Written by PETA
© Starmax Inc
Since discovering how much being vegan improved his health, former president Bill Clinton has been belting out praise for plants like he belts out jazz on the saxophone. A new CNN article traces his progression from hamburger-and-fry guy to commander-in-leaf.
Not long after he left office, Clinton's penchant for hamburgers, steaks, and other high-fat foods, coupled with a family history of heart problems, left the ex-president in need of quadruple-bypass surgery, followed by two stents three years later. "I was lucky I did not die of a heart attack," he told CNN.
After Clinton's second surgery, PETA sent him a vegan care package. Then, in spring 2007, PETA Vice President Dan Mathews was seated next to the former President at a dinner party in Las Vegas, and the two spoke at length about the health benefits and ethics of a vegan diet, which Clinton told Mathews had always intrigued him since his daughter Chelsea had been such an articulate vegetarian since she was 10. Mathews followed up by sending Clinton Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn's book Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease. After consulting with Dr. Esselstyn as well as Dr. Dean Ornish and Chelsea, Clinton decided to make the switch to a plant-based diet: "I essentially concluded that I had played Russian roulette .… So that’s when I made a decision to really change."
So began the era of Bill Clinton, vegan advocate and heart disease survivor. "All my blood tests are good, and my vital signs are good, and I feel good, and I also have, believe it or not, more energy," he says. We wondered who you think should be the next big political figure to get a smaller figure by going vegan? Will it be Barack Obama, Dick Cheney, Al Gore, or Sarah Palin?
Who do you think should be the next big political figure to go vegan?
Written by Michelle Sherrow
After Al Gore chastised President Obama in a Rolling Stone essay for not being tough enough in combating climate change, PETA, in turn, took the former veep to task for not being tough enough on his own high-carbon diet.
Even though scientific studies show that raising animals for food is one of the leading contributors to greenhouse-gas emissions, Gore continues to chow down on chops. In fact, the official handbook of the Live Earth concerts—which Gore helped organize—acknowledges that abstaining from meat is the "the single most effective thing" you can do to reduce your impact on climate change.
"As you know, going vegan will help reduce animal suffering, your waistline, and your impact on the planet, so it's a win-win situation for everyone," wrote PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman in a letter to Gore. "After all, it wouldn't do to challenge the president's 'climate of denial' while ignoring your own book's excellent advice."
Yesterday, at Al Gore's book signing in Beverly Hills, it wasn't the former vice president who drew the most attention from the throngs of onlookers—it was our sexy Mother Earth who turned heads. The crowd showed Mother Earth all the love she's not getting from Gore, whose hypocritical addiction to meat is getting in the way of his call to go green.
Even Gore has admitted that going vegan helps save the environment. And the official handbook for Live Earth—the concert series that Gore himself helped organize—states that not eating meat is the "single most effective thing you can do" to curb climate change. So why hasn't he taken our effortless Pledge to Be Veg yet? Apparently, the simple, delicious truth is just too inconvenient.
Written by Logan Scherer
Fox News host Glenn Beck may not be ready to sign PETA's "Pledge to Be Veg" just yet, but that didn't stop him from dishing up some choice words about Al Gore's continued, convenient omission of any mention of the meat industry's devastating impact on the environment.
"… I am siding with PETA on this one—once again asking Al Gore, 'If you really want to save the planet, put down the cheeseburgers and pick up the veggie burgers. Time for soy milk and Tofurky.' … I've said before I disagree with PETA, but I respect them because they are not hypocrites: They say what they mean and mean what they say. I just disagree with what they say—except when it calls for Al Gore to eat tofu."
Makes me wanna send Mr. Beck some vegan chocolate kisses.
Folks, trying to clean up the environment without going vegan is like trying to mask the smell of rotting garbage by hanging 100 fragrance trees from the ceiling. It doesn't work. The only way to get rid of the stink and cruelty to animals is to change what you put on your plate.
Written by Karin Bennett
I got my first vegan pancake recipe from Moby when his berry flapjacks were featured way back when in Seventeen magazine.
He could have stopped there, but it seems like Moby keeps coming up with ways to win my animal-loving heart.
In a recent blog entry, Moby goes the extra mile for animals and the planet by calling out "environmentalist" Al Gore over his refusal to ever mention that animal consumption is the leading cause of climate change. Moby says:
i asked al gore about why he didn't mention this in an 'inconvenient truth' (as animal production is responsible for more greenhouse gases than every car, bus, truck … plane, boat on the planet COMBINED). he answered honestly, basically saying that getting people to drive a hybrid car isn't that difficult. getting people to give up animal products is almost impossible. i appreciated his honesty. so i guess i'll be talking about climate change tomorrow, and i guess i'll have to mention the most inconvenient of inconvenient truths, that you can't talk seriously about climate change and global warming without looking at the role of animal production (animal production being responsible for 24% of greenhouse gas emissions and also the #1 cause of deforestation in the rainforest).
Gore should have named his movie Sorta-Inconvenient Truths if he didn't want to cover the environmental destruction that his meaty diet causes.
Written by Shawna Flavell
If you were paying attention to the news yesterday, you may have seen quite a few stories about PETA—apparently, we were quite busy!
The biggest story came from NPR, which reported on our efforts to save animals from the humiliation of having losing sports teams named after them. Our joint effort with the Humane Society, "Stop Teams Everywhere From Animal Mascots (STEAM)," has reportedly supported legislation in Michigan, Maryland, and Tennessee.
Meanwhile, Tor.com discussed our indecision regarding the Furry community (Animal-friendly? Unfriendly? Too-friendly?), and Aero-News.net announced our intention to seek $250,000 in damages (as well as an apology) for the geese killed in the "Miracle on the Hudson."
