Social Engagement

iaminlikewithmybike:

danij12:

Dr. Thompson is found guilty of all counts in LA road rage trial.

A Los Angeles Superior Court jury on Monday found Dr. Christopher Thomas Thompson guilty of assaulting cyclists by abruptly stopping his car in front of them on a hilly Los Angeles County road last year.

Thompson, a former emergency room doctor, was found guilty of six felonies and one misdemeanor and could face as much as five years in prison.

He was remanded and ordered held without bail until sentencing. He was handcuffed in the courtroom after the verdict was read.

Thompson was accused of assault with a deadly weapon, reckless driving causing specified bodily injury, battery with serious bodily injury and mayhem. The most serious charges stem from a July 4, 2008, incident on Mandeville Canyon Road, the road where Thompson lives, where he was accused of abruptly stopping his car in front of two cyclists. Other charges relate to a similar incident on the same road that did not result in injuries.

In the July 4 incident, the two cyclists hit the rear of Thompson’s car; one slammed through the rear window, the other catapulted over the car into the road. In the earlier incident, the cyclists said they narrowly avoided hitting the rear of Thompson’s car.

Thompson’s lawyer had argued that the cyclists were belligerent and may have fallen because of the inherent instability of bicycles. He suggested that in any case the incident was accidental, not criminal.

Velonews

L.A. Times

You would think an ER Doctor of all people would be less reckless.

You probably recognize the name Land O’Lakes. The company’s butter and milk products line grocery-store shelves. Now, please consider the immense suffering of these cows―who are given little more than a numbered tag punched through their ears―documented by PETA during our new undercover investigation of a Land O’Lakes supplier. 

Cow #717, who can be seen in PETA’s video went down in the factory farm’s milking parlor a day after giving birth to twin baby calves. Even before giving birth, cow #717 was hobbling because of pain in one of her rear legs and suffering severe discomfort from an enlarged udder. On the day that she went down, she had a high fever and her knees and the front of her ankles had deep lesions caused by her struggle to stand. Despite cow #717’s obvious fear and pain, the owner of the factory farm electro-shocked her. 

PETA’s investigator wrote: “When [the factory farmer] returned to the parlor, he was carrying the electric shocker … cow #717 could not rise fast enough … [the factory farmer] went over to her and shocked her a few times to get her out. She could not rise and dragged herself out of the milking stall to get away from the painful electro-shock. She skidded out of the stall on her knees and struggled to stand. Her udder is so swollen and huge, it seems to be causing pain that also inhibits her ability to rise and walk. Her left rear leg seems to be unable to bear weight. As the video shows, she wasn’t able to rise until after she was repeatedly shocked and forced to drag herself out of the milking area.”

Two days later, cow #717—who was still downed and suffering—was shipped off to be slaughtered for her flesh.

This is the story of just one of the cows whose painful experiences our investigator documented on the farm of this Land O’Lakes supplier. Others suffered when their newborn calves were torn away from them shortly after birth or when their tails were tightly wrapped with elastic bands in order to “dock” them, and they were forced to live in perpetually wet pens and sheds full of deep excrement, which leads to the spread of disease. Watch our investigation video to learn more.

This blatant disregard for animal welfare is routine in the dairy industry. Cows are kept constantly pregnant in order to make them continue to produce milk, and they are hooked up at least twice a day to machines that take the milk intended for their own calves. When their exhausted bodies are “spent” and can no longer provide enough milk, they are sent to slaughter, usually for hamburger meat.

I think this pertains to what Danny was saying with his recent piece.