Unfortunately Literal Food for Thought

"From stable to table in seven days" is the take away message of the excellent, though brutally graphic but honest, piece that aired on HBO Real Sports with Bryan Gumbel on Monday evening. If you have on demand, you can watch it at your convenience.

The piece, which featured Mountaineer Race Track, the Sugarcreek auction and even the New Holland livestock auction, was unflinching in its portrayal of the truth and even showed lumps of horse meat being dished out on plates in Italy. If that wasn't enough to make you wary of eating meat in Italy, I don't know what is.

But more on target were Bryan Gumbel's questions at the end to the reporter who covered the story. "Does this happen everywhere?" he wondered. "And what can be done to stop it?" Of course, those are the six million dollar questions which the Americans Against Horse Slaughter deal with every day. We had mention of the bill in Congress but unfortunately no way for viewers to find out more. Perhaps if the web site is besieged with emails, they might forward them on to Washington.....

I can't help but think that if the sport had a Racing Commissioner, these practices could be outlawed. Of course, the black market will always exist, but it could exist with a heavy financial burden attached. Any trainer caught "selling" horses right off the track would have his license revoked. Of course they have to be caught. But what better job for those already involved in the rescue movement than to "police" tracks with which they are already associated?

We need oversight in the sport--from the breeding shed to the backside of racetracks to the second stage of a thoroughbreds career, as a pleasure horse or therapy horse, not as someone's dinner.

This is an important message that needs to be sent to the National Thoroughbred Racing Association. I urge you to make your voices heard on the NTRA blog.