Html to talk to flash?

Thanks so much for replying to my post! I had been trying to get the variables to point to different labels using 4 different URLS:

pets.swf?position="cows"
pets.swf?position="sheep"
pets.swf?position="geese"
pets.swf?position=“chickens”

And some ActionScript in the first frame:

barnyard.text = position;
if (position=cows) {
gotoAndPlay(“cows01”);
}
if (position=sheep) {
gotoAndPlay(“sheep01”);
}
if (position=geese) {
gotoAndPlay(“geese01”);
}
if (position=chickens) {
gotoAndPlay(“chickens01”);
}

This doesn’t work but I can’t seem to find out how to fix it. Do you know why the if statements don’t work? Should I even be using if statements? I’ve been trying to figure this out for over 7 hours!

About to go crawl into a cave and never come out again,
Emme