Author: stevekuusisto

National Federation of the Blind Condemns Amazon’s 
Push to Put Kindle E-books in Schools

Blind Americans Will Protest at Amazon Headquarters

Seattle, Washington (December 4, 2012): In protest of a recent push by Amazon.com to put Kindle e-books, which are inaccessible to blind students, into K-12 classrooms across the country, members and supporters of the National Federation of the Blind will conduct an informational picket at the company’s headquarters on Wednesday, December 12. The action comes on the heels of Amazon’s launch of Whispercast, a system designed to allow teachers and school administrators to push Kindle e-books to different devices, theoretically allowing the sharing of content among devices brought to school by the students.  Kindle content, unlike some other e-book products, is not accessible to blind students, even on devices that are themselves accessible to the blind, such as personal computers and iPads.  This is because Amazon makes Kindle content available only to its own proprietary text-to-speech engine, if at all, rather than to accessibility applications of the reader’s choice.  Furthermore, the limited accessibility features that Amazon has implemented do not allow for the kind of detailed reading that students need to do in an educational setting. Although the books can be read aloud with text-to-speech, the student cannot use the accessibility features of his or her device to learn proper spelling and punctuation, look up words in the dictionary, annotate or highlight significant passages, or take advantage of the many other features that Kindle devices and applications make available to sighted students.  Kindle e-books also cannot be displayed on Braille devices, making them inaccessible to blind and deaf-blind students who read Braille.

Dr. Marc Maurer, President of the National Federation of the Blind, said: “Amazon has repeatedly demonstrated utter indifference to the recommendations of blind Americans for full accessibility of its Kindle e-books and failed to follow the best practices of other e-book providers.  Blind Americans will not tolerate this behavior any longer.  While we urge Amazon to correct the many obvious deficiencies in its implementation of accessibility and remain willing to work with the company to help it do so, we will oppose the integration of these products into America’s classrooms until Amazon addresses these deficiencies.  Putting inaccessible technology in the classroom not only discriminates against blind students and segregates them from their peers, but also violates the law.”

For more information on this important issue, please visit www.nfb.org/kindle-books.

Encounter At The Market: Veteran’s Service Dog
(The Chattanoogan)
December 4, 2012

CHATTANOOGA, TENNESSEE– [Excerpt provided by Inclusion Daily Express] After a trip to the Chattanooga Market today, I would like to thank a member of the Chattanooga police department, Sgt. Mike Smith for his assistance. His knowledge of the ADA laws in regards to service dogs came in handy.

My husband is a wounded veteran; wounded twice in Afghanistan and medically retired from the Army over a year ago. He recently acquired a service dog and takes him just about everywhere he goes.

Today we decided to go the market downtown and, of course, the dog came with us. My husband and I entered the market and were approached by one of the vendors who informed us that pets were not allowed inside. My husband provided the documentation specifying his dog as a service animal. Although the gentleman insisted the dog needed to be wearing a placard or vest, he took the paperwork provided as proof and allowed us to enter the market.

Not all disabilities are readily apparent. My husband doesn’t use a wheelchair or any other device and appears, to the casual observer, to be perfectly normal but things are not always as they appear. People would do well to remember that. You never know what is under the surface.

Due to his disabilities he doesn’t often go where there are crowds. After this incident he felt harassed and discriminated against and attempted to communicate without getting upset, which is hard for him due to his disabilities.

Entire article:
Encounter At The Market – And Response
http://tinyurl.com/ide1204126

Yesterday’s Senate defeat of the United Nations charter on the rights of people with disabilities is easy to dismiss as an instance of the Tea Party’s influence on 38 rightward leaning Senators–politicians so frightened by re-election they’re willing to pander to contemporary know-nothing-ism. A variant of this small “d” democratic impulse at rationalization is to say that the Senate has occasionally been worse–one has only to recall the influence of the KKK in our nation’s affairs for example. (In fact the Tea Party bears a considerable resemblance to the Klan with its rabid and narrow view of American exceptionalism.) I can’t say if things are worse now than when Harry Truman was young and was advised to join the Klan if he wanted a political future; I’ve no idea how hateful and deep the present strain of America’s reactionary provincialism is. What I do know is that I have a bad case of Huddie Ledbetter’s “Bourgeois Blues” with a decidedly crippled strain. I think of Leadbelly singing: “Hey all you colored people, listen to me, don’t you ever try to build no home in Washington, DC…”   

