Too busy replaying the clip of Sacha Baron Cohen swooping into the MTV Movie Awards and landing his bare ass in Eminem's face to catch this gem? I understand.

During his acceptance speech for the award for best comedic performance, Jim Carrey told 5.3 million viewers what caused factory farm flu:

MTV Shows

Is Carrey vegetarian? Is this his partner, Jenny McCarthy, rubbing off on him? Is there any experience quite like watching Pet Detective for the eleventh time?

I don't really have any answers here.

By this point, everybody’s seen the video of downer cows being abused by Hallmark/Westland Meat Packing employees. And everyone’s read about the massive beef recall that the HSUS video prompted. The upshot is that nonveg*ns everywhere are finally getting to see what we already knew happens to scores of animals in this country every day.

Well, if any of your omni friends won’t watch the video because it’s too depressing, they have another option: Doreen the Downer by animator Mark Fiore. It does for beef production what The Meatrix did for factory farming, except it’s short and whimsical, like so many of those misguided “educational” videos from the ’50s and ’60s.

I was lucky enough to meet Congressman and Democratic Presidential hopeful Dennis Kucinich in Washington D.C. over the July 4th weekend. The Congressman and I had a brief chat about his veganism (and his frustration at always being labeled vegan first and politician second): apparently it allows him to stay clearer and "more focused" than he's been in twenty years--he's able to work 18 hour days and snag hot young ladies. And he swears by hummus. Perhaps a bad batch was what struck him down with food poisoning this week. Hopefully he'll recover quickly to hit the trail and do a little shoe pleather campaigning.

I know political progressives are torn over support for Kucinich--he's part of the two-party system, yet he's more progressive than Nader--and, oh yeah, he doesn't have a chance in hell. But a girl can dream.

Looking for yet another reason to convince your friends to go veggie? A recent study suggests that cured meat, such as hamburgers and bacon, can negatively affect lung function, leading to emphysema and even lung disease or cancer.

Cured meats are high in nitrites, a kind of preservative, that's been implicated as the cancer-causer. Past research has also linked nitrites to other diseases such as pancreatic, bladder, stomach, gastric and breast cancers. Most veggie burgers and other mock-meats, on the other hand, do not contain any nitrites, and various studies have shown that vegetarians may not only have a lower risk of getting many cancers, but may actually be warding off certain cancers by avoiding nitrites and other meat-related carcinogens.

So meat has officially been linked to nearly every kind of cancer known to man. I wonder how much more it's going to take to convince people that smoked sausage and bacon at 8 a.m. isn't a smart way to start the day.

It may sound sci-fi, but scientists now theorize that mobile phones could be to blame for Colony Collapse Disorder that's struck bees across the U.S. and Europe. Scientists say the radiation given off by mobile phones and other high-tech gadgets may be interfering with the bees' navigation systems, preventing them from finding their way back to their hives.

Although sufficient hard proof of this theory is still lacking, research already suggests that cell phone radiation may have serious adverse effects on human health, causing brain tumors, reduced sperm counts and loss of brain cells. If cell radiation can do this to people, imagine what it could do to bees...

Given the backlash in Chicago, it’s no surprise that the fight to ban foie gras in NYC is getting foodies’ panties in a twist. But this is a new low, especially during the holidays. Fairway has declared itself "Foie Gras Central" and is promoting the hell out of its foie gras products.

Declaring foie gras utterly humane and “one of life’s gustatory pleasures,” the sign basically panders to one of the lowest human impulses—spite—and dares people to buy the product, slinging a loud “Nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah” along with their blood money.

Help set the record straight—that includes the fact that we can indeed spell “foie gras” correctly—and join Farm Sanctuary as they leaflet outside Fairway markets in New York this weekend. For more information on how to get involved, e-mail Carol Moon at nyc@farmsanctuary.org.

Let me begin by saying - you must read this book, Bird Flu: A Virus of Our Own Hatching (Lantern Books, 2006). If not the whole book, which I recommend, then at least read some parts of the book. There is no excuse not to do so as it is offered in its entirety online for free in an easily readable format. Dr. Michael Greger, has written an incredibly well researched (roughly 100 of the 465 pages are references) book. The book consists of five sections, Storm Gathering, When Animal Viruses Attack, Pandemic Preparedness, Surviving the Pandemic and Preventing Future Pandemics with a Forward by Professor Emeritus Kennedy Shortridge, who is credited with discovering the H5N1 (bird flu) virus in Asia.

While I consider myself fairly well versed in the horrors of factory farming, having read much of the prominent literature regarding animal rights and veganism, I found myself underlining informative sentences and gasping paragraph after paragraph with some of the information spilling off the pages. Certainly the description of the zoonotic diseases introduced to humans through the domestication of animals - including Lymes disease, rabies, AIDS and Ebola - was a particularly insightful example of one of the many reasons factory farming is problematic. Obviously bird flu is another example, historically shown to be dangerous to humanity and believed to be on the verge of a pandemic world-wide.

I prefer the view from behind a monitor, but if you talk a good vegan game, you might want to apply to PCRM’s new Heart Health program. The health-conscious org is looking for a few good veggies to spread the word that a vegan diet can help prevent, treat, and reverse heart disease.

PCRM will provide the training, then send you off to talk to members of organizations like the Rotary club. To apply, you need to fill out an application and make a five-minute video of yourself giving a presentation (ideas for the chat can be found here.) Then send it all off to:

The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine
Human Resources Department
Re: Heart Health Presentation
5100 Wisconsin Avenue NW, Suite 400
Washington, DC 20016

For more information, e-mail HeartHealth@pcrm.org or call 202-686-2210.

It’s not news anymore that the introduction of the bill banning the sale of foie gras in NYC was postponed due to pressure from the bill’s opponents. As the foodies continue to torture animals in the name of a delicacy, all the while bitching and moaning that the government has no right to tell people what they can or can’t eat, the Big Apple banned the use of trans fats in restaurants, and plenty of people would like to see more regulation and oversight when it comes to food thanks to the recent outbreaks of salmonella and E. coli.

I can’t help but think that all this activity surrounding food and fat and health and safety will lend credence to the foie gras ban, since foie gras is literally fatty, diseased organs, produced by force-feeding ducks and geese a third or fourth of their body weight every day, resulting in livers that are 10 times normal size, not to mention a host of diseases, paralysis, and premature deaths that predate even slaughter.

We need to make sure this legislation is introduced, and you, your friends, and family can help. Following is an exhaustive guide to getting involved.

On Thursday, I went to Stand-up NY (kind of an unlikely venue) for a lecture by Dr. Michael Greger, for a presentation based on his new book, Bird Flu: A Virus of Our Own Hatching.

The talk was both fascinating and terrifying. Did you know, for example, that all human infectious diseases are thought to have originated from animals—the flu from sheep, colds from horses—and that infectious diseases did not exist before humans started to domesticate animals? (In populations that hunt and eat wild animals, there are no such diseases.) Hence, a virus of our own hatching.

Some facts from the book:

“In 1918, half the world became infected and 25% of all Americans fell ill. Unlike the regular seasonal flu, which tends to kill only the elderly and infirm, the flu virus of 1918 killed those in the prime of life. Public health specialists at the time noted that most influenza victims were those who ‘had been in the best of physical condition and freest from previous disease.’