Bummer last name for being the spokesperson defending a poop issue.
Man, going after a candidate because he put a dog crate on the roof of his car 24 years ago may be the lamest political hit I’ve ever seen.
There’s a good chance that the dog was reasonably safe, and having a much better time than he’d have stuck in the same crate in the back of the station wagon. Assuming the crate was attached properly to the top of the car, it’s actually a pretty clever solution. And the fact that Romney went out of his way to build a windshield suggests to me that he actually cares more about his dog than the average person would. For example, where Romney’s from it’s pretty common to see dogs running around in the beds of pickup trucks, which is much more dangerous.
Our dog rides in the car with us. I know it’s slightly less safe, but it’s also a hell of a lot more fun for the dog. If I’m bringing the dog crate, I usually remove the top half, flip it over and stack in in the bottom half, and then pack our luggage into it. The dog rides in the back with our daughter. I suppose I’m going to hell for that, huh? Sometimes I even (gasp!) let her stick her head out of the window. Give the safety Nazis and PETA enough time to collaborate on a suitable punishment, and in a few years I’ll probably have to do hard time for that one.
Jeez, people, let it go. It was twenty five years ago.
Romney says his views on dog transportation have evolved and are completely different now.
It’s so much better to make up stuff about what the opposition did 40 years ago.
So what, exactly, was it that Romney made up about the opposition 40 years ago? I’m not asking what his party made up, but about what he made up.
So, say that I have a kid that’s about 10 months old. My wife and I decide to trek up north to Redmond, Washington - a considerable drive from the SF Bay Area. I just got my hands on this neat contraption called the Baby Bubble, which is basically a clear, hard plastic carrying case with a baby seat inside.
The Baby Bubble comes with some custom made safety belts, which I can use to secure the device inside the car, just like a normal baby seat. Instead, though, I decide that I can actually use these safety straps to secure the Baby Bubble to the top of the car. Think of the fun my kid could have up there - I mean, if he likes it when I toss him in the air, he’ll definitely get a kick out of this!
This is a completely ridiculous, insane, stupid analogy! (Look what you’ve driven me to! No pun intended…) And that’s because this is a completely ridiculous, insane, stupid situation to begin with! I don’t see how the thought even entered Romney’s mind. The first thing I would have thought of would be to put some of the luggage up there, and put the dog inside (as other posters have already said). It seems like a no-brainer.
Now, all that being said - this was something that happened 25 years ago. 25 years ago! What’s next? Are we going to start digging up stories of how a certain presidential candidate ate worms when he was a kid?
Geezum Pete…
LilShieste
Actually, my understanding is that things can be much worse on airplanes, especially if you have a largish animal that has to go in the baggage compartment. Seems they don’t hold pressure. Can’t imagine it’d be much fun to ride in a cargo box at 30K feet with low air pressure and no heat.
Not true. Check any major airline, and they warrant that shipping pets is always in a heated and pressurized hold. If it wasn’t, no animal would survive several hours at thirty thousand feet.
I stand corrected. My understanding was that at least at one point and time the holds didn’t always maintain pressure and that it wasn’t uncommon for them to spend at least a portion of the flight unpressurized. Apparantly this is wrong.
Still, at least after dog crapped all over the roof of the van, Romney didn’t pull over, yank the dog out by it’s tail and proceed to beat the crap out of it. (Mind you, I am so not voting for him that what he did do doesn’t sway my opinion of him a bit.)
And if he’d simply said, “I can’t imagine what possessed me to do such a thing, but it was a long time ago,” that would be how I’d feel too.
But he’s standing up in the here and now for what he did then. So the 24 years doesn’t matter for diddly.
Well then, everything’s hunky-dory!
The problem is, you can be pretty damned sure something’s attached firmly to your car, and still have it work its way loose over a period of hours. Trust me on this one, OK?
And you wouldn’t want to have a dog running around in the bed of a pickup truck on a 12-hour trip either.
Voyager, Jackmannii, and Kimstu have all suggested that the dog should have been in the car. And now you’re saying “I suppose I’m going to hell for that, huh?” Nice strawman. Consider it torched.
This debate consists of series of straw dogs. There is no evidence of mistreatment of the animal. It was secured in a cage with a windscreen. There is no evidence the dog was not relieved. All the article stated was that their stops were made at gas stations.
If anything, the dog experienced the complete opposite of mistreatment. Any dog I’ve ever dealt with loved to sniff the air while riding in a car. The cage with a windscreen must have been a little slice of heaven. The alternative in a station wagon was a cage placed in the back. That would have kept the dog away from the airflow and also increased the level of motion disorientation. Not a pleasant environment for a large dog.
