and water from the wild horses and burros and selling the public lands will not help the horses and burros – it will increase the problems. Even now, under lease agreements that are not complete ownership – these land leases have been given the rights to the grazing fields and the water to do as they please. This is the very reason why I backed off being so involved because there are so many people who take it for granted that politicians will actually change the policies of the Bureau of Land Management when in fact, they have appeased, but not changed anything. Buying horse at $10/head is just one example; it does not however, cover any other activities that have happened. Since BLM does not keep accurate records of the number of horses/burros and how many are paid for during roundups it will be almost impossible to file any complaints unless a person comes forward with the actual data from BLM. As a gov employee, any BLM employee will have to follow the rules of their job and that could and can include any agreements to keep all of these facts in-house. I just refuse to argue about it because there is no definite change in what BLM does.
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What we need is a informant ,I am sure there is one there, with all the corruption , I am sure there is at the least 1 person there who is not pleased with what they are doing !!!!!!!
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Frankly, I understood the meaning of the President’s remark in the same way as Jo-Claire – as in things are done differently than they used to be.
But to be honest – I’m not a fan of Romney.
Hoofhugs, have learned a good deal from your emails & links. Does seem like our public lands
are being gobbled up faster all the time. And I’m sure the eradication of the wild horses is a part of it.
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You were not supposed to like Governor Romney. The President assumed that he would be the nominee, so his funders decided to fund Adbusters which got the OWS movement started. After Adbusters got it started, the OWS movement was supported by Moveon.org. The purpose of OWS was to ingrain the idea in people’s minds that the reason that the 99% are struggling is because the 1% of Americans do not pay enough in taxes. This is based on the idea that there are only x number of pieces in the pie. If y takes more of the pie than z, then it is unfair to z. Maybe true in table manners, but not in our economic system if you believe that in America everyone can bake his own pie. Therefore, if C only wants a little pie because she doesn’t like to bake as long as D, that is OK. Maybe C values other things more than the size of her pie. However, if D wants to spend 10 hours a day six days a week baking his pie, shouldn’t he be allowed to enjoy his pie. D gave up playing golf or going hunting. C wanted to ride her horses, and she did not want to make the same sacrifice. The question is would it be fair to make C work the same hours D did? Would it have been fair to prevent D from working hard to earn the pie he wanted? C made her decision freely and so did D. Each of them got what they wanted. Why then should C fill her life with resentment just because D’s pie is bigger than hers. She did not want that pie.
Occupy seemed to be about building resentment because some people felt entitled to good jobs when they graduated from Ivy League schools or other schools with debt and could not find a job. My parents advised me to major in something that I could find a job doing. My first few jobs didn’t pay much more that food, rent, car payments. But I learned a lot, worked with a good group of people (priceless), had an opportunity to advance and learn even more. Therefore, I found the whole OWS stuff pretty disgusting after the first few days. When I taught at the school for the blind here, I observed our blind students carrying their Braille Text books around campus with them. In order to make sure they stayed on the right direction, a lot of the kids would keep one food on the edge of the sidewalk, so here you have children carrying books the size of a Sears catalog, trying to balance a couple of them, and concentrating on the tactile feedback to get to class. I was often amazed at how quickly and how well they did it. They didn’tcomplain about it—they were proud that they were able to do it. I would love to be able to soar through the air like Michael Jordon did, but God didn’t give me those gifts. We are created equal by God in terms of our inherent worth and our rights to certain opportunities, but do not all have the same gifts or temperaments. That is good because a lot of different work needs to be done.
But I digress. Before the Republican nominee had been selected, the President’s funder had put OWS in motion and people bought into it. How many of us say, I am part of the 99%. If some people weren’t so rich, I would have more. I do not know how many different ways we were repeatedly messages that we did not belong to one another, but were separate. I know that my life is infinitely better every day because a wealthy philanthropist donated enough money to build the YMCA’, the church, community gardens, etc. I’ve spent a lot of time on college campuses and cities. There are libraries, academic centers, laboratories, wings for breast cancer patients in hospitals, dormitories, missions in this country and to foreign companies, that are paid for through the philanthropic efforts of people who are wealthy. All Senator Reid wanted you to think about is that Mitt Romney had not paid taxes in 10 years. The Governor had not taken a salary in over 10 years; his income was based on his investments which are taxed at a lower amount because the income you made on some of your earnings has already been taxed once. The Governor gives almost 30 percent of his income to charity. The President gives more than 30% of our income to charities. But we were supposed to believe that the Governor is a greedy, cold man. To make sure that this is what you believed, we have been unedited with messages from a media that is largely funded by one man or his multiple groups. Another media mogel shares some of this same man’s goals, so we weren’t going to hear anything else.
