I thought I had trust in him. No more.

Salem, New Hampshire

Mitchell

The 40% of “full funding” as promised by the original IDEA (the Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 1975) was for 40% of the EXCESS COSTS of educating these children, not 40% of the total costs. Furthermore, it is Congress that appropriates the money for the IDEA — so blame our federal legislators, not the executive branch.

In your claim that Gov. Palin couldn’t possibly advocate for all children with special needs, it appears that you deem her statement as overbroad or reaching; however, your claim does the exact same thing regarding adults with a diagnosis of Down syndrome.
Just like there are many differences among people without disabilities, there are also many differences and a wide range of abilities, behaviors, traits and health issues among individuals who happen to have the same disability. Avoid the “Disability Hierarchy” where someone compares one disability with another, it creates a class system among those who have no need of another imposed barrier. Over-generalizations are similar to stereotypes which we know are also harmful. Individuals with Down (no ’s) syndrome experience such a wide variety of characteristics that it could almost be argued that it follows a Spectrum as well….Ever heard of a Dual diagnosis, how about the rare but occuring Triple Play?

Palin does not have a CLUE what raising a child with autism is like. No one does unless they have, so I will certainly not be voting for her because of this! I will be voting for Obama because of many reasons but one is that he is involved with the autism community and has them included in his plans for the future.

Thanks, but no thanks.

You fail to consider how important it is to have a parent of a child with a disability in the White House. Once the campaign is over, and the promises forgotten, who do you think will still remember about special-needs children? Obama? No. Biden? No. McCain? No. Palin? Yes!

The fact she has a special-needs child means she will learn first hand what it takes. To me, that is worth more than anything you have cited because most of those issues are pre-Trig.

You also neglected many positives by Palin while she was governor of Alaska. For example: Palin tripled funding for high-cost special needs children from $26,900 per student in 2008 to $73,840 per student in 2011. If you are going to do research, please make sure it is complete instead of presenting just one side when it suits you.

“Palin also cut $125,000 in funding for assistive technology for people with disabilities.” This is for Alaska’s 2009 budget. But, you failed to do any research on it. What was the technology for? Why did she veto it? The answers require research but perhaps you didn’t want to know the answers? For all I know, it could be 60″ Hi Def TVs for people in nursing homes. As of now, all you are doing is echoing other blogs.

The reason that the presidential candidates don’t focus all their efforts on such a huge group as us people with disabilities and our friends and relatives is that ours is not the only issue, and it’s a relatively minor issue for the president. We need advocates in Congress. As a former Navy Brat and Marine wife, I am very uncomfortable with the idea of Obama in the White House.

I honestly don’t feel like politicians can do much for me in general. I became disabled in a car accident at the age of 25. Before that I thought that discrimination was a thing of the past because it’s illegal. Now I know how silly that was, but I was clueless.

The ways to change how I’m treated by this society are
#1 Raise awareness. I am so happy that Palin is a candidate, no matter who wins, because simply being a candidate brings these issues to the spotlight.
#2 Children. Through Ability Awareness in Action, children can value our diversity and focus on people’s abilities. This will gradually change how society treats us.

This article was informative for me because there were so many points where there’s simply no data for the McCain Palin camp. So, I’m going to write them and ask them to let us know where they stand now. I don’t want to know where they stood 5 years ago. I want to know where they stand now.

Six years ago, I had no idea what life was like as a person with a disability. So, my perspective’s completely different. I want to know how Palin’s perspectives have changed as a mother of a child with a disability, and I want to know how McCain’s perspectives have changed as he’s getting to know her and reading articles like this.

Palin’s views are going to continue to evolve as she watches her son grow up in this society. I hope that she’ll be a good influence on McCain. For now, I’m still going with McCain as the lesser of two evils. I don’t want a Socialist president, even if he has a Democrat label. So I’ll take the Democrat president with the Republican label.