HSUS charged with false fundraising practices again

[Bill Fosher]

The Humane Society of the United States never misses an opportunity to pull on your heart strings to get you to open your wallet. As far as I know, it doesn't usually resort to outright lies, but in the wake of the indictment of football star Michael Vick and others on federal dog fighting charges, it apparently did.

 

The day the indictment was announced, HSUS claimed on its website that it would use all donations to "care for the dogs siezed in the Michael Vick case." In fact, the dogs are in the custody of public authorities (as near as I can tell) at taxpayer expense, and HSUS CEO Wayne Pacelle has called for the dogs to be euthanized.

 

I'm not sure how much money the HSUS raised with its claim that it would be caring for the dogs, but I can guaran-freakin'-tee that it was more than the $5,400 that 54 doses of blue juice and its administration would have cost. The HSUS operates no shelters, so how it planned to make good on its claim to use the money to care for the dogs is a mystery to me. Even if it did operate shelters, why it presumed that it would be allowed access to evidence in a criminal case is a further mystery.

 

Incidentally, the web site has been changed and now offers to accept donations earmarked for a campaign to end animal fighting. Pictures of one of dogs siezed in Virginia are still featured prominently.

 

The disposition of funds from an earmarked campaign that the HSUS set up in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina to reunite animals and owners is under investigation by the Lousiana Attorney General's office.

 

The source for this information, the Consumer Freedom Foundation, is no box of chocolates itself. They're the people who shill for big tobacco, among other clients. But it's good to know that someone is riding herd on the HSUS, which appears to me to be an organization more interested in raising funds than doing good.

[Guest pax]

Not surprised.

[Eileen Stein]

The source for this information, the Consumer Freedom Foundation, is no box of chocolates itself.

 

That's for sure! I wouldn't believe anything solely on the word of the Center for Consumer Freedom, which I've found to be frequently dishonest as well as biased, but in this case there's supporting evidence.

[Tranquilis]

That's for sure! I wouldn't believe anything solely on the word of the Center for Consumer Freedom, which I've found to be frequently dishonest as well as biased, but in this case there's supporting evidence.

Sometimes, even a blind squirrel finds a nut.

 

Ironic that C4CF actually did some real public good, though.

[Black Watch Debatable]

Stop it! You're making Wayne very upset!

 

The request for donations is still on his July 18 blog entry, by the way. Screen cap:

 

 

"have been assisting with the care" --- Oh, please.

 

According to a spokesperson, the HSUS gave "several thousand dollars" to shelters caring for the dogs taken from Vick's property. Such largesse from an organization worth over 200 million

 

Honestly, you gotta admire the PR skills of those people, getting an HSUS t-shirt in every. damn. shot. of the Vick dogs, Katrina rescue, etc. You'd think they were active in the rescue world --- but they're just a huge, vegan lobbying group whose CEO told author Ted Kerasote [in Bloodties: Nature, Culture, and the Hunt], "I don’t want to see another dog or cat born."

[PennyT]

Bill remarked "The disposition of funds from an earmarked campaign that the HSUS set up in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina to reunite animals and owners is under investigation by the Lousiana Attorney General's office."

 

That will not have the HSUS quivering in its boots. The HSUS will be snickering.

 

Penny

[Tranquilis]

'Wayne' can get as upset as he likes. While the HSUS is not quite telling a bald-faced lie, they're as close as they can get whilst still remaining on this side of the line.

 

That is fundamentaly dishonest - it's the worst sort of weasel-wording and slimy behavior. I'd prefer an actual, honest-to-goodness outright lie over this word-smithing, squirming, and hairsplitting.

[Bill Fosher]

No, they are telling a bald-faced lie. "You can help us care for these animals with a special donation." They weren't caring for the animals, so what are they doing with the money that suckers scam victims marks unsuspecting contributors donated?

 

Supposedly "several thousand dollars" were contributed to the pounds where the dogs are being kept as evidence, but the HSUS has not accounted for the money it raised through this special appeal -- which was more than several thousand dollars or I'll eat a bug -- nor does it have any assurance that the money it donated is going for the care of the dogs.

 

Ol' Wiggly Wayne himself said in the statement in which he called for the dogs to be euthanized that the HSUS doesn't even know how the dogs are being kept -- that was one of the reasons that they should be destroyed.

 

The HSUS should return all the money it collected under these false pretenses.

[Tranquilis]

I can see how they're able to weasel-word this. By making a donation (assuming they've actually made one), they can claim to have 'helped care' for the dogs. By a private citizen (read: Sucker) making a 'special donation,' the HSUS can weasel to claim that some (7 cents) of that money is going to 'help care' for Vick's dogs. It'll stand up in court. Just. It's effectively a lie, but they can make their case, which I why I say that it's not quite an outright lie. But an outright lie would be more honest, IMO.

 

The HSUS should return all the money it collected under these false pretenses.

Agreed.