We are in a dangerous place in our history because our media is only reporting what it wants us to know in the way it wants us to know it. Have you seen any stories about the plight of the wild horses. Has one major media network done a feature story on a wild horse family being torn apart? Has one major media outlet talked about the important role wild horses play in range ecology? Has any major media outlet done a special on Ginger’s work with Cloud or the very scientifically significant work of Karen Sussman? No, there is no media coverage about the parts of the story that tear us apart because we understand this story differently.
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I share your ambivalence about the idea of selling off a large amount of our public lands. However, the fact that the lands belong to the public while the government manages them for us acting as care takers hasn’t been working out too well for us. We have multiple federal agencies who have yet to meet a scientific fact they couldn’t edit. We have spent billions of dollars funding federal employees who think they are land barons, not public servants. If the land were sold to private land holders, it would be in the hands of the people. I am not suggesting that we need to sell all our public lands or that we sell them to one group as opposed to another. However, we are in danger now because our government (we–but we no longer matter) owns this huge mass of land full of natural resources to provide water, minerals, oil, natural gas, coal, uranium, and many other substances. There is also a lot of land for raising animals for food as well as GMO grasses, fruits, and vegetables.
Our founding fathers never intended for the government to own land. They feared that the government’s control land could give the government too much power. If government owned property which it controlled, government could quite easily forget that iwas eeping the people’sland in trust for them. Government would own the ability of the country to prosper and the country’s wealth would be in the hands of our government, not the people. The people, under such a system would be serfs living on the government’s or the government’s chosen corporcracy’ land.
This sounds absurd, but go back and read Debbie Coffey’s articles. Review the video above where the Wild Life Project is laid out. Look at your email. Did you get anything in your email today asking you to send a letter to your Congressman or Senator requesting him or her to designate some areas as a protected area for wildlife? Have you received an email from the Sierra Club or Earth Justice lately? Do you live in any of the states that are going to be observed by representatives from the UN who do not live in democracies like ours to make sure that the minority vote is not suppressed. Do you think that the UN is more reliable than any of the vast number of resources in the US?
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To consider the public lands, which are payed for by tax dollars, even under lease agreements that do not transfer the proceeds to the taxpayer, as “for sale” real estate is a very big mistake. First of all, the American Indian nations may have something to say about all of the broken agreements…one of which every American Indian would receive 160 acres, etc. But, along with with headache comes the oil, gas, and mining industries. The states would have a nightmare trying to regulate all of these companies and the problems of individual ownership. I am even thinking that these public lands would be so expensive that only the wealthy would be able to own them after the bidding started. The problems with the leased public lands have been enough headache and if selling the lands do not solve the wild horse/burro population and migration problems, then what would be the reason to do so under this venue? To actually manage these public lands, BLM would have to be dismantled and undergo complete restructure. To hire the people that it would actually take to reorganize the land area, to stop these centuries long lease agreements with ranchers who have caused more problems than do anything else, and to make sure the lands and the wildlife are actually protected would be a wonderful way to increase the number of employed in the country. I live in a state that has plenty of Forest Reserves – but horses are not allowed on the lands. This entire program is entirely stupid. It never allows for migration to water and grazing; increasing the number of wildlife killed because of the imbalance of nature, water, and grazing. These government programs should be totally separate from the national parks and the other programs that BLM proudly proclaims as making profit on. If the horses were put under a totally different gov. agency, BLM would not have the rights as they do now to make any profit or complain due to their own mismanagement. I don’t like bureaucracy, but your idea of selling to individuals means that we are going to be in a bidding war much worse than the bidding wars when people are trying to save as many wild horses as possible against a bunch of thugs who are trying to sell them to slaughter in Mexico and Canada. In the U.S. the gap between the middle class and the upper class has grown; most people couldn’t afford to pay the price once the lands hit the open market. And, under a real estate agency, under normal circumstances the prices would be even higher because the agent would have the right to a commission, and so would the auctioneer and all concerned. Who would receive the money that is paid for each acre of land? It wouldn’t go to the horses and burros, and it wouldn’t go anywhere except to what the BLM decided which could be to rid even more horses from the public lands. I understand your opinion, but there are just too many consequences that are bad for the horses and burros.
