Oprah Winfrey is winding down her show this week, but Madeleine Pickens, wife of oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens, sent the trendsetting TV icon a video appeal on Sunday, May 22 to publicize the plight of America's wild mustangs.
Photo: Oprah Winfrey, courtesy of Abayomi Azikiwe, Pan-African News Wire
Pickens chose a peculiar way of trying to get queen of daytime talk's attention, especially considering the name "T. Boone Pickens" would normally open any media door. Madeleine chose to send out a special video appeal with hubby T. Boone directly addressed to Oprah, publicly releasing the video on May 22 in an email blast reported by Ah-Ha Rancho Santa Fe News.
One would think one of the wealthiest people in the world wouldn't have trouble getting media exposure for a wide-ranging animal rescue project. But Oprah works in mysterious ways. Apparently, Madeleine and T. Boone Pickens can get on everywhere from CNN to Al Jazeera with their quest to save the mustangs, but Oprah is a world all unto herself.
One might also wonder, wild mustangs are nice, but what about helping people, especially with all the resources a billionaire has at hand. This time, we're not talking about Oprah, but the fabulously wealthy Pickens clan. Throw a few bucks toward humans, why don't you?
Pickens has gone around and around with federal officials about her plan to set up a wild mustang refuge on national park ground. Ah-Ha Rancho Santa Fe News first detailed the effort earlier this year, but the video campaign picked up steam this week with the e-mail blast to media and supporters. She put together the kind of lobbying effort and web site you would expect from a billionaire. Called "Saving America's Mustangs," the site has a lot of information about the wild mustangs and the effort by the Pickens clan to save them. The photo below is courtesy of Pickens.
Pickens calls the effort "a viral video to show awareness and the importance of protecting our American mustangs from extinction."
"The video is directed to the attention of Ms. Oprah Winfrey," Pickens continues. "She has been instrumental in many animal rights issues including: exposing the dolphins in Japan, puppy mills, and slaughter. Please share this video to other influential people in the media who can get this message out before it's too late. Together, we can create positive change for our wild horses."
Want to see the exclusive video now? Of course...
Pickens also has a special song. She gives a special thanks shout-out to Band of Horses for allowing Save the Mustangs to use "The Funeral." Please download the song on iTunes at here.
Owner of the exclusive Del Mar Country Club and married to oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens, Madeleine Pickens has advocated for animals for decades. While married to Gulfstream Air founder and top horse breeder Alan Paulsen before his death in 2000, Pickens involved herself in the thoroughbred industry, and later helped lobby the passage of the American Horse Slaughter Prevention Act by Congress.
About 33,700 wild horses roam freely in 10 Western states, about half in Nevada, according to BLM officials. The BLM set a target level of 26,600 horses and burros in the wild, removing 10,637 of the animals from the range in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30.
What do you think? Should Oprah Winfrey take up the cause? Should Madeleine Pickens continue, or maybe put her good efforts into helping, hmm, people perhaps. Tell us what you think.
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Comments: 11
One solution to the expensive warehousing of wild horses currently in holding is Madeleine Pickens proposed wild horse sanctuary plan through her Saving America’s Wild horses Foundation. The sanctuary plan will save taxpayers approximately $700 to $800 million over a decade. Mrs. Pickens, a successful business woman in her own right, has already spent her own money to purchase 2 ranches in Nevada for the sanctuary. The wild horse sanctuary will generate tourism and jobs for Nevada, a state with one of the highest unemployment rates in the country. It would be great if Oprah spoke up for our wild horses. However, what is most needed is taxpayers to stand up for our wild horses, thereby saving millions of dollars to be used for people in need and/or getting control of the deficit. It just sounds like good business!
I respect these actors and others for what they do and their well-intended concerns. I do ask if each of these individuals on the film, including the Pickens clan, have read the Wild Free-Roaming Horse and Burro Act (WFRHBA), in its entirety. It does require the protection of the horse but also requires that BLM manage for a “thriving natural ecological balance on public lands”. The Secretary of Interior (who oversees BLM) is required to determine the number of horses the range can support in order to “preserve and maintain a thriving natural ecological balance and multiple-use relationship in that area”. Multiple uses include the horses, wildlife, recreation, livestock, energy development, etc.
One minor fact that is omitted in all this discussion is that the horse population increases on the average of 20 – 22% per year and therefore their populations will DOUBLE every four years. This is not a path to extinction! The law requires the BLM to protect them; therefore they will never be extinct. I also ask where they got their numbers of 2 million horses on the range 100 years ago. I believe this to be very inaccurate information used to mislead you into their cause because it sounds really bad to have that many horses 100 years ago and now only “33,700” on the range. In reality, the reason for the 40,000 in captivity is that they reproduce so quickly that the range can’t support them. Again, that ISN’T extinction!
The WFRHBA is just one of many laws that BLM is required to abide by. Those who have chosen to participate in this video should read the WFRHBA, the Federal Land Policy and Management Act (FLPMA) (1976), and the Public Rangelands Improvement Act (PRIA) (1978). The BLM is supposed to follow all the laws but because special interest groups such as the Pickens clan have chosen to pick and choose the parts of one law they want to focus on and use snippets to mislead these celebrities and much of the general public. You can visit www.wildhorserange.org for easy links to the above mentioned laws and do your own research before getting too caught up in this “cause”.
I also question why these people with so much money and “such good intentions” don’t put their time, money, and energy towards caring for people who are being treated much worse and live lives much worse than these horses.
i think castration will cut the herd back, and the young ones also need to be done when old enough, they really need to give these horses and burros to Madeleine and stop those horrible roundups.