Golden retrievers sent to comfort Newtown survivors
Judging by the reader comments there, many people agree.
Frankly, I can’t decide whether I find this heartwarming or sickening. 
Why did they say “about 10 dogs?”
Can’t they count how many dogs there are?
Our neighbor had serious health problems - bad hip, lots of pain, befuddlement. We’ve brought our golden over to her, and it helps a lot. It helps that our golden loves her more than just about anybody. So, this makes perfect sense to me.
Unless Lutheran Goldens are a bit more standoffish, of course.
My dog is a golden and we’re Lutheran. She IS a bit of a bitch. Pretty girls, yaknow?
But she is soft and loves love and looks into your eyes and has a good sense of human emotions so yeah - 10 of her would be great in a crisis. Well done, all.
Why?
Maybe they just weren’t sure how many were going yet?
It’s probably one of those optimal packing problems. Assume spherical dogs.
My golden sheds enough fur every day to make another dog. With 10 they might have thought another was hiding in the pile of hair. Plus visibility might suffer when enough hair is blown around by wagging tails.
One of the comments on that link suggests that, in addition to “comfort dogs,” we need to establish a team of “guilt cats.”
Guilt cats would be sent to people we suspect are guilty of something. Instead of snuggling, they would just sit there glaring at the person, as if to say, “I know what you did.”
Love it Sailboat
(What’s sickening about a traumatized kid getting to hug a trained sweetie of a dog?)
Kudos, Mangetout. That was good! 
If they were Lutheran dogs, did they bring hotdish? 
Dammit, beaten to the punch.
But seriously, what happens when the dogs leave? I assume these are not permanent adoptions and the last thing some of these kids need is losing something else they love. (I can see somebody loving one of these dogs completely in about ten seconds.)
No, we should assume cubical dogs.
Nobody’s adopting or fostering anything, or even taking any pets home.
The dogs and people will all go meet at a place and the dogs and people will talk and pray and hug for a bit of momentary relief, and then everyone will go home, dogless.
And the rage will grow … slowly … step by step … and the target practice will begin …
Cubicle dogs distract the IT guys.
You ever try counting a roomfull of Goldens? I know, I know…just count the tails and divide by one.
The original Bubbadog was a Golden Retriever and my SDMB namesake. Like many Goldens he was empathetic to the point of being almost creepy about it.