One can say, “Well, we have the ADA here at home–the failure of the Senate to ratify an international treaty that would bring those rights to other parts of the world doesn’t mean anything, really.” Dear Senator Grassley: I recall being denied entry to an Italian church because of my guide dog. Recall being denied access to a hotel restaurant in Milan. Senator Grassley, you apparently don’t give two straws about my rights to travel abroad with dignity as an American citizen. In fact, given your long standing opposition to disability rights, it’s clear you think that disabled people should shut up and live in a back room on the family farm and stop bothering you. Senator, you are a party hack. The idea that voting for a United Nations charter would in any way interfere with American law is false but you used it–you used it to suborn the rights of people all over the world who are striving to follow America’s lead. To you and your 37 colleagues who voted down one of the noblest exercises in human rights in global history I say simply, you are pandering to the same forces that historically animated the political arm of the KKK–shallow, paranoiac, isolationist vitriol. And that’s the best thing I can say. How can you look Bob Dole in the eye? Oh, that’s right, you don’t have to! You can walk right around him since he’s using that wheelchair. Senator Grassley, you’re a just a saucebox: an impertinent and petulant fellow. That you’ve cultivated this in lieu of statesmanship means of course that you are a wantwit–a fool. In this age of international relations and globalization you and your 37 buggy cohorts represent a dangerous tendency in our politics, for you want us to simply leave the world, not as leaders but as dark and toadying neo-Fascist romantics. I’ve lived in Iowa, sir–I’ve always thought you a dullard, but never a dolt. And who am I? I’m just one of the 56 million people with disabilities in these United States. That’s all.

CQ NEWS

Dec. 4, 2012 – 12:30 p.m.

Senate Rejects U.N. Disabilities Treaty

By Sarah Chacko, CQ Roll Call

The Senate on Tuesday rejected a resolution to ratify an international treaty that sets global standards for the treatment of people with disabilities.

Senators rejected 61-38 the U.N. Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (Treaty Doc 112-7), a pact signed by the United States in 2009 and sent to the Senate for ratification this May. A two-thirds majority of those present and voting, 66 in this case, is required for adoption of resolutions of ratification. Eight Republicans joined Democrats in voting for ratification.

Former Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole, R-Kan., who lost the use of his right arm in World War II, was present on the Senate floor during the vote. Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., asked members to vote at their desks, a ceremonial gesture reserved for historic occasions.

Signed by more than 150 countries, the treaty addresses the equal rights of persons with disabilities. Parties to the treaty agree to “undertake to ensure and promote the full realization of all human rights and fundamental freedoms for all persons with disabilities without discrimination of any kind on the basis of disability.”

In September, 36 Republican senators signed a letter saying they would oppose any efforts to consider treaties during a lame-duck session. The letter did not say the lawmakers would oppose ratification of any particular treaty.

All but one of the Republicans who signed the letter, Scott P. Brown of Massachusetts, also voted against ratification. Mark Steven Kirk, R-Ill., who did not sign the letter, was absent.

Critics said ratifying the treaty could hurt citizens domestically, opening up the states to lawsuits based on international laws regarding parental rights and home schooling that are different from those in the United States. Senators such as Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., and James M. Inhofe, R-Okla., who opposed the treaty have been skeptical of a committee established by the treaty to review reports submitted by countries on steps taken to implement the treaty’s provisions.

Proponents of the treaty, such as John McCain, R-Ariz., said U.S. laws already afford many of the protections called for in the treaty and ratification of the treaty would not affect U.S. law.

The committee created by the treaty can only make recommendations, said Foreign Relations Chairman John Kerry, D-Mass.

The Senate Foreign Relations panel approved the treaty by a vote of 13 to 6 in July, with Republicans Richard G. Lugar of Indiana, Johnny Isakson of Georgia and John Barrasso of Wyoming joining Democrats in support.

