I don't know if I agree with you but I see your point, and it's not the sort of thing that people should be downvoting, I don't think.
I usually think that the law shouldn't exist to enforce morality, but I'm not sure if that principle should be applied in the absolute sense or not. Anyway, its not clear that it's immoral under any secular ethics to "mistreat" animals in the first place, especially if there's a clear benefit to humans. Even if it is immoral, its not clear which animals should be valued. Most people seem to agree that chimpanzees should be treated with more consideration than jellyfish. My personal utility function values warm blooded animals higher than all others and below humans, but that's just an intuitive preference, not based on any rigorous analysis. I have hope that the next few decades of AI research might shed some light on this issue by giving us an idea of what "sentience" really means, but this is far from guaranteed.
I suppose I'd like to see efforts focused on restructuring meat subsidies to make meat more expensive (and better reflective of the costs of production). I'm sure doing this would be a political nightmare, and I don't have the necessary understanding of agricultural economics to give any suggestions for exactly how to do this, but it seems doable. Higher meat prices will also hopefully make synthetic meat research more attractive. Synthetic meat would conveniently bypass this whole debate.
Other measures that should probably be attempted before we turn to fining and jailing people for mistreating or disrespecting animals should probably address the pet breeding industry, people who aren't looking for a dog to aid with hunting or foraging or some other specialized purpose should have more incentives to prefer a shelter over a breeder than currently exist. And maybe make it a crime to intentionally kill or hurt certain animals for no reason.