Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper is really good at ignoring people. He"s ignored millions of outraged Canadians and concerned people around the world; he's ignored countless representatives of the animal protection community; and he even managed to ignore Sir Paul McCartney, when the former Beatle pleaded with him to put a stop to the seal hunt taking place in his country. So no one’s doubting Stephen Harper’s capacity to be ignorant. But, after a letter from PETA President Ingrid Newkirk to Mrs. Laureen Harper, Mr. H may have to add his wife to the list of people he gives the cold shoulder to. Here’s hoping she has a more compassionate response than her husband.

I love me some Disney—hell, it still brings a tear to my eye every time I watch that little redheaded mermaid thing turn into a real live human girl and walk onto the beach—so, as you can imagine, it pains me more than anyone to hear bad things about the company. But Disney’s latest project, Snow Buddies, which used a number of purebred dogs in the production, sends kind of a different message than the "save the animals" stuff you get from most Disney movies. In fact, the whole thing was such a mess that PETA is now calling on Disney to dump distribution plans for the movie after dozens of the puppies fell ill and several died from parvovirus during production.

Apparently, the puppies were imported for use in Snow Buddies from an unlicensed commercial breeder in New York, even after the dogs started getting really sick, and most of them have died or become badly ill at this stage. Our stance is that Disney is being a bit disingenuous by distributing cute little movies about adorable, cuddly puppies when they’ve been working behind the scenes with sketchy-ass breeders who evidently have no idea how to properly care for dogs in the first place. You can learn more about the whole business here.

I’m sure most everyone is already aware of Burger King’s recent animal welfare improvements, but I still wanted to share this little tidbit with you. The BK story was covered all over the media, but the Houston Chronicle took it a step further and published this amazing editorial on corporate responsibility and animal welfare.

It’s not every day that animal issues get the coverage they deserve, much less with phrases like “Though most consumers are vaguely aware of it, cruelty is the rule, not the exception, when it comes to producing the meat most of us buy” and “On factory farms, pigs exist packed into wire or wood pens; tails are hacked off so they won't gnaw each other from stress and boredom. Sows are entrapped in "farrowing crates" so tiny they cannot turn around” so I was pretty psyched to read this.

So anyway, yeah, there you have it. Props up to the Houston Chronicle for taking an uneqivocal stance on this issue.

First of all, Happy Easter from everyone at PETA!

Now, as a little food for thought for the Easter holidays, here's the transcript of the 2007 Easter Message by the Slovenian President (and my new personal hero) Dr. Janez Drnovsek. President Bush, I really hope you're paying attention:

In 2000, I was still busy trying to figure out how "electronic mail" worked, and PETA, for all its marketing brilliance, was still just kind of feeling its way in terms of having an Internet presence. But we did hit on a campaign that ended up having a real life of its own on the ol' World Wide Web—it was all over blogs and forums, and it's still talked about on religious websites—and, with Easter just around the corner, I thought I'd raise that burning question again:

Was Jesus a Vegetarian?

Here is the website that started the debate, and you can read some more of the controversy here. Have a great Holy Saturday, everyone!

We actually didn't say "I told you so" in this instance, just:

I thought that was pretty nice of us, under the circumstances. Here's the back story: Whiteford Agricultural Schools’ superintendent Craig Haugen is receiving a bouquet of flowers from PETA after breaking his arm in a donkey basketball game. PETA had contacted Haugen more than a week before the game, pointing out the cruelty and dangers that go along with these ridiculous events and citing incidents where people have seriously hurt themselves during games. But Mr. Haugen ignored the letter and actually went on TV to say that the game would go on and that he saw nothing wrong with it. Anyway, after we heard he broke his arm, there were just so many possibilities … but apparently my boss Ingrid has this whole big thing about "being compassionate," so he got flowers and a note and that was it. So there you have it. Enjoy your flowers, Craig, and at least read our letter this time—it'll do you good.

With hundreds of people standing in line waiting for tickets last week, the Lewis and Clark Old-fashioned Circus just folded up its tents and slinked off into the night. (OK, whatever—it was daytime, and circuses probably can't slink exactly, but I need a bit of creative license here.) The reason for all the drama was that York City Manager Trey Eubanks had decided at an emergency meeting with city leaders that the circus had failed to meet safety guidelines and that three caged tigers used by the circus posed a danger to York citizens. You can read our letter thanking the city here. While it admittedly may have sucked a little for everyone waiting in line to go see the circus, it's awesome to see a city recognizing the dangers—not to mention the brutality—of animal circuses and booting them out of town. Nice work, York!

This week, the folks at Unilever—the parent company for Axe Body Spray—learned the hard way that you can't perform nasty animal experiments for your product and have Pamela Anderson star in your ad campaigns. It's really one of those “one or the other” situations—both is just greedy. And, of course, it's worth mentioning that maiming and killing animals when you trawl out a new product is a singularly unpleasant way of carrying on in the first place.

Anyway, here's the letter that the wonderful Pamela wrote to Unilever asking them to get their heads out of their … um, out of the sand, and move their testing policy into the 21st century. Pamela, I know I've said this before, but I love you.

P.S. Click here for the full list of PETA—and Pam—approved companies that don’t test on animals.

Allie "Gullible's not in the dictionary" Sullivan

I know I've been going on ad nauseam about my little April Fools joke, but did you see Ecorazzi’s? Pretty funny, I think. And obviously a joke, right?

Obvious to most of us, but not all. My friend Allie actually screamed with excitement when she thought Paris Hilton was doing an ad for us. I don’t remember her exact words, but they were something like “Really?! Holy COW! Like, oh my god!” I actually felt bad breaking the news to her that the ad wasn’t going to happen, but I felt worse about the ridicule she received from the entire marketing department for the rest of the day.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t feel THAT bad, which is why I’m sharing the beautiful story with thousands of people on the Internet. Nice work, Ecorazzi. There's a sucker born every minute, but our Allie is one in a million.

I’ve got some wild stuff for you this week, so let’s get into it.

This couple REALLY loved their dog. Um, wow.

I don’t particularly like Alanis Morissette or the Black Eyed Peas all that much, but somehow putting them together is, well, magical.

I promise I didn't take the clown’s missing bike, but I bet the tip line in the story works for telling Ringling what you think of its animal abuse too.

Did you see the story about blood from an animal lab spraying out of a sewer onto people on the street? So disgusting.

Here’s a pretty decent piece about pork from The New York Times, just in time for Easter.

OK, is it me or is this just beyond crazy? We’re at war and the Army is spending millions putting on a rodeo. WTF, Army?

I love this funny bit about PETA protesting the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Amnesty Internation protesting PETA, the ACLU protesting Amnesty, the Christian Coalition protesting the ACLU, and Fred Phelps protesting everyone and everything. A for effort on this one, Spoof guys.

Zoos will do anything to get their animals to breed so they can make a buck, I swear.

These videos show just how insane and detached from the rest of the world the pork industry really is. Insanity.

And finally . . .

Here’s a short animated video about the seal hunt, done by Canadian Graeme MacKay, editorial cartoonist from The Hamilton Spectator.