Ingrid Newkirk Quotes

I was caught on the freeway for hours when Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans. The entire city had to be evacuated. I observed lives threatened by catastrophes and a whole range of behaviour. What could people do during a crisis?

I did live through Katrina and also Hurricane Rita, which hit Lake Charles. Interestingly, when Katrina hit, they evacuated and Lake Charles was one of the evacuation destinations. We opened up the civic center of the city to the evacuees and provided them free medical and psychiatric care there.

There is no question that FEMA and the National Emergency Response System did not fail America the day that Katrina hit. They failed the day before and the days before that.

In a disaster you have to have speed. In order to have speed, you have to have trust. And in order to have trust, you have to have people organized and planning before the disaster.

FEMA has lost its focus, and Floridians know first-hand of the agency's shortcomings, .. Natural disaster preparedness and response programs have become trapped in a homeland security bureaucracy.

I love animals, always have, and it seemed natural to help the ASPCA. Animals have no voice of their own, so we have to be that voice.

While Hurricane Katrina demonstrated the dangers of failing to evacuate hospitals from the path of a storm, Hurricane Gustav demonstrated that moving thousands of sick people has its own risks. Gustav also highlighted a critical vulnerability of American hospitals - an inability to withstand prolonged blackouts.

There are several very good websites which describe the details of preparedness planning for citizens.

Terms like that, 'Humane Society,' are devised with people like me in mind, who don't care to dwell on what happens to the innocent.

As Mayor of San Francisco, I will work hard to ensure that, in the event of natural or man-made disasters, San Franciscans are prepared and our City is protected.

I can watch endless humans get killed, but if I see a movie and they kill a dog, I practically want to walk out.

Brutality to an animal is cruelty to mankind - it is only the difference in the victim.

In America, dogs are viewed by their names first, breed second. And dogs live behind walls. It's an unnatural point of view.

A major part of being prepared is having a plan. Local calls don't always work in the immediate vicinity of a disaster, so it's important to have an out-of-town contact with whom the entire family can check in.

The problem with experiments has always been that human beings make the decisions on whether or not the animals have benefitted from the treatment.

There's no better feeling in the world than knowing that my show played a role in stopping animal abuse or alleviating animal suffering.

To me, it is one world, and the non-human animals bear the brunt of oppression and suffering.

I only live in the world of animal protection. I speak only of that. I think only of that. I am obsessed.

I'm very much into animal welfare.

Animals have never betrayed me. They are an easy prey, as I have been throughout my career. So we feel the same. I love them.

If there were a major earthquake in Los Angeles, with bridges and highways and railroads and airports all shut down and huge buildings collapsing, I don't care how much planning you do, the first 72 hours is going to be chaotic.

If a hurricane strikes, we can blame the president for not being there; we can blame Congress and FEMA; we can blame the state governments; but in the end, it's the mayors and the local city governments that have to be prepared for emergencies and be prepared to act.

If you have a major disaster involving hundreds of thousands, or in this case millions of people, whether it be a natural disaster or an act of terrorism, the first 72 hours are going to be totally chaotic no matter what you plan to do.

Both my wife and I have a lot of compassion for animals in general.

I was so sad from losing two of my dogs and my mother. I had this vision of all these animals sitting behind bars. They had no control and were scared. That's why I got into fostering and adopting animals out.