USARK on NPR's Diane Rehm Show Today!

USARK on NPR's Diane Rehm Show Today!
USARK (United States Association of Reptile Keepers)
Join the Diane Rehm Show on NPR TODAY February 1, 2012 from 11am-12noon EST. Guests will include HSUS CEO Wayne Pacelle, USARK CEO Andrew Wyatt, Zuzana Kukol from Rexano Exotics and Tim Harrison. It will be a live call in show. Please call in with good questions. You can also email or Tweet questions in. It is a discussion, not a debate.
1-800-433-8850
drshow@wamu.org
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/20...al-industry-us

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I will be listening, but I will definitely not be calling in. Maintaining my bearing, tact, and being respectful while asking Wayne Pacelle a question might be pushing the limits of my self-control. I admire and commend Andrew Wyatt and the others for being able to sit in the same room and have a civil conversation with him...

Well, that went about as well as I expected it to. Wayne Pacelle is a professional public personality and politician. His primary tactic is, if you don't let your opponent talk, they can't refute anything you say.
Unfortunately, the host of the show let him get away with it, and then even let him have the last word.
Disappointing.

I knew it would be aggravating but I listened to the whole thing. Wayne is such a tool, definitely came across as the previous poster said "professional public personality and politician". I was the most annoyed when he asked if people should be able to own big cats and (I believe Andrew) started to say his expertise was in reptiles and Wayne cut him off and said basically "you don't need to know anything about them to be able to say people shouldn't keep them".

I have to just give points to everyone for NOT losing their temper with the man. I would've started shouting him down after the third time I was interrupted.

I only caught the last half, but it was very frustrating to listen to. :mad:

since the first thing he did was attack the opposition i almost thought of this as another political debate. we should demand copies of his tax return lol

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dragoon

since the first thing he did was attack the opposition i almost thought of this as another political debate. we should demand copies of his tax return lol

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HSUS is a non profit :rolleyes: so all their expenses are public record.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by mikel81

I knew it would be aggravating but I listened to the whole thing. Wayne is such a tool, definitely came across as the previous poster said "professional public personality and politician". I was the most annoyed when he asked if people should be able to own big cats and (I believe Andrew) started to say his expertise was in reptiles and Wayne cut him off and said basically "you don't need to know anything about them to be able to say people shouldn't keep them".

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From the perspective of a layman - someone who is not familiar with snakes or exotics in general as pets - Wayne comes across very confident, very polished and very believable.

Very brutal to listen to from the standpoint of a reptile keeper. Wayne may be a tool, but to the casual listener, he is a believable tool who is in his element when it comes to this type of format.

When Andrew would try to make a point, Wayne would very deftly counter and parry it.

Again, when you look at this through the eyes of someone not in the hobby, it was not a banner day for the keeprs of exotic pets.

Will this be posted on the NPR site?