“When have words or suggestions that have no power, that cannot be implemented, that have no access to the courts, that have no effect on the law of the United States and cannot change the law of the United States, when has that threatened anybody in our country?” Kerry said.

The consequence if Congress rejects the treaty is that the United States could lose credibility for refusing to participate in a treaty that asks other nations to live up to its standards, Kerry said.

Opponents said the United States is already a “gold standard” and does not need to open itself to the scrutiny of the United Nations.

“These unelected bureaucratic bodies would implement the treaty and pass so-called recommendations that would be forced upon the United Nations and the U.S. as a signatory,” Inhofe said. “We don’t need the United Nations bureaucrats changing it in our country in the name of worldwide application.”

Thus encouraged, Oliver tapped at the study door. On Mr. Brownlow calling to him to come in, he found himself in a little back room, quite full of books, with a window, looking into some pleasant little gardens. There was a table drawn up before the window, at which Mr. Brownlow was seated reading. When he saw Oliver, he pushed the book away from him, and told him to come near the table, and sit down. Oliver complied; marvelling where the people could be found to read such a great number of books as seemed to be written to make the world wiser. Which is still a marvel to more experienced people than Oliver Twist, every day of their lives.

‘There are a good many books, are there not, my boy?’ said Mr. Brownlow, observing the curiosity with which Oliver surveyed the shelves that reached from the floor to the ceiling.

‘A great number, sir,’ replied Oliver. ‘I never saw so many.’

‘You shall read them, if you behave well,’ said the old gentleman kindly; ‘and you will like that, better than looking at the outsides,–that is, in some cases; because there are books of which the backs and covers are by far the best parts.’

‘I suppose they are those heavy ones, sir,’ said Oliver, pointing to some large quartos, with a good deal of gilding about the binding.

‘Not always those,’ said the gentleman, patting Oliver on the head, and smiling as he did so; ‘there are other equally heavy ones, though of a much smaller size. How should you like to grow up a clever man, and write books, eh?’

‘I think I would rather read them, sir,’ replied Oliver.

‘What! wouldn’t you like to be a book-writer?’ said the old gentleman.

Oliver considered a little while; and at last said, he should think it would be a much better thing to be a book-seller…

**

Oliver has it exactly right. It’s much better to sell books than to write them. 

Thanks to poet Seth Abramson for mentioning my forthcoming collection of poems Letters to Borges in his review of the best new books of poems for The Huffington Post.

Here’s a poem from the book:

For Anyone At All

After the clock was done with noon

The boy leapt up like a crow

To land in the great dictionary.

Like an ape he tore the pages,

Applied some paste with a stick

Until he held a doll of sorts,

A puppet made of words.

He could hear the neighbor’s

Children at a window: Hey

Blind boy—find us where we are!

Come on and guess!

He waved the pages then,

Making them bow and rise

Like nothing you will ever see.

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The history of disability is packed with alarming ideas and misconceptions. The news that the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, DSM-5 has dropped Aspergers Syndrome from its formal classification of psychiatric conditions is cause for considerable fear among “aspie” advocates because so little is still known about it, and the decision to place Aspergers under the umbrella of autism spectrum disorders poses the possibility that people in need of rehabilitation services and educational assistance will now be given short shrift.

Back in the time of FDR Aspergers was cheerfully called “Little Professor Syndrome” by psychiatrists who thought the condition was endearing since those who have it are wonderfuly acquisitive. People with Aspergers tend to have a keen command of facts and a concomitant inability to connect with others. Little Professor.

Some years ago I spoke with a well regarded psychiatrist in Columbus, Ohio who, by means of the promise of anonymity affirmed for me that psychiatry is not a science, adding that “the worst people, the lowliest medical students go into psychiatry”.  If this seems pejoratively subjective let’s consider the DSM-5 more broadly, for it purports to be a scientific document when in fact it lacks research credibility on many levels. Dr. Allen Frances wrote on Psychology Today’s blog about the grievous research errors that have been rather willfully incorporated into the DSM-5:

The DSM-5 Task Force originally planned two sets of field trials, the second of which was meant to provide quality control to correct whatever weaknesses would be exposed in the first. But along the way, the field testing got far behind its schedule and the quality control step was quietly cancelled. No explanation was ever offered, but it seemed likely that DSM 5 was being rushed to press so that APA could reap publishing profits.