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SECTION 1. Section 598c is added to the Penal Code, to read:
Section 598c Prohibition of Horse Slaughter
(a) Notwithstanding any provision of law, it shall be unlawful for any person to possess, import into, or export from, the state, or to sell, buy, give away, hold, or accept any horse with the intent of killing, or killing or having another person kill that horse, where that person knows or should have known that any part of that horse will be used for human consumption.
(b) For purposes of this section, “horse” means any equine, including any horse, pony, burro, or mule.
(c) Violation of this section is a felony punishable by imprisonment in the state prison for 16 months, 2 years or 3 years.
(d) It is not the intent of this section to impact any commonly accepted horse commercial, non-commercial, recreational or sporting activity.
(e) It is not the intent of this section to impact any existing laws which relate to horse tax or zoning.
SECTION 2. Section 598d is added to the Penal code, to read:
Section 598d Prohibition on Sale of Horsemeat
(a) Notwithstanding any other provision of law, horsemeat shall not be offered for sale for human consumption. No restaurant, cafe, or other public eating place shall offer horsemeat for human consumption.
(b) Violation of this section is a misdemeanor punishable by a fine of not more than $1,000; confinement in jail for not less than 30 days nor more than two years; or both the fine and confinement.
(c) A second or subsequent offense under this chapter is punishable by imprisonment in the state prison for not less than two years nor more than five years.
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I like the sounds of that Arlene. Is it for a state or is it federal?
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Dear Hoofhugs it was sent to me i will find out
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I think you might enjoy seeing this video about the Horse Soldiers of Afghanistan. It is a powerful statement about what it takes to win a war in this part of the world.
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Hey Horsehugs,
The Marines have a training camp somewhere in Cali where they go to train the Mustangs that they ride over in Afghanistan to get to where the Taliban are hiding way up in those mountains between Pakistan and Afghanistan. They have been riding these horses and mules since the beginning of the war in 2001 after the attack on the World Trade Center. I have a son-in-law who just retired from the Marines on the 11th of Oct. and this unit was featured several times on the RFD channel and they have ridden in the Rose Bowl Parade every year carrying the colors of our Country and the Corps. Plus they are the only ones to use bayonnets on their rifles in combat. UH-RAH!!! From a former Marine Corps Wife and Mother-in-law.
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I had had the good fortune to see all the equine units in the 2010 Parade of Roses. it really is quite extraordinary. The former director of the Parade had a love for horses. I remember the units—might come up with a photo if I can pick it out. There may be multiple places where equines and marines and other special forces train to use horses in special situations. Every marine is apparently trained to use a bayonnette and they are standard issue. Mustangs need all the good publicity they can get.
The movie Horse Soldiers is in development. I have the book, but it is still on the “to be read” shelf. I’ll see if I can pick out the Marine/Mustang unit you describe. I have cable, so I don’t get RFD unless there is a special program put on the Internet.
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Hey Horsehugs,
Thanks for the info on the Horse Soldiers book and movie, I’ll have to look for that one. As for the Marine unit in the parade, I can’t remember if they were in their Dress Blues or in their Desert Camies. But I do remember that there were quite a few of them on horses and mules. If you get anymore info about that UN/Agenda 21 stuff, send it to me. I tried to tell my Progressive Son-in-law from Cali and when he couldn’t find anything he said I was “just dreaming it all up.” So, if you can send me anything else, send it to me at my email address tswietek@yahoo.com. To save the Mustangs we all have to join in and join together and make a loud noise!!! Semper Fi!!
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/Users/User1/Pictures/iPhoto Library_2.photolibrary/Masters/2012/09/24/20120924-013856/IMG_0233.JPG
This may be a picture of this unit. I don’t know if it will open or not.
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It wouldn’t open for me. So I Googled Marine Corps Mounted Unit 2010 Rose Bowl Parade and a whole bunch of pictures came up. If you will look through them you will see them in their dress blues carrying the flags.
