Grumpy Editor

PETA unhappy over California 'happy cows' TV spot

A 30-second television commercial featuring “happy cows” --- so happy, they talk --- is not making People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) happy, notes Grumpy Editor.

What’s more, a California judge tossed out a PETA lawsuit, filed last year, seeking to shelve the California Milk Advisory Board/California Department of Food and Agriculture TV spot promoting happy, healthy and well-cared-for cows. 

In the action, the animal rights group demanded that California dairy farmers prove that California cows are “happy,” as claimed in the commercials. 

PETA complained that “most California dairy cows are subjected to physical and psychological pain and stress caused by intense and uncomfortable dairying practices, have a high risk of suffering from a number of diseases and die prematurely.”

(One wondered if PETA had happy cows mixed up with some chronically unhappy taxpayers struggling around tax-filing time.) 

Actually, PETA has complained about happy cows since 2002. 

The judge ruled the California Milk Advisory Board and the California Department of Food and Agriculture provided sufficient evidence to support their claim that dairy cows in the Golden State are comfortable, safe and happy. 

Few daily newspapers reported the judge's decision. 

However, the Merced (Calif.) Sun-Star covered the ruling under the headline:  Judge: California dairy cows are happy. 

In the TV spot promoting California cheese, two happy cows chat in a barn as a rooster crows nearby. 

A voiceover mentions: “Great cheese comes from happy cows.  Happy cows come from California.  Real California cheese.” 

See the TV spot here.

Children can continue driving tractors on family farms

Credit the Labor Department’s withdrawal of a dopey 85-page proposed rule that would have affected children doing routine duties on family farms to a report by The Daily Caller’s Paul Conner, mentions Grumpy Editor.

 The planned regulation would have drastically changed the extent to which children could work on family farms and learn valuable skills.

Editorial writers on major city newspapers --- far from rural farms --- were quiet on the development, apparently unaware of the planned rule.

As Conner explained it:  “The rule would have dramatically changed what types of chores children under the age of 16 could perform on and around American farms. It would have prohibited them from working with tobacco, operating almost all types of power-driven equipment and being employed to work with raw farm materials.”

Sen. John Thune (R., S.D.) said the proposal would “ultimately undermine the very fabric of rural America.”

The Labor Department said the decision to withdraw the rule “was made in response to thousands of comments expressing concerns about the effect of the proposed rules on small family-owned farms.”

Appearing Friday on Fox News, Sen. Jerry Moran (R., Kan.) said “farming is a family operation” and that’s where “kids learn the work ethic.”  He said 18,000 comments went to the Labor Department last week.

In a statement from his office, Moran said, “If this proposal had gone into effect, not only would the shrinking rural work force have been further reduced, and our nation’s youth deprived of valuable career training opportunities, but a way of life would have begun to disappear.”