Our friends at ecorazzi highlighted Al Gore's new and non-environmentally-hypocritical line of organic vegan frozen foods—first up, "Al Gore's Vegan Nubs." And Groovy Vegetarian lamented the sad news that our president, Ingrid E. Newkirk, was caught chowing down on a Burger King Whopper.
Now, come on, people, you didn't really believe any of these stories, did you? I mean, everybody knows that we'd ask for way more than $250,000 … I kid, I kid. So, yes—we found ourselves the subject of a number of April Fool's jokes. And don't worry, we had our share of the fun too. C'mon—squirrel underpants? Pheromone-fueled hunter-targeting snake attacks? A Photoshop job this bad on a PETA ad?
I hope you all knew better than to fall for that one!
Written by Amanda Schinke
Well … kind of. The former veep, unsatisfied with having invented the Internet itself, is now attempting to create a new domain-name suffix ".eco" for use by individuals, organizations, and companies that promote environmentally friendly causes. We think this is such a great idea that we plan to be first in line to use the new suffix that Al and Dot Eco LLC have teamed up to try to create—for our Web site OffsetAlGore.eco.
Sure, we already have the wildly popular OffsetAlGore.com, where you can go to compensate for some of the carbon and methane that Al Gore releases into the atmosphere every time he eats one of his daily Angus steak dinners or lunches by pledging to go vegetarian for 30 days. But OffsetAlGore.eco has such a nice ring to it, don't you think?
Click here to read PETA's letter to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (the corporation that approves new domain names) expressing wholehearted support for the opportunity to introduce legions of people to the idea that the harm their sea kitten sticks and pepperoni pizza inflict on the environment may be the most inconvenient truth of all.
Written by Alisa Mullins
Al Gore admitted to an audience at a political blogger conference that he may, indeed, be bad for the environment and guilty of contributing to global warming. Why? Because he just can't seem to stop eating meat, which is more harmful to the global warming crisis (which Gore is known for being a teeny bit fanatical about) than all of the world's cars, trucks, SUVs, and planes combined!
According to Ezra Klein at Prospect.org, Gore said, "It is true that it would be healthier for us as individuals and as a planet if we consumed less meat. I acknowledge that. … I myself am a meat eater and maybe that's had some effect" (emphasis mine). How did he go from acknowledging that vegetarianism is better for individuals and the planet to saying that maybe his choice to eat animals has some negative effect?
Without committing to any changes in the present, Al Gore explains that he "plead[s] guilty" and that we must "walk before we can run." Seriously? He doesn't know how to walk the walk on this issue? Have we not been clear enough with this guy? We'd love to love you, Al, but please stop clinging to the one thing that is so devastating for the world while asking everyone else to drop their bad habits.
What's next, M.A.D.D. beer cozies sized to fit in your car's cup holder? Ugh.
Posted by Sean Conner
The guy’s leading the charge to invigorate global warming advocacy, he’s consistently getting attention for the issue in the mainstream media, and he’s setting the agenda by which people think about global warming and its effect on our lives. So why the hell is PETA publicly rebuking him? Well, honestly, it’s for pretty much those same reasons. It’s great that he cares —; it really is — but for him to leave factory farming (i.e., the number one cause of the problem in the first place) out of the debate just because it doesn’t seem particularly convenient to him to have to reevaluate his lifestyle is irresponsible to a degree that’s almost unfathomable in light of the influence that he has on public opinion about this issue.
Of course, if you’ve been reading this blog more or less regularly, you will have already heard variations on this theme—but I’m bringing it up again today to highlight a really fantastic article by PETA Vice President Bruce Friedrich in yesterday’s Huffington Post. Here’s an excerpt:
“Personal choices can only be allowed to go so far. For example, most environmentalists would agree that people shouldn't have the personal choice to dump their motor oil in a river. And if our choices involve direct support for the number one human cause of global warming—and a refusal to even mention the meat industry when telling people what they can do to decrease their global-warming footprint—at what point is someone's oversight on such a crucial issue cause for publicly calling them out on it?”
I think Bruce nails it with this one, so be sure to check out the full article here, and feel free to comment with your perspective. I know this issue’s a bit controversial, but it’s a vitally important discussion to have.
-Jack
Here’s how this works: By neglecting to address the number one cause of global warming, Al Gore—as one of the world’s most prominent environmental advocates—is arguably doing a fair bit of damage to his cause. So if he’s not going to set an example by boycotting the industry that generates 40 percent more greenhouse-gas emissions than all the cars, trucks, ships, and planes in the world combined … well, somebody needs to pick up the slack.
Which is where OffsetAlGore.com comes in. Visitors to the site can learn the full extent of the meat industry’s role in causing global warming, and actually do something to help stem the tide by taking a pledge to go vegetarian for 30 days. That's enough time to prevent the release of more than 270 pounds of carbon dioxide into the Earth's atmosphere, and a more effective way of combating pollution than giving up driving every weekday for the same amount of time. As PETA VP Bruce Friedrich puts it:
"Visitors to OffsetAlGore.com can undo some of the damage that Al Gore is doing to the environment every time he sits down to a steak. Mr. Gore's own addiction to meat is adding to the very crisis he's devoting his life to stopping."
Anyway, check out the site, take the pledge (if you haven’t already), and let me know what you think of the campaign. We’re big admirers of Al Gore’s work here, but it really seems like the guy is doing his own cause a serious disservice by avoiding the single most important issue facing the environment today.
If you have a general question for PETA and would like a response, please e-mail Info@peta.org. If you need to report cruelty to an animal, please click here. If you are reporting an animal in imminent danger and know where to find the animal and if the abuse is taking place right now, please call your local police department. If the police are unresponsive, please call PETA immediately at 757-622-7382 and press 2.
Follow PETA on Twitter!