Published: November 16, 2008 12:36 am            

Mystery surrounds identity of new first pooch

There is a great deal of intrigue surrounding the nascent Barack Obama administration.

People are wondering who he will choose for his cabinet, where his kids will go to school and what kind of role Michelle Obama will play as first lady.

But these questions are secondary to the one keeping tongues wagging in official Washington and across the nation.

What kind of dog is he going to get his daughters?

Inquiring minds want to know. Will it be a mutt, a purebred, a shelter dog, a hairless breed or one that is supposedly hypoallergenic?

This might just be the first major decision of the Obama White House.

The Obamas likely are leaning toward a hypoallergenic pooch, if such a thing exists, because young Malia Obama has been found to be allergic to dogs. According to the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology, “There is no truly ‘hypoallergenic dog.’”

Getting a hairless dog won’t help, say the doctors of the AAAAI, since it is proteins that cause allergies, and these show up in doggie dandruff, as well as saliva and urine.

You can keep the dog out of the child’s bedroom, remove carpeting, give the pup a weekly bath and clean the house with vacuums equipped with double bags and special filters, but it won’t eliminate the symptoms altogether.

So Malia and her sister, Sasha, have to decide, either to hold dad to his promise of getting the girls a dog if he was elected president (thus subjecting Malia to sneezing, coughing and teary eyes), or opt for a decidedly hypoallergenic pet, like a fish.

Take it from me, girls, choose the allergies.

I, too, was deemed allergic to dogs and cats when I was a child, and thus was forced to choose pets like fish and those little bitty turtles they used to sell in dime stores.

There’s nothing wrong with fish, or the little turtles, for that matter (save for the fact the turtles often carry salmonella), but they are not dogs.

You can walk a dog, play with it, throw your arms around it and give it a big kiss. Dogs can share your bed and share your dinner (under the table, if mom doesn’t catch you).

A dog can protect you, can amuse you and can keep you company on a lonely day.

You can train a dog to sit or shake hands, you can curl up for a long nap with a dog, you can talk to a dog, and it can talk back, after a fashion.

Fish are just there. You can look at fish, feed them and clean their bowls. The same with a little turtle. It is hard to consider a fish or a turtle part of the family. Have you ever tried to hug a fish? It never ends well.

So go for the sneezing and wheezing, kids. You’ll probably grow out of it. I did, and finally got my first dog when I was in sixth grade. The poor pup was with us a week before having to be put down because it suffered from distemper, thanks to an unscrupulous breeder.

It was then I quickly learned another lesson about dogs as opposed to fish or turtles. It’s a shame when fish or turtles die, but losing a dog breaks your heart.

So my advice to the Obama girls is, go get a shelter dog, a mutt, a Heinz 57 who otherwise might soon be put down. Walk down the row of cages and just look into their eyes. When you see your dog, you’ll know.

America, after all, is a nation of mutts, we’re all a little of this, a little of that, leavened with a bit of the other.

And don’t worry about that housebreaking thing. The Secret Service can handle that.



Mullin is senior writer of the News & Eagle.