When the likes of Rick Santorum prevail,

we're all brought down,

down


down

down.

The United Nations disability treaty failed to pass the Senate, due to Republican opposition, led by the far right. They had claimed that "the treaty would erode the principles of American sovereignty and federalism." This, of course, was bullshit, but despite support from disciplined Republicans, including Bob Dole, Dick Lugar, John McCain and former Attorney General Dick Thornburgh, the United States will fail to join 155 nations who have signed the treaty and 126 countries who have signed it.

I can't imagine any of the disabled veterans who stood in opposition to their fellow Republicans are exulting in this country's "sovereignty" today.

Read the article here.

Grumpiness

Lately, I've felt so grumpy and worn out by my own petty concerns that when I hear the pundits talking on the radio or see the latest in stupid comments by the likes of Rush or Geraldo or Gingrich or Santorum or Romney, I can only think of one thing:

Shut the hell up!


Actually, instead of the fiery inferno, I think the f word, but I'm not going to disgrace myself. Remember the movie Do the Right Thing by Spike Lee? I wish he'd make one called Shut the Hell Up.

The Middle Road

I want to stand as close to the edge as I can 

without going over. Out on the edge you see all the kinds of things

 you can't see from the center.**

-- Kurt Vonnegut 

In politics, there's always talk of the need for a middle road, a proverbial path where extremes are blended into some sort of equanimity. People who cry for moderation maintain that there is great virtue in being moderate, that the voices of the left and the right are "too extreme," "irrational," "out of touch with normalcy," etc. My father, a very wise and intelligent moderate bemoans the lack of civility in modern politics and abhors extreme positions on either the right or the left, but as a moderate, his viewpoints are often mysterious to me. I don't know, really, where he stands.  I'm not moderate and would never claim that my way is the right way. It's just my way, I think. I try to temper my beliefs and listen to those whose beliefs are dissimilar, but I feel a weird pressure to somehow move to the middle, to recognize commonalities, to embrace what binds us together  to use some common expressions and exhortations from seemingly more reasoned people than myself. And I'm finding this to be nearly impossible. Frankly, I don't think the middle is that great of a place. Even more frankly, I don't want to move to the middle.

I thought about these things this morning as I drove back from Oliver's school and listened to NPR's coverage of the Republican primaries in Alabama. A nice-sounding guy told the reporter that he was still undecided on whom he would be voting for in today's primary. I'll paraphrase his comments and put my own in parenthesis):

Republican Primary Man: I like Romney for his financial acumen. (He used the word acumen, so I'm assuming he's thoughtful and well-educated, a plus, but there's controversy about just how Romney ran his businesses and acquired his vast wealth. I believe voting for him is like voting for a corporation to be president).

Republican Primary Man: I like Gingrich for his foreign policy views. (Okaaaay. Bomb Iran?)

Republican Primary Man: I like Santorum for his social views and emphasis on family values. (Okaaaay. Hatred of homosexuals, stripping women of reproductive rights, blending church and state, religion and politics?)

Now, where am I going to find commonality with this guy and where is he going to find commonality with me, other than the obvious fact that we're both humans and good enough people (although I really think that anyone who espouses the social views of Santorum is NOT a good person). Why do I have to walk some middle road with the likes of him?

I don't have any answers and am thinking aloud, obviously. Have you heard of the word sheeple? I guess it refers to people who flock together like sheep. That's how I currently see the middle road. I'm going out on a limb and saying, f*^$ that. I'm walking on the edge.

** Thanks to Erika for leaving a comment on this post with this quote! It's just so perfect that I had to add it.

A painful Saturday night, evangelicals and a funny poem

1. I reached deep into parenting patience last night and spent about one half of an hour looking at Oliver's Wacky Pack collection. I made comments, tittered over the gross ones and expressed interest in the sheer numbers that he had collected.
2. I watched Facing the Giants with the boys,  perhaps the lamest movie about high school football ever made. Weirdly, I hate football but am a complete sucker for a football movie (not to mention Friday Night Lights, one of the best tv series ever produced). That this pathetic excuse of a movie was also over-the-top evangelical Christian was salt in the open wound of football. Evidently, Christian filmmakers believe that God is on the side of the football team that prays the hardest and leads their entire sinner high school to revival, and they also write lines for the coach that include various Biblical phrases to pump the kids up (I apologize about the spoiler, but I'm assuming that no one here will waste their time on such pablum unless you want to be a martyr). I amused myself by noting how the opposing team (at the Georgia State championship) was made up of animal-like mostly African Americans dressed all in black while "our" team was entirely white, a veritable army of future Ricks (Santorums and Perrys). The only salvation was that even Oliver at some point looked at me and rolled his eyes. I know I probably sighed a lot and prompted the derision, and lest you think me entirely heretical, I did assure both boys that yes, I thought the movie was really nice, but the acting was terrible. I also threw in the fact that I believed in God but I didn't believe he cared one whit about football. Oh, and the other salvation was that we ate a lot of Girl Scout cookies.

