This is in reference to this.

Steve Miller and Bones at the Secane Station Tavern. My print column is up.

UPDATE: Though the reaction to this column was generally positive there was this email:

Dear Gil:

Although that story is meant to be heartwarming, I think it conveys a cycle of disrespect for that animal.  How willingly he was ready to give it to anyone that called about it and then to a drunk couple in a bar. Then he made sure he got a good’s night sleep even though he knew there were problems when the dog got to the couple’s home. Yes, indeed. I can see he has the best interests of the animal in mind.

If you want to write a story of animal rescue, write about the animal rescue groups that work tirelessly to save and place these animals in loving homes. There is a process to animal adoption and ownership, a process to introducing pets into a home . We need to talk about responsibility to pets and not recycling them back into potentially unfit homes.

Karen Ditomo

I say: Nah, it's always a better story when the dog goes to the bar. But thanks anyway, Karen, for the advice. 

The best part about this is that it's real

Oberlin College in Ohio has nothing on our very own Swarthmore College when it comes to concern about hate crimes on campus, real or imagined. My print column is up.

UPDATE: Michele Malkin is also on the story and has even bigger doubts about it than I do. She has good reason.

The truth is that Oberlin has been a hotbed of dubious hate crime claims, dating back to the late 1980s and 1990s, when I was a student on campus. In 1988, giant signs reading "White Supremacy Rules (Kill All Niggers)" and "White Supremacy Rules, (F**k (slashed out and replaced with 'Kill') All Minorities)" were hung anonymously at the Student Union building. It has long been suspected that minority students themselves were responsible.

In 1993, a memorial arch on campus dedicated to Oberlin missionaries who died in the Boxer Rebellion was defaced with anti-Asian graffiti. The venomous messages -- "Death to Chinks Memorial" and "Dead chinks, good chinks" -- led to a paroxysm of protests, administration self-flagellation and sanctimonious resolutions condemning bigotry. But the hate crime was concocted by an Asian-American Oberlin student engaged in the twisted pursuit of raising awareness about hate by faking it, Tawana Brawley-style.

And so it goes...