Dog Perspective

Excerpts from an opinion piece on the Kristi Noem ‘dog killing’ episode, by talk show host Mark Davis on the Newsweek website:

Say what you will about the Bidens, but when their dog Commander went on a White House biting spree, they didn't walk him out to the South Lawn for a summary execution.

There are differences one can find between Commander, a German Shepherd sent to live in a less stressful environment, and Cricket, a 14-month-old female wirehair pointer who took a bullet from South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem—a story the governor shares with baffling enthusiasm in an upcoming book.

Pause for a moment and consider not only that she did it, but that she is so proud of it that she touts it two decades later in a book clearly designed to boost her chances at the vice presidency, if not an even higher office. Then consider that a collection of editors and the governor's own advisers thought this would be a great thing to share in the thick of a fateful political year.

It takes a special blindness to miss the obvious revulsion this story would provoke across political and cultural lines.