How did you spend your Saturday night?

15 minutes go by....I am reading in bed...and now I've turned the computer back on and am finishing this post.

I opened up my New Yorker to this poem, which demonstrates, if not an act of God, a perfect synchronicity:

Testimony


The Lord woke me in the middle of the night
and there stood Jesus with a huge tray,
and the tray was heaped with cookies,
and He said, Stephen, have a cookie,


and that's when I knew for sure the Lord 
is the real deal, the Man of all men,
because at that very moment
I was thinking of cookies, Vanilla Wafers


to be exact, and there were two
Vanilla Wafers in among the chocolate
chips and the lemon ices, and one
had a big S on it, and I knew it was for me,


and Jesus took it off the tray and put it
in my mouth, as if He were giving me
communication, or whatever they call it.
Then He said, Have another,


and I tell you I thought a long time before I
refused, because I knew it was a test
to see if I was a Christian, which
means a man like Christ, not a big old hog.


--Stephen Dunn

Emily Rapp, Paradox and Rick Santorum (again)

I'm going to read Emily Rapp's new essay in Slate over and over again because she is writing beautifully of paradox, that elusive thread that I tried to articulate just the other day. Emily is a writer and a mother of a young boy with Tay-Sachs, a rare and degenerative genetic disorder. Her son will die one day, probably very soon, and her response to the recent ruckus caused by Rick Santorum and his extremely conservative views about women is very provocative, to say the least.

What do you think about Emily's essay?

Pioneer Woman and homeschooling

Heather Sanders wrote an interesting piece on Pioneer Woman's blog the other day about homeschooling and recent comments made by Rick Santorum. Why, you ask, am I reading a homeschooling post? Well, I read Pioneer Woman's blog like ten million other people in the universe do, and yesterday I accidentally clicked on the Homeschooling tab instead of the Home and Garden tab, and it just caught my eye. I read the post, which was interesting, but then I started scanning the comments and got a sense that yes, there really are people out there who like Rick Santorum and don't think he's a crazy and they even have names and blogs and I could "talk" to them if I wanted to. There are literally hundreds of comments on that post, comments that quickly veered away from the topic at hand -- homeschooling -- and dug deep (or shallow, I suppose) into religion, birth control, women's roles, abortion, evolution and all those other topics that strike fear into the heartland of our privileged country.

Yikes.


This is some scary stuff for left-wing, communist, socialist, gay-loving, elitist, phony theologist, environmentally radical people like ourselves.

Sighs, Exhalations and Irony/Disgust/Despair

The Body of Abel, Found by Adam and Eve, William Blake

Republican Presidential contender, Rick Santorum, is calling for an end to public education.

Can I hear a sigh? (and I'd be ever so grateful, if you're a Republican, if you'd tell me, why, why does your party stand for this man?)

Republican Presidential contender, Rick Santorum, is calling for an end to prenatal testing, using the religious/anti-abortion defense. 

Can I hear an exhalation? (see parenthetical statement above)

The state of California is debating whether to help balance the budget on the backs of the ultimate money grubbers: children with special healthcare needs. 

Can I hear some irony, disgust and despair?

Here's a bit of information about the last thing on my list. If you want to express your own irony, disgust and despair, click on the link and sign the petition.

Can I hear another sigh?

The Medical Therapy Program (MTP) is a special program within California Children's Services that provides physical therapy (PT), occupational therapy (OT) and medical therapy conference (MTC) services for children who have handicapping conditions, generally due to neurological or musculoskeletal disorders.

Currently, children in California with one of these qualifying medical conditions qualify for services regardless of their financial status. 
Cerebral Palsy, Spina bifida, Muscular dystrophy, Rheumatoid arthritis, Spinal cord injuries, Arthrogryposis, Osteogenesis imperfecta, Head injuries.  
The California state budget proposes to align income eligibility requirements for Medical Therapy Program with the broader California Children's Services (CCS) Program. Currently, there is no financial test for eligibility. Under the proposed eligibility standards, families with annual income more than $40,000 or with annual CCS related medical expenses less than 20% of their annual income would not be eligible.

This means, a family with two working parents who make minimum wage make too much money and are no longer eligible for medial therapy services.  They would be responsible for finding these services and paying for these services for their children.  This is a huge financial burden for any family, especially families with children who have special needs.  A family with good medical insurance would still have to pay $200-500 per month on therapy.  And, the therapy sessions would have a maximum number of visits, which is usually around half of the time the child needs.  A family without medical coverage would likely not be able to afford services at all.

The Medical Therapy Program provides necessary physical and occupational therapy for children with medical conditions that effect their day to day life. 


Addendum:


I urge you to go here and read these thoughts about disability and government. I could never say it so well.