Author: stevekuusisto

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mobileweb/2012/04/03/obama-paul-ryan-budget-social-darwinism_n_1399080.html?ref=daily-brief?utm_source=DailyBrief&utm_campaign=040312&utm_medium=email&utm_content=NewsEntry&utm_term=Daily%20Brief

Stephen Kuusisto
Director
The Renee Crown University
Honors Program
University Professor
Syracuse University

Odysseus called himself noboday, or no one, depending on the translation–his answer to strangers. In ancient Greece that was also the name of the blind beggar. Homer knew. Odysseus knew. And what it meant, then and now, is that Odysseus was dependent on the Greek code of sympathetic fortune, for the Greeks understood the capriciousness of luck. I’ve been in mind of this lately as the Ryan budget waves from the flag pole of the House of Representatives–the Ryan budget which essentially seeks to destroy social security disability and medicaid and which aims to kill medicare by throwing it to the states–remember the states? They can’t even keep the roads repaired. And so in the near future, whether Ryan has his way, or is merely stopped at the edge of catastrophe, (which means the budget will be siphoned in a sequential way like the death of a thousand cuts) Americans will soon be calling one another “Noboday” for millions will be beggars who were once barely in the middle class. The upcoming battle over the budget is the battle over our ability to understand our essential nature as a nation. Homer understood that Greece was cruel. Our nation was supposed to represent a different experiment. 

Marigolds, dropped newspapers, shoes at the hospital–not even close–but one can live with these–knick knacks of survival–don’t shrug friend, don’t give up on antique spoons.

I saw the sunset behind a glass of Russian tea one night some thirty years ago and I’ve never forgotten.

Poetry is a tomb and it ain’t talking.

Please Share

*April 4^th is the last day to have your voice heard: Submit a comment to commemorate Disability Rights

With less than two days left to comment there are only 617public comments posted onRegulations.Gov. The majority are of currently from the “hospitality industry” and consider a lift (at $2,000 – $4,000 before tax credits) too high a price for equal access because there are too few individuals who need them. Do you think that is representative of America?

Points to consider:

· The new rules would enable people with disabilities to access pools at fitness centers in their communities, while on business trips or when on vacation providing social and exercise opportunities that are critical to health.

· The final regulation language published in September 2010 on accessible entry and exit from swimming pools and spas been through an exhaustive, deliberative and very public process that began September 30th, 2004; all parties had ample opportunity comment.

· Owners and operators have had eighteen months since the 2010 standards were initially promulgated to address any issues or questions about compliance. .

· The concepts of program accessibility and readily achievable barrier removal provide operators and business owners with alternatives and protections against undue financial burdens that are not offset by available tax incentives for improving access to business.

· Justice should move forward without further delay to make effective the requirements to provide access to pools, wading pools, and spas on May 21, 2012, and to resist this sudden realization of impact resulting in last minute efforts to undermine the seven year deliberative and inclusive process that lead to the development of the standard. Ignorance is not excuse The Department should also clarify that the current delay applies only to existing pools, wading pools, and spas and does not excuse newly constructed or altered pools during this period.

Comment at http://www.regulations.gov/#!submitComment;D=DOJ-CRT-2012-0006-0001

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From the Concord Monitor:

"The federal Department of Justice has joined a class-action lawsuit that accuses the state of cutting community mental health services and instead needlessly institutionalizing people at the state hospital and at a home for the elderly.

The lawsuit was brought in federal court in February by the Disabilities Rights Center against Gov. John Lynch and state Health and Human Services officials. It alleges the state has repeatedly violated the Americans with Disabilities Act by exiling the mentally ill rather than treating them in their own communities.

In announcing the decision to join the case, John Kacavas, U.S. attorney for the District of New Hampshire, said the state responds to people in mental crisis by forcing them to spend days at local emergency rooms until they can be brought to the state hospital, sometimes by the police."

(New York Times)
March 28, 2012

ALBANY, NEW YORK– [Excerpt provided by Inclusion Daily Express] Nearly 300,000 disabled and mentally ill New Yorkers face a "needless risk of harm" because of conflicting regulations, a lack of oversight and even disagreements over what constitutes abuse, according to a draft state report obtained by The New York Times.

In 2010, the number of abuse accusations at large institutions overseen by the State Office for People With Developmental Disabilities outnumbered the beds in those facilities — a sign of trouble in buildings where many of the state's most vulnerable residents are housed, and where the state has repeatedly had trouble with abusive employees and unexplained injuries and deaths among residents, according to the report.

The report was commissioned by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo in response to a Times investigation last year into problems of abuse, neglect and fraud in state homes and institutions for the developmentally disabled. A draft of the report began circulating in October, but has not yet been released to the public; people frustrated by the delay separately provided to The Times an executive summary and a bound copy drafted in December.

Problems were found at all six state agencies that provide residential service to children and adults with an array of disabilities, mental illnesses or other issues that qualify them to receive specialized care by the state.

According to the report, a regulatory maze has complicated and in some cases constrained the state's response to claims of abuse. At one agency, the police are summoned if "there is reason to believe that a crime has been committed," while another agency does so only if a potential felony has been committed. A third agency turns to law enforcement only if a local district attorney has "indicated a prior interest," the report said.

Entire article:
People in state care hurt by abuse, neglect
http://tinyurl.com/ide0328121a
Related:
Jonathan's Law and Oswald D. Heck Developmental Center (Inclusion Daily Express Archives)
http://www.inclusiondaily.com/news/institutions/ny/odheck.htm

"The budget plan released by House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wis., is a serious threat to Americans with disabilities.

Ryan is taking aim at Medicaid, which serves more than 8 million disabled Americans. It helps pay for such essentials as prescription drugs,wheelchairs, prosthetics and therapies.

Ryan's plan calls for block-granting Medicaid, which means the federal government would give the states a lump sum of Medicaid revenue to spend as they see fit. This may sound nice, but it really is a sneaky way of ending the guarantee that people with disabilities have to Medicaid. States could conceivably restrict eligibility in ways they cannot currently, thus limiting access to Medicaid services for people with disabilities. Since about 40 percent of Medicaid money serves people with disabilities, the incentive for states to dump them off the rolls or reduce their coverage to save money would be powerful."

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POTB Responds:

Man, talk about unplugging Grandma! Hell, If I were a betting man I wouldn't give grandma any odds of survival under the Ryan plan. In fact, under the Ryan plan Grandma wouldn't get plugged in in the first place!

Picture Grandma, with her backbone on fire, crawling down the street. 

The heartlessness of Paul Ryan is only exceeded by his soulless  smirk. 

Even in a group he is alone–listening to the branches, he’s the tribe’s paranoiac child.

Impatient, vaguely dizzy, aware of fences.

Talk & he will talk back. But he won’t say the words that preoccupy him: marrow, wind, caution, stars.

Upright, in a sleigh of his own making, & fast clouds, sudden moonlight.

“My mind forgets the persons I have been along the way…” 

–Jorge Luis Borges

This morning I stitch them back together: the anorexic kid who was afraid of the hot, metallic words in his throat, who stared at the blue washed walls of the psychiatric hospital. The young man who conjectured that the world was an activity and not a foregone conclusion. The older man who saw that disability was simply an ingredient in a daily rebirth. And the needle is swift. It pushes between danger and disorder. Here is the man who holds all his shadows inside himself and remains in love. He is like the heores in a tale that only contains animals. Oh he’s stitching alright. He stands on one of the world’s three angles with his damaged eyes wide open.