SOUTH KOREA HAS GONE TO THE DOGS. South Korean researchers have become the first To successfully cloned a dog. This news will make humane societies and dog pounds around the world groan with dismay. There are more dogs than anyone on earth knows what to do with and we exterminate them by the thousands. No matter, these are scientists. They do not have to be practical. They just have to be first.

They made this puppy from a single cell taken from the ear of a dog. As it turns out, dog cloning is really inefficient. The scientists tortured more than 100 anesthetized dogs with multiple surgeries. They also created more than 1,000 laboratory-grown embryos that died or were killed. Think of it as canine ethnic cleansing. Out of all this carnage and pain, only two cloned puppies were born, and one of them died after three weeks. Can you say creepy?

Despite the fact that we do not need more dogs and that it takes many dogs to produce the clone, scientists forge ahead, both to say they did it and because there might be a market for cloned dogs, taking advantage of grieving people who have lost their pets. They will advertise they can create a new one that looks just like Spot and, after a drink or two, you might believe it.

Scientists have also cloned mice, cows, sheep, goats, rabbits and cats. Dolly the sheep was celebrated at the first cloned mammal in 1996. Scientists also did not tell the public about the hundreds of deformed animals and clumps of unidentifiable flesh they created and killed in the process. If all dogs go to heaven, there will be some funny looking stuff up there. I wonder if the guys that created them will be there, or if they will have to account for their actions in some other way.

The era of the mad scientist is upon us. These guys might even be more dangerous than Congress.