 What is more troubling is the following:

Dr. David Kupfer now wants us to believe that the recently published results of the DSM-5 field-testing somehow serve to justify the inclusion in DSM 5 of extremely controversial and much feared changes. This is a terribly misleading claim. Independent of all the other criticisms of DSM-5 (and there are plenty), the poor results of the field trials must have been a major disappointment to the Task Force. Dr Kupfer is now making a desperate attempt to salvage the failed project by putting an unrealistically positive spin on its results.

Our forty-year experience in reliability testing for DSM-II, the RDC, DSM-III. and DSM-IV makes clear what are acceptable and what are unacceptable kappa levels. There is no way of avoiding or cloaking the stark and troubling fact that the DSM-5 field trials produced remarkably low kappas – harking back to the bad old days of DSM-II.

http://1boringoldman.com/index.php/2012/10/31/humility-2/

Equally disturbing, three of the eight diagnoses tested at multiple centers had widely divergent kappa values at the different sites – hardly a vote for their reliability. Even worse, two major diagnostic categories [Major

Depressive Disorder and Generalized Anxiety Disorder] performed terribly, in a range that is clearly unacceptable by anybody’s standard.

http://1boringoldman.com/index.php/2012/10/31/but-this-is-ridiculous/

Dr. Kupfer has been forced to drastically lower our expectations in an effort to somehow justify the remarkably poor and scattered DSM-5 kappa results. There is, in fact, only one possible explanation for the results- the DSM-5 field trials were poorly designed and incompetently administered. Scientific integrity requires owning up to the defects of the study, rather than asking us to deviate from historical standards of what is considered acceptable reliability. It is not cricket to lower the target kappas after the study results fail to meet reasonable expectations.

Diagnostic agreement is the bedrock of our system -a non-negotiable bottom line. The simple truth is that by historical standards, the DSM-5 field trials did not pass muster. Dr Kupfer can’t expect to turn this sow’s ear into a silk purse.”

**

It’s important to remember that there are lives in the balance. The decision of Dr. Kupfer and his team to eliminate Aspergers from the manual while shoe horning several disorders together is as faulty as anything we might have seen some 70 years ago in the psychiatric field.

By Andrea Scarpino

So many of
us lonely.

First snow:
a sudden brightening. The sky no longer gloomy grays, the air, a new freshness.

Open mic in
Marquette: a man walks to the front of the room, says he wants to recite a poem.
Then begins his life story, growing up on a farm, pumping well water, taking
care of his younger brother. Then Vietnam, a soldier he killed who was trying
to hide behind a tree with only a few pieces of grass as camouflage. How he
earned his first ribbon for bravery. Then his work in the circus, in the prison
system. For thirty minutes, he tells his life story. Not a poem. Something more
like loneliness.

Finally,
someone cuts in, asks the man to let other people speak.

“I guess you
can tell I’m pretty lonely,” he says, walking slowly back to his seat. “If
there’s time at the end, maybe I can get to my poem?”

Time at the
end: his brother’s daughter who died as an infant and comes to him in the
night, his grandfather’s friendship with Attila the Hun, how together they
conquered India. He talks and talks, no poem in sight.

My head
swirls trying to keep up. The uncertainty in his walk, his mismatched clothes.
I run through a list of possible diagnoses : dementia, PTSD, some sort of
psychological break with reality. Then chide myself: loneliness. Who doesn’t
want a moment on stage? A moment to tell our life bigger, grander, more
important than it ever will be? Who doesn’t want an audience to listen, nod
their head, tell us we’re meaningful?

I stare at
the darkened window reflecting his gestures, the jerk of his head, his lean on
the podium. First snow: a loneliness. So many of us afraid. 

Blog like you mean it. This morning I’m shouting out to Ari N and DJ and all my friends who daily take up the fight for the rights of autists. I love you all.

This morning I’m thinking of the Blinded Veterans of America. Their organization has done more for the rights of the blind than many other outfits. I love you all.

Two discretely shouted moments of universal love on a grey morning. And nor I must walk my guide dog.

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