The HSUS-driven animal rights attacks on the horse business just keep coming. Every man and woman who cares about preserving our horseback culture, our ability to make a living and raise our families in the horse business, and who cares about preserving the true, intrinsic value and worth of all horses needs to stand up and speak out TODAY!

Contact the American Horse Council and your Congressional delegations tell them to stop supporting the Prevent All Soring Tactics (PAST) Act. Egregious soring is illegal and has been for 40 years. Violations are not rampant. The proposed language is so broad that literally any training method could be used to permanently ban a horse from ever showing, and it gives animal rights activists a wonderful tool to destroy the livelihoods of any horse breeder, trainer, and showman. The only thing this legislation does is facilitate the last nail in the coffin of a once proud, prolific, and prosperous American horse tradition.

When they went after the Tennessee Walking Horses I did not speak out because I do not own Walking Horses.

Speak out about the Safeguard American Food Export (SAFE) Act which promises nothing but more pain, suffering, and economic devastation for both horses and people. Ignoring the fact that all meat is produced under federal inspection governed by the U.S. Humane Methods of Slaughter laws, and the Federal Meat Inspection Act which are the highest standards in the world for humane handling and food safety-this act claims that horse meat can never be tested for safety and that the only solution is to completely take away horse owner's private property rights, ban either the processing of horse meat in the United States, and the transportation of horses to other countries for that purpose.

When they went after horse processing I did not speak out because I'm not in that part of the horse business.

When they come after your Mexican Charriada neighbors attacking traditional livestock sporting events-speak up! Don't let a bunch of clueless animal rights activists interfere with livestock events like the Jordan Valley Big Loop in Oregon. Stand up and speak out when nonsensical legislation like blanket bans on hauling horses in standard livestock trucks are pushed regardless of the size of the animals or the configuration of the trucks.

When they went after less widely practiced livestock events like ranch rodeos, charriadas, and big loops I didn't speak up, and even when they went after mainstream rodeos and livestock fairs, because I don't rodeo...and I'm not a Mexican...

All of these animal rights driven agendas are based on the worst kind of propaganda, at best wild exaggerations, and at worst bald faced lies and misrepresentations-the more outrageous and unbelievable the better, it seems, to jack up the emotional drama dripping fundraising campaigns which are their stock in trade.

It is hard not to see the corollaries between the egregious tactics of these groups and Nazi Germany. Anyone who has ever visited the Holocaust Museum, or studied how Hitler was able to promote such unspeakable evil, knows that one of their most successful tactics was the use of exactly that kind of propaganda.

In 2011 the Holocaust Museum in Washington D.C. mounted a special exhibition, "State of Deception: the Power of Nazi Propaganda" that was certainly enlightening, as is the three chapters on propaganda in Hitler's book "Mein Kampf" on the study, use, and practice of propaganda.

"Propaganda must not investigate the truth objectively and, in so far as it is favorable to the other side, present it according to the theoretical rules of justice; yet it must present only that aspect of the truth which is favorable to its own side. (...) The receptive powers of the masses are very restricted, and their understanding is feeble. On the other hand, they quickly forget. Such being the case, all effective propaganda must be confined to a few bare essentials and those must be expressed as far as possible in stereotyped formulas. These slogans should be persistently repeated until the very last individual has come to grasp the idea that has been put forward. (...) Every change that is made in the subject of a propagandist message must always emphasize the same conclusion. The leading slogan must of course be illustrated in many ways and from several angles, but in the end one must always return to the assertion of the same formula."

Sound familiar? For those of us who have been on the front lines trying to save the horse industry from the rabid attacks of animal rights activists...it sounds like it comes straight out of the HSUS playbook.

Silence is not an option, or you, like Pastor Niemoller, will wake one day, or maybe you already have, to find that they have come for your [insert your horse breed/discipline/sport/equine use here] business, and there is no one left to speak for you. 

 It is almost too late, don't delay...

Here's how to contact the American Horse Council

Here's how to contact Congress