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For those of you who have asked about the military use of horses, one use is the Old Guard. This is the Army Unit that watches over the Unknown Soldier. Here is a link to the program for veterans I think you will like that is for soldiers home from battle etc.:
http://www.army.mil/article/81601/Therapeutic_riding/
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Here is a story about the statue commemorating the contributions of the Horse Soldiers in the Afghanistan war. This is now at Ground 0 as part of the memorial. One might think it too grand to missed by the grand visitors and speakers who come here.
http://horsetalk.co.nz/2011/11/29/horse-soldier-statue-stands-proud-near-ground-zero/#.UIxcwLShDFI
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Great videos – do remember hearing about the horse soldiers in Afghanistan way back when, but there never seemed to be much information “out there”.
By the way – I’m not ambivalent about the selling of our public lands – just worried that selling to the so-called public might mean the land would be bought up by large corporations, as has already happened. And not all of them American. The BLM definitely needs to be gone. BUT how do we – the people make this change? Doesnt seem to be working well so far. And having the states take over the public lands just might not be better in all cases.
I hope & pray that the news conference will get information out there for people who arent aware of the danger to the wild horses.
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Six months ago, I would have been opposed to the sale of public lands. However, I find it helpful to always be open to new information because I don’t know everything. Knowledge is not concrete; it is more like wet clay and changes shape as more clay is added or shaped by more skilled hands.
Interior already has the authority to sell public lands through land swaps, and is encouraged by Congress to do so if it is profitable and under the Secretary’s discretion the purchaser will make good use of the land involved.
I am not advocating the sale of all public lands. I am advocating the elimination of the Bureau of Land Management, the most corrupt, willfully ignorant and incompetent, arrogant, unaccountable federal agencies imaginable. The issue is this: If the federal government owns the land, the federal government controls every single things about the land. During the Clinton administration environmentalist and Al Gore selected Interior Secretary Bruce Babbit decided to shut off water to the Klamath Basis. Several farm families relied on this water to irrigate their profitable family farms. This was their livelihood. Secretary Babbit made his decision based on fictional science provided by FWS alleging that this was necessary to save two rare species of a fish. The land dried up. The farmers went bankrupt and lost their farms. It was later discovered that the science was wrong. These fish were not endangered at all, but the damage was done.
Why anyone would want to continue pay taxes to support a federal agencies actually building fences to keep Americans off federal lands per Administrative Orders from Secretary Salazar? I can tell you, these fences are not being built for decoration. They are being built to keep you and me from accessing public lands. Fencing was always an issue in Madeleine Pickens Mustang Monumnet. Remember when they were removing the piddly 1,4000 horses from Antelope not far from her property. Her fencing was not then ready. We are being fenced off now. Please open your eyes. If you skipped the Wild Lands video, please, please open it. This is just one tiny piece of this.
There is a lot of water, an ocean of water under the state of Nevada, and apparently there is a lot of oil far below the desert. This land is being sold now to very wealthy friends, funders, supporters, of Senator Reid, Secretary Salazar, the President, and those on board with UN Agenda 21.
We are in a fight for our freedom. If people do not realize that while our soldiers have been fighting and dying in the Middle East, while the real take over of our country is being carried out in Washington, DC., far the bloody battlefields of Afghanistan, we are lost.
And as for our horses, our symbolbs of freedom with their might hearts—why would anyone want to remove them from the Americans who love them and take such inspiration from them?