[Eileen Stein]

I think the original webpage contained a bald-faced lie or two. It's true they said the money donated would be put to use "to care for these dogs and to support all our vital animal protection programs," and so if they sent some of the money to the shelters actually caring for the dogs this was, while slippery and misleading, not an outright lie. But they also said, "We desperately need your help to care for these dogs while the case is pending." That was a bald-faced lie. They weren't caring for the dogs, other entities were, and those other entities would go on caring for them whether the public sent HSUS any money or not, and whether the HSUS sent them any money or not.

 

I don't think Wayne outright lied in his self-justifying rant -- or at least I didn't notice any outright lies. He relied more on the "look over there!" defense: He didn't address the substance of the valid charges against the HSUS webpage solicitation, but instead wrote at length that HSUS has been actively working against dogfighting for a long time (absolutely true) and that the CFF are lowlife shills (also true). To me, that comes across as an admission that he has no defense to the charge made, but I guess he thought it was the best he could do.

[Guest WoobiesMom]

".... it all depends on what your definition of 'is' is...."

 

Which "these dogs" does each sentence refer to? Only the shadow knows.............

 

 

Grrr grumble grumble double grrrrr

[Tranquilis]

I think the original webpage contained a bald-faced lie or two. It's true they said the money donated would be put to use "to care for these dogs and to support all our vital animal protection programs," and so if they sent some of the money to the shelters actually caring for the dogs this was, while slippery and misleading, not an outright lie. But they also said, "We desperately need your help to care for these dogs while the case is pending." That was a bald-faced lie. They weren't caring for the dogs, other entities were, and those other entities would go on caring for them whether the public sent HSUS any money or not, and whether the HSUS sent them any money or not.

The key words in all that are 'Help' and 'Care.' Like Clinton and the weaselling around the meaning of the word 'Is,' the HSUS can apply the most carefully-crafted and -construed meanings of the words 'Help' & 'Care,' and provided those meanings have any touch with reality, even if highly tenuous, they can slide through. Depending on how they choose to use those words, that's their get-out-of-jail card.

 

If I were in his shoes, I'd come clean, but I'm not, and he's almost certainly using a highly permissive definition of "help care," one that relies upon strict denotation, and not at all on standard connotation.

 

I don't think Wayne outright lied in his self-justifying rant -- or at least I didn't notice any outright lies. He relied more on the "look over there!" defense...

Standard spin-doctoring. Agreed, it means, that like Clinton, he was caught, but has elected to try to word-smith his way out of trouble, relying upon strict denotation and obscure associated meanings, rather than the understood meanings. Those are the paths of the dishonest and the lawyer caught in extremis - IOW, desperation moves.

 

Edit:

WoobiesMom: Heh! Thinking along the same scandalous lines!

[Bill Fosher]

The link in Wayne's blog says, "You can help us care for these animals with a special donation." If you clicked on that link, you presumably went to the original web page with the weasel words. Now you go to the page that promises to use your donation "exclusively" for a campaign to end animal fighting.

 

That link from his blog post, which he has not changed or corrected at least as of 2 p.m. EST today, is a false pretense. A bald-faced lie, if you will. The page where you enter your credit card says something different, but if the CEO of the organization gives you a link that says, "You can help us care for these animals with a special donation" then that's what should happen if you click on that link and donate money.

[Tranquilis]

The link in Wayne's blog says, "You can help us care for these animals with a special donation." If you clicked on that link, you presumably went to the original web page with the weasel words. Now you go to the page that promises to use your donation "exclusively" for a campaign to end animal fighting.

Yup - And dishonest people love that ephemeral nature of the web. Of course, the offending page may've been archived on one of a number of web archives, and so may be traceable.

 

That link from his blog post, which he has not changed or corrected at least as of 2 p.m. EST today, is a false pretense. A bald-faced lie, if you will. The page where you enter your credit card says something different, but if the CEO of the organization gives you a link that says, "You can help us care for these animals with a special donation" then that's what should happen if you click on that link and donate money.

Agreed - that's what should happen. Any any money so donated should either be returned, or turned over in entirety to someone who can make good on that promise. But they've left themsleves the slimest* possible excape path - that's why I so loathe weasel words - They can make a legal case that they meant what they said, in some bizzaro-world twisted manner, and you can't quite prove them wrong, no matter how obvious it is to the reasonable observer.

 

 

*Misspelling deliberate.

[Black Watch Debatable]

The link in Wayne's blog says, "You can help us care for these animals with a special donation." If you clicked on that link, you presumably went to the original web page with the weasel words. Now you go to the page that promises to use your donation "exclusively" for a campaign to end animal fighting.

 

That link from his blog post, which he has not changed or corrected at least as of 2 p.m. EST today, is a false pretense. A bald-faced lie, if you will. The page where you enter your credit card says something different, but if the CEO of the organization gives you a link that says, "You can help us care for these animals with a special donation" then that's what should happen if you click on that link and donate money.

 

Guess they finally got around to fixing that. [it's in his next-to-last paragraph.]