The only debate is the level of safety attributed to the animal. Anything outside the steel cage of a car interior will be less safe. A rollover would be fatal. There should be no debate on this issue. But the comparisons made in this thread are flawed in respect to the level of safety. A dog is basically food that has been domesticated into a pet. It cannot be compared to a baby or a child. The level of safety afforded children will always be higher.
The dog was hosed down with water, and forced to ride on top of a car. Q.E.D.
Unless, of course, what he did actually was perfectly fine, in which case continuing to defend it is only normal and right.
As someone who has tied many things to vehicles, and never had one come loose, all this tells me is that you don’t know how to properly secure things to your vehicle. Maybe Romney does.
Lots of people do that. Go work on a farm sometime. The dog’s in the bed of the pickup truck all day long, including longs trips to town. I’m not saying this is right - I wouldn’t put my dog in the bed of a pickup - but it’s common.
Talk to the PETA types, and they’ll tell you that you’re a scumbag if you don’t have your dog properly secured in a crate inside the car. Letting your dog sit free on the rear passenger seat is highly frowned on. In fact, some people in this very thread think that what I do is worse:
And? After a dog gets washed they shake off the water and you let them air dry. What’s your point? You think a dog will dry off faster inside a car or outide?
Hypothermia. A wet dog on the roof of a car is in considerably more discomfort than one inside the car.
Hi long time lurker, first time poster, I hope I’m doing this right. One thing I’ve admired about this board is the sensitivity and logic of most of the posters but you guys are missing a few key elements to the Time Magazine story…
1st. The dog, an Irish Setter a rather high strung breed to begin with, lost control of its bowels and crapped a “brown liquid” all over the back of the car. This is a sign of acute anxiety. The dog was truly stressed and that’s evidence. I’ve seen one other dog lose control like this and it was being attacked by a Pit bull.
2nd. Even tho it happened in 1983, Mitt is telling the story (to Time Magazine!) like it’s warm and funny little example of how cool he is under stress, not realizing that something isn’t entirely kosher about his actions. Especially disturbing, hosing a dog off at carwash (I wonder if he used the high pressure hose?) and then re-strapping his soaking dog on the roof all of the way to Canada!
3rd. While some dogs like to stick their heads out of windows they certainly don’t do it for 12 hours and they certainly don’t expose their whole body to the wind. Dogs are bothered by wind and the high pitched noises that come along with it. It’s why they hate hair dryers. What he did was callous and cruel and to not be able to see that is sort of sad.
In which case, the 24 years also doesn’t matter.
He’s taking a position today about something he did 24 years ago. Whether he was right or wrong back then, this makes the time lapse immaterial.
Glad to hear it. I still wouldn’t stake a pet’s life on it.
I know parts of Canada are rural, but living 6 hours from town (a) would be a rarity even up there, and (b) would make trips to town a pretty rare thing.
OK, I see your point. It’s true that in event of accident, anything in the car that’s not tied down - animals, children, New Jersey governors - can and generally will become projectiles continuing to fly forward at the pre-accident speed of the vehicle.
I suppose I’d have to ask the PETA types how being in the secured carrier is supposed to be beneficial to the dog. AFAICT, the only difference is in what the dog hits - the end of the carrier, or the interior of the car - not how fast it does so.
Still, ISTM that the dog strapped to the roof has (a) about the same overall risk (if not greater), in event of an auto accident, as the loose dog inside the car, plus (b) a risk of injury or fatality from things coming unsecured absent an accident that the dog in the car doesn’t have.
I personally continue to regard this as bad judgment (YMMV, and clearly does), and if Romney himself told this story to demonstrate his ability to deal with life’s curveballs (haven’t seen anyone claim otherwise yet), then I’ve got to continue to see him as a bit ‘off’ in a not-so-good way. Should it be Romney’s ‘macaca’ moment? No; being his ‘my dog’s caca’ moment, a much lesser gaffe, will suffice.
At any rate, I’m perfectly happy to let the electorate reach its own conclusions on this one.
Yes, if it was strapped to the roof. It was in a cage with a windscreen so it’s no different than being in a car with the windows open or running around the backyard.
I disagree. A makeshift windscreen does not mean it was hermetically sealed. If Mitt was able to hose down the dog while it was still in the carrier, the unprotected sides and top expose the dog to far more wind turbulence than he would experience inside the car. Just because Mitt stuck a piece of cardboard up in front of the carrier does not mean a wet dog could not be subjected to serious discomfort.
Then I guess we’ll have to disagree on this. I’ve flown in open cockpit aircraft(such as an Aircam) at speeds much higher than an automobile. Anything blocking the wind creates a slipstream of air around the area behind it. It would be like driving in a convertible car.