Dog Rights in America versus Human Rights in Vietnam

By Hoi B. Tran

In a recent weekend edition, July 20, 2007, posted on Peace and Freedom and on this site, John E. Carey talked about “Pet Prowess in America”. Referring to the phrase “Pet Prowess”, John explained; “it is my own term to view the number of pampered pets in America, the amount of money Americans spend on their pets, and other pet related statistics”. According to American Pet Products Manufacturers Association (APPMA) John cited in his article, pet spending in 1994 was $17 billion, $36.3 billion in 2005 and in 2006 was $38.4 billion. Regardless of how you slice it, $38.4 billion is a considerable amount of money. It may be more than some country’s annual national defense budget. It is worthy to note that the proposed budget for Global War on terror through fiscal year 2006 by President Bush was $72.4 billion. This comparison is to show the pet care spending of $38.4 billion is evidence America is a civilized and humane country.

Indisputably, almost everyone knows that America is one among a few countries in the world that has an Animal Welfare Act. Even the use of animals in the field of biomedical research is strictly regulated by Federal law and regulations. Inhumane treatment of animals is an offense punishable by a fine, imprisonment or potentially both depending on State law or local ordinance. Last week, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Richmond Division charged football star Michael Vick for “Conspiracy to Travel in Interstate Commerce in Aid of Unlawful Activities and to Sponsor a Dog in an Animal Fighting Venture”. On July 26, 2007, Vick will be in a Federal courtroom in Virginia to enter pleas to the felony charges. If convicted, he will face up to six years in prison and a fine of $350,000. Aside from the felony charges, Vick is likely to lose his multi-million dollar job and endorsement. At this juncture, Vick is a suspect and, of course in this civilized society, he is innocent until proven guilty. This dog fighting scandal was headline news on most media establishments in the US, but that is beside the point this article is trying to make. The point here is inhumane and cruel treatment to animals, especially to dogs and cats, is a serious offense and against the law in America.

While the U.S. government and the media are very critical of animal cruelty in America, the fiendish top leaders of the Vietnamese Communist Party have relentlessly and brutally squashed fundamental human rights in Vietnam.

Last week, at approximately 11.30 p.m. July 18, 2007 Saigon time, the satanic regime in Vietnam dispatched over 1,500 police equipped with electric prods, tear gas grenades, animal control and police trucks to crush a sit-in protest of 1,700+ peasants in front of the office of Vietnam Congress in Saigon, Vietnam. Initial reports revealed four protestors were knocked unconscious by police electric prods, twenty-four badly injured, one with a serious head injury, and many were arrested and transported to unknown places. The reason these peasants staged this non-violent demonstration was to request the government to return their property that was illegally seized by corrupt officials. As of this writing, July 21, 2007, there was an eyewitness report from Afriqueenligne.fr stating, “An eyewitness report coming out of The Socialist Republic of Vietnam states that Police in Ho Chi Minh City have detained about 200 political protesters and are being blamed for the deaths of over 100. Farmers were protesting the government’s seizures of land and "free expression". ⁽¹⁾

As you may have already known, after April 1975, the satanic regime of Vietnam incarcerated hundreds of thousands of South Vietnamese in communist so-called re-education camps across Vietnam. Countless numbers died of extreme hard labor, starvation and disease. Many thousands of Vietnamese women and children were sold and exported to affluent foreigners outside of Vietnam. A great majority of these unfortunate women ended up in prostitution. To escape persecution by the wicked regime, hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese lives drowned in the South China sea, thousands of Vietnamese women raped and killed by Thai pirates in the Gulf of Siam. The millions of ill-fated Vietnamese trapped inside Vietnam never had an opportunity to taste and enjoy liberty and freedom since the so-called liberation of the South in April 1975.

As an American of Vietnamese descent, I feel pity for my compatriots in Vietnam. They were dragging their lives in misery and extreme poverty under the leadership of a bunch of deceitful charlatans. To solidify their power and to protect the party, the totalitarian regime of North Vietnam pertinaciously trampled on the fundamental rights of the people. The freedoms of speech, religion and assembly were brutally abused and cruelly suppressed by force. Under the barbarous and inhumane control of the Vietnamese Communist Party (VCP), the value of the Vietnamese citizen inside Vietnam is worth much less than animals in America! Animals in America have their rights. Ironically, citizens of Vietnam have no rights. Only communist party members have rights, the rights to abuse their own people. The slogan created by the VCP back in the 1940s to appeal patriotism, “Independence- Liberty-Happiness”, has become a contradiction in terms. It is a shame! It is a huge reproach to all those fiendish leaders in the highest hierarchy of the VCP!

⁽¹⁾ Please click the link below for complete report. http://www.afriquenligne.fr/news/daily_news/vietnamese_police_blamed_for_deaths_of_over_100_political_protesters_200707213508/