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I contacted the White House several times and every politician I could to determine just why they couldn’t move this “fish” that was so important that it dried up the land and now fertile lands look like a dust bowl. I have been one of the first ones to post this personally on fb page; and then I also took on the reason why they were doing it. I also was one of the first ones that explained just how Agenda 21 is effecting the entire country and how it, along with Martial Law, has superceded the rights of any Americans if the gov. so chooses to make any decision good or bad. The military aspect is one that I am familiar with as I worked for the military and family members served, serving, or died for this country. What you have said just proves my point, no matter what you do, unless Agenda 21 is stopped, which also is part of the Laws of the Sea, by congressional mandate, it will go forward under any administration. The fact that the lands are being sold to rich investors is another proven point. Do you really think that it would be different under any administration? Not unless these lands are devalued and you and I both know that the oil, mining, and other industries are going to bid high prices for these lands no matter who is in office. I really don’t see an argument here unless it is just to clarify, I do not disagree with you. I however, have in the past posted these facts just as soon as they were happening and people began to realize slowly, just how devastating it would be. Sadly, these lands would never be purchased by someone who wanted to allow wild horses and burros because the BLM is still controlling issues that it should never be allowed to have anything to do with due to the employees inability to understand how to do the work that has to be done, which I also posted on that several months ago. Dismantling the BLM would go against any political agenda right now due to the fact that this organization has been supported by those who want these lands for oil, mining, etc and no amount of discussion will change that. The only way to get anything done, of course, is to not give up and keep coming up with ideas and proven ways to dismantling BLM. But, “warning”; we really must have people who can divide these problems up in a organized way and have people who are qualified to do these jobs on hand. When these roundups happen, the advocates can never raise enough money to buy all of the horses that are put up for “adoption” or sale. Which brings me to another point: every wild horse that is adopted is gelded or sterilized. This may cut down on unwanted horses for some, but it does nothing to ensure the bloodlines of certain horses, which we have seen decrease and the gene pool is now dangerously low, including the problem of the number of fertile mares and stallions which could be too closely related to breed successfully without some birth defects; also the breeds that are part of heritages, the ability to breed true white mustangs, the ability to have healthy foals is severely depleted. Now, that moves me to the “adoption” process of these horses which is never an open policy of allowing the public to know details of each horse/burro. To disagree with you is not my point; agreeing and reading ideas that work, and trying to get them implemented is.
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HoofHugs,
Thank you~Thank you~ Thank you~standing and cheering.
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Two days ago the President issued the following executive order while most people thought he was just being grilled about Libya by Denver Channel 9.
This will allow the White House to establish a network of our neighbors that they trust and choose, not elected officials that we can vote out of office, to keep an eye on us and report to them any of our activities that might represent a threat to “national security”
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2012/10/26/executive-order-establishing-white-house-homeland-security-partnership-c
This is about our Freedom.
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Tighten up the posts Hoofhugs; make your point and then come back to continue.. They are TOOOOOOOOOO long.
I got it…Obama is the devil.
Sadly, no one else to choose from.
CONGRESS IS OUR/US PROBLEM!!!!!!!!
Flame on at will………..
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The Bureau of Land Management is not necessary. They do not manage land. The Office of Surface Mining could take over some of the duties of the BLM. There are many firms that do auditing and clerical work that could be contracted to perform the issuing of leases. The BLM doesn’t do Environmental Assessments or Environmental Impact Statements unless it is issuing a wild horse removal and then these guys can produce 120 pages of gobbledegook. They are not managing the lands for healthy lands. They are managing horses to extinction. They deceive the public.
Perhaps it is because I live in the East and there has never been a Bureau of Land Management here. Our land is much healthier. Our pastues of rolling and green. Horses and cattle share pastures quite happily. Our states’ departments of agriculture emphasize pasture management and talk about how having both horses and cattle on the same pasture can help “rest” the pasture.
The way things are now, the BLM is essentially a king maker. The BLM decides who gets permits to use public land. They decide which ranchers in Oklahoma can earn millions from allowing wild horses to graze on their land. They decide who can have water and who can’t. They help their friends remove wild horses from public lands to sell for horse slaughter. You know they know good and well who is taking these horses and selling them for slaughter. Heck, if I even know this as far away as I am removed from this situation, you know the BLM has employees that do.
I do not think that all public lands should be sold. As for the wild horses, I think it would be very beneficial is communities and perhaps universities would develop an extensiion serve study center around wild horse herd areas. That is the case around the Shackleford Island horses in North Carolina where Duke University and Princeton University have ecology and animal sciene students spend time monitoring wild horse behavior and the effects of wild horses on the island’s ecology.
Even if students did end up working with wild horses, there would be much value in using such a site to train students on what and how to measure animal behavior and, at the same time, study the ecology, weather, and other influences both on horses and the horses on the land. To create university study centers and training centers for wildlife personnel in the area of where wild horses live you have a rationale for land being managed by people who hopefully have some education in land management who will be constantly measuring and assessing what is happening to the land and the water as well as grasses.
