By Anastasia Pantsios
On a Monday evening in May, Satan has come to Solon. Sun streams in through picture windows, bathing the crowd of 50 who have gathered in the community center meeting room to hear the impossibly dynamic speaker. He's the type of guy — tall and well-groomed, with glossy black hair flecked with gray at the sides, an athletic stride, and energetic delivery — that you might expect to find peddling a scheme for getting rich on real estate investments.
But Wayne Pacelle is peddling something very different. He is the CEO of the Washington, D.C.-based Humane Society of the United States, better known to its very vocal enemies as the radical, out-of-state animal-rights group that aims to impose its will on Ohioans.
But for this group on this night, Pacelle doesn't have to do much. "He doesn't even have to say anything; I'll do whatever he wants," sighs one woman as she eyes Pacelle.
But even if he were fat and unsightly, Pacelle's message would be lapped up by this audience of primarily middle-aged women from Cuyahoga and surrounding counties. Most have already signed on to the mission: gathering the 402,275 valid signatures needed to put a package of three issues on Ohio's November ballot pertaining to the treatment of livestock animals.
