Defending Dairy

Get on a jet at Lambert and it will take you three hours to get to LAX.

But last Sunday night, Joaquin Phoenix moved us even further away. The actor’s comments made it easy to understand why the Oscar presentation saw a 20-percent drop in viewership from last year’s show. Our poll at the radio station had 93-percent of the respondents say they didn’t see the show.

Phoenix used his acceptance speech to lecture America about the exploitation of dairy cows by farmers.

“We feel entitled to artificially inseminate a cow and steal her baby even though her cries of anguish are unmistakable,” he said. “Then we take her milk that’s intended for her calf and we put it in our coffee and our cereal.”

Guilty. I also eat cheese….and I pillage eggs from hens. Let’s not even get into the sacrifice made by hogs for my breakfast.

Making dairy farmers into the enemy for providing the country with fresh milk is a perfect example of why Mid-America can’t force itself to watch the Academy Awards.

Just last month, Phoenix was arrested in Washington where he spoke about the link between agriculture and climate change….right after he got off a jet with a huge carbon footprint.

It was once said----the only cure for hypocrisy is irony.