Perhaps some people could open real eco-tourism businesses near wild horse herd areas that did not include fences. I think people would come to areas to ride, paint, photograph, hike, practice Yoga, kayak, or take part in other activities where they could observe wild horse families from a distance. We don’t necessarily want fences.
But I think the key will be to make sure that the horses are kept safe will be to have people on the lands near the herd areas, and the truth is we have much to learn. The Shackleford Banks results are quite interesting because they reveal that having the wild horses on the land is reforesting the island. They are the only grazing animal there.
I believe that the first thing we must do is rid our country of Secretary Slaughterzar, and the President. Then, we need to work out some structure with our local or federal elected officials to see how we can get our wild horses back into their herd areas. Yes, some of them have been gelded and we also have low numbers in others.
Interestingly enough, Dr. Gus Cothan has been banking wild horse DNA at Texas A & M, so it may be possible for us to retrive some of that. They may also have frozen embryos. Who knows. We are truly living in a Brave New World, and if you find it chilling, so do I. Nonetheless, it is what it is, and we must do what we must do.
If federal land were returned to the states to manage, it would be a good idea to have some ideas about how the wild horse areas in your state could be used for wild horses while at the same time having a human presence constantly on the land. It might be that since they are protected by federal land that a federal agency could be created to do what the BLM was first charge to do in 1971.
We know they are corrupt. We know they ignore science. We know they hire contractors that treat our horses cruelly time and time again. We know they try to kill and cripple as many horses as they possible can during roundups (not so many they attract the attention of NEPA), we know they are in cahoots with horse killers.
Maybe there could be a raffle for the right to bid on federal lands and the raffle could be managed by T. Rowe Price or American Express—-some group without an interest in the end. Perhaps the raffle could be open to only those people with good credit with an income under $200,000 for 10 acres at a time. There are ways this could be done. Don’t say Can’t. Think about how it could be done so that the public has a shot. Even if the federal government does nothing more than rid itself of the BLM, it will save millions every year. The land does not necessarily need to be sold to the person who has the highest bid.
I do want our wild horse families saved and preserved and on public lands where the public can come to view them and be inspired by them. But at the same time, I fear that as long as the government owns this amount of land (Imagine Ken Salazar is ruler of one of the largest and most valuable tracts of land in the world. Has this been good for us or our wild horses?) Our freedom is at stake here, not just the freedom of our wild horses. If this land were privately owned, it would be must harder to pull something like this off. That’s all.
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I understand your optimism, and frankly that is what will help us all continue on in a fight that has been nothing but the federal agency known as BLM and the policies set forth under this administration and previous administrations toward the wild horses and burros. This is not the first administration that has carried on this policy towards wild horses and burros. The complications is so very vast; that is what I am talking about. There is also a danger of the U.S.F.S. (US Forest Service) also being handed the job of “managing” wild horses and burros, and we all have seen how well that works out – the F.S. doesn’t even have to notify the public of any roundups and can and do kill at will. That is a real problem – transferring the care of these horses and land masses for them to live on while I have noticed they never leave a migrating area for these horses. Also, your idea of private ownership is one that has been part of the lease agreements with BLM. As a matter of fact, the lease agreements gives them the greatest part of ownership of the land with BLM retaining only in name, but all water and land rights (except for mining and drilling are under different lease agreements). These lease owners have the right to shoot the wild horses at will due to the idea that they are protecting their livestock. The idea of thinking that all good people will be buying up these lands is not very realistic. Of course I agree with the Universities involvement – but you have to know someone willing to introduce the thought and the whole political systems of universities are not all that easy to get through. There is the problems of writing applications for grants and having enough people who are actually serious about staying with these programs so they will work. But, if someone doesn’t get started it will never get done. I am not capable, I am not going to make people believe I am able to do that – it would be wrong. I have just worked at a university and understand some of the problems the people who want to do this would be challenged with. I do understand you thoughts about the state controlling the horses; and, if each governor and senate, legislature would all agree that the wild horses and burros are needed for the balance of nature and the protection of heritage it might work if the state has the budget to do so. These ideas all cost money, even if you are able to purchase the public lands, there is still the problems with the neighbors who are ranchers and can and do kill horses without notification – it’s just common sense to know that I don’t have to have a video of these ranchers killing horses and burros to believe that it happens. Especially since these ranchers have so many gripes about the wild horses and lie on federal documents and even make false reports on federal documents and harass federal agents who try to investigate. We are talking about changing more than just the ownership of land – we are talking about being able to change the actions of people for more than 100 years. I can see that you are very intelligent, and without a doubt much more attuned to the capability of introducing your ideas at the meetings and gathering people together that can make a change. Your living location is perfect because I have seen some of the pictures of the wild horses on the east coast – while not perfect programs, it’s a place to start improvements. If you could find a venue to go on air and have people who are experts with you to answer questions your ideas could happen even if it took awhile to do! At any rate, I am thankful that people like you love the horses because we all do not want to lose them to extinction. Thanks for communicating with me. ~jb
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Tracielynn,
The picture I have has a group of young men in dress blues and white hats. Maybe I can send it to you when I email you.
