More on Palin and Special Needs...

[Emily Kronenberger]

A few days ago, I posted on my blog, New Wave Grrrl, about the gaps surrounding Sarah Palin's purported policy priority of addressing the needs of children with disabilities. I questioned the McCain-Palin ticket's ability to put our money where their mouths have been on the subject of more funding for people with special needs. On October 24th, Palin gave a speech in my home state of Pennsylvania, on just what she and John McCain planned to do in order to better serve children with disabilities.

Although Palin's speech was heartfelt, and I believe she truly cares about disability issues as a parent and as an aunt of children with developmental disabilities, her speech and the so-called McCain-Palin plan for children with special needs (which comes less than two weeks shy of Election Day) still falls flat, and still lacks any real promise of change in the quality of life for individuals with disabilities.

One glaring reason for this is the complete lack of policies that support people with disabilities beyond childhood. People who live with physical, developmental, cognitive, and multiple disabilities need various levels of care and support services throughout their entire lifetimes, in order to achieve a better quality of life and live fully within their communities. This includes not just vocational services for people with disabilities who can and want to work, but actual Medicaid dollars to fund the programs that provide for independent living in the community and not in State institutions, regardless of the severity of one's disability.

Palin did mention teens in her speech, within the context of education and transition to adulthood planning, but again, the McCain-Palin approach is fragmented and does not address the current and critical health and human service needs of young people with disabilities. A recent study published earlier this year in the Journal of School Health showed that adolescents in special education programs are more likely to contract Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) than their typically developed peers. In adddition, we know that young people with disabilities are more likely to be victims of sexual abuse and assault. Better sexuality education and health services are needed to address these serious issues, and under a McCain-Palin Administration which would continue to fund harmfully inaccurate Abstinence-Only Education programs in schools, it is unlikely that these issues would ever see the light of day.

Palin also mentioned how lucky she and her family are to have such a strong network of social supports, and acknowledged that others who are surrounded by less family or have fewer resources are less fortunate. Wow! But neither Senator McCain nor Governor Palin have track records of supporting family-friendly work policies that would make it easier for families to put together the kind of support networks that Palin referenced in her speech. Their actions of not supporting family leave, benefits for same-sex partners, or pay parity for men and women strongly suggest that they recognize their privelege of having access to services and family supports, but will do nothing concrete to create the same access for others. How is this a populist message?

Last, although it is not funny, I almost have to chuckle to myself when I hear Palin talk about IDEA and fully funding this law, which gives children with disabilities the right to a free and appropriate education that best meets their needs. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) was originally passed with the provision of the federal government eventually funding 40% of the cost for states in order to provide education to children with disabilities. This act also includes a provision for Early Intervention, a voluntary program that provides therapeutic and educational services to infants and toddlers with disabilities. IDEA has never been funded fully, which has thrown the special education and Early Interventions systems within many states into decades of problems while not being able to serve enough children with disabilities. This story includes Palin's state of Alaska, which has little infrastructure and one of the worst track records of serving children with special needs in-state.

Moreover, not only has John McCain routinely voted against more funding for IDEA during his tenure in the Senate, but he has also vowed to freeze all federal spending indefinitely if he becomes President. This could likely be disasterous for vital federal programs that serve people of all ages with disabilities, including veterans, not to mention for states which count on federal dollars to make their budgets whole and to provide the most basic of services to the most vulnerable people in our society.

The recent McCain-Palin proposal to address the needs of people with disabilities is not only too little too late, but it is derived from a complete lack of policy knowledge and understanding that has haunted their entire campaign.

[Emily Kronenberger]

Hey N Hester (I love your kitty icon by the way, I am a huge cat person)! I'm truly confused by your comment. Obviously, it's clear that I am already personally voting for Obama, but the reasons I support Obama were not the points at issue in my latest post. I was presenting facts, based upon McCain/Palin's so-called plan for people with disabilities, and pointing out the reality that their misguided and inconsistent policy records, along with their current policies, will lead nowhere for individuals with disabilities in terms of opportunities for them to live more independently in their communities (which incidentally costs the government alot less than funding for people who live in state-run institutions) and to live full, healthier lives.

Do you know anyone with a disability, N Hester? Is this an issue that matters to you? I ask because I am surprised by your response, which did not offer any other point of view on disability policy, but rather appeared to link people with disabilities, including children with autism, mental retardation, and cerebral palsy, with people on welfare. You seemed to allude to some charge that "these people," as you call them, do not need any help from anyone because they are responsible for their situations and that they should just deal with it. In addition, you confuse people with disabilities with "welfare recipients." I'm sorry...huh? I just don't follow.

Although I do not understand your reasoning for this linkage, I will provide information on both issues. On disability policy, anyone who advocates that people remain in state-run institutions for the better part of their lives, regardless of what living situation is most appropriate to their needs, simply does not grasp the degree of significance of this human rights issue. John McCain certainly does not, that is why he has voted against legislation that would have begun to move people with disabilities into their communities.

With regard to "welfare recipients," I suspect that you do not know anyone of welfare, which is why you have a greatly distorted view of what public assistance, or welfare, entails. In 1996, the US Congress passed sweeping federal welfare reforms. Much of the details on how welfare would be administered were left to individual states, in order to give those states more localized control and oversight as to how individual state welfare programs would work, which in many respects was viewed as one of the more positive aspects of this reform. Most states, like the state in which I was raised - New Jersey - already had laws in place which limited the amount of assistance people on welfare could apply for. For example, in New Jersey, individuals on welfare do not get additional assistance for more children if they in fact have more children while on the system. Their benefit remains the same as it did when they originally applied for the program. Further, New Jersey has not increased the monetary amount of assistance benefits in over 20 years to individuals and families, despite the double-digit increases in the cost of living over those 20-plus years.

But I digress. Welfare reform of the 1990s not only greatly limited public assistance for individuals and families, it also mandated that any person receiving assistance participate in work activities in order to receive anything, which ushered in state welfare-to-work programs. Many people on welfare currently work in menial, low-skilled jobs, because they cannot get other jobs with their education and training, and/or because if they make over a certain amount of money, they will no longer qualify for assistance but they still won't be able to make enough money to support themselves and their families. They are caught in a no-win situation, but it is not because they are lazy or inherently "dependent" as you asserted in your comment.

Facts on disability policy or welfare programs aside, what is it that you are really looking at here? Why did you link disabilities with welfare and then Obama in your comment? I throw these questions back to you...think about it and send me a reply.

[N Hester]

If you have questions as to the McCain-Palin policy you can always vote for Obama. His policy wasn't hard to grasp. He will take your money to better enable the government to assist welfare recipients. Now there is a great cause. We wouldn't want to do anything to help these people become less dependent on government (taxpayer's dollars) aid.