The video near the top that is captioned The Wild Lands Project is part of a group of videos I found on Agenda 21 that are on You Tube. There is also one called Agenda 21 for Dummies. There are also several videos that have been done by Rosa Koire. I like to look at the date that the video was made or last edited. While the quality may vary, it is more likely that you will find signs or will hear language that sounds familiar.
This began in 1992 in Rio at the UN Convention on the Environment when George Bush signed this treaty. It was not implemented in the US until President Clinton issued an Executive Order to form the President’s Council to decide how to implement this treaty in the US. The people at Rio believed that it was possible that that the world was heating up and some science pointed to evidence that man’s creation of CO2 was in part responsible. A lot of the science has been discovered to have been fraudulently created, and there is contradictory evidence and opinion about how to interpret that evidence and controversy abut whether man’s behavior is contributing to climate change (global warming is now out of fashion). However, before the 1992 with governments across the world, a shadowy figure named Maurice Strong who now lives in China, met with over 100 non-governmental organizations known as NGO’s to law the framework for the 1992 governmental convention. These groups were primarily environmental groups such as the Sierra Club. The Sierra Club was also a member of President’s Council on implementation.
The Sierra Club is being paid by the same funder who I have aluded to before to lobby against the coal industry. The Sierra Club Foundation has spent over $200,000 in contributions for Democratic candidates and over $800,000 against Republican candidates. Both the Sierra Club and Earth Justic have opened chapters in my state over the last few months—every email is full of propaganda.
We are asked over and over agains by environmental groups to write out Senators and Represenatives to ask that we preserve such and such a place or to save such and such a species. Every time we sign one of these we are sealing our own fate. These groups are being used by the government to keep us off the land under the guise of protected a habitat or some type of rock formation.
I have gotten so unnerved by this, that I am just deleting them all, until I can figure out which ones are working aginst our horses(like the Sierra Club, Earth Justice) and which ones are neutral if there is such a thing.
The other part of this to consider is that not only are so many sources of the media bought and paid for, we are also being bombarded by emails and petitions that look like they represent causes we could support, but we are also being sent some very strong messages over and over again until we don’t question their veracity.
Because some of them were anti-coal and since I am fronm a state where coal is the life blood, I paid careful attention to the messaging. If these petitions were about something that I did not have an internal gut check on, I may not have noticed. When I go back and look through my email, groups of petitions, Change 2 newsletters, there appears to be a well coordinated message. I would not suggest such a thing if I had not spent some time digging around trying to find sources.
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http://www.freedomadvocates.org/articles/illegitimate_government/pelosi_and_others_promote_agenda_21_in_congress_20040910112/
Documents early efforts to implement UN Agenda 21…Factual…Factual links
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/06/09/executive-order-establishment-white-house-rural-council/
Executive Order 13575 – Establishment of the White House Rural Council…
http://ppjg.me/2011/07/18/the-quiet-coup-the-implementation-of-agenda-21/
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http://ppjg.me/2011/08/01/the-usda’s-incestuous-relationship-with-the-rural-council-the-united-nations/
http://ppjg.me/2011/07/25/usda-closing-roads-to-public-lands-while-opening-doors-for-the-united-nations/
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http://ppjg.me/2011/07/04/is-the-u-n-stealing-control-of-our-water-and-republic-right-out-from-under-us/
Most of these articles have appeared here on R. T.’s site. Look for patterns. i wish this were science fiction, but it isn’t.
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