Free Republic

In order to meet its targets for Diversity Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility, (DEIA), the Federal Aviation Administration is recruiting for people with severe mental disabilities, psychiatric problems and physical disabilities. The recruiting campaign comes at an awkward time, as companies like Spirit AeroSystems, which built the malfunctioning fuselage for Boeing 737 MAX 9s, have crowed to their shareholders about hitting their DEI targets for hiring, and firing white men in order to met their diversity quotas. The FAA’s targeted disabilities for hiring are, in the agency’s own words: Hearing (total deafness in both ears) Vision (Blind) Missing Extremities Partial Paralysis...

PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. — A new law aimed at helping to improve interactions between law enforcement and people with disabilities goes into effect on January 1. SB 784 which is named the ‘Protect Our Loved Ones Act’ allows local police and sheriff departments to develop and maintain databases of people in their communities with developmental, psychological, or other disabilities. The listed conditions also include autism, Alzheimers, dementia, and Down syndrome. A parent or caretaker would have the choice to voluntarily submit someone with a disability to the registry, should their local law enforcement agency create one. Michelle Detwiler with the...

The top management of the FAA needs to be gutted. This is unacceptable that they look the other way when pilots and flight attendants are killed or injured by the COVID vaccines. ... Executive summary The FAA is not investigating any pilot injury, disability, or deaths if it is associated with the COVID vaccines. They know about the incidents, but there is no investigation. When contacted, they have no comment as to why there are not investigating these incidents. The official story is “we haven’t seen a problem” but they haven’t seen a problem because they refuse to look. The...

Today, the Supreme Court overturned nearly 50 years of bad abortion law: “We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled.” The issue of abortion will be left to the States. In 1973, the Supreme Court legalized abortion under the auspices of the “right of privacy,” which it held to “encompass a woman’s decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy.” While we do have rights that are guaranteed to us despite not being in the Constitution (those natural rights), abortion was never one of them. Not until Roe, at least. It is estimated that more than 63 million babies...

BERKELEY, Calif. — If, in the fall of 1987, you found yourself at the University of California, Berkeley, and you made your way through the sloping, verdant campus to Moffitt Library, you could walk through the doors and take two flights of stairs down to the basement. Turn right and you would find a door tucked in the corner — room 224, though the placard isn’t written in braille. After unlocking the door using a key with a ridged top, you’d walk through a small lobby with tables, chairs, and a “sofa” made of seats pulled from a van. The...

A little African penguin named Rosie is making a big impact on children with special needs. Veterinarians at Arizona's Odysea Aquarium first noticed Rosie's skeletal abnormalities when she was hatched in 2019. "We knew very early in Rosie's development that she was a little bit different," Jessica Peranteau, director of animal control and education at Odysea Aquarium, told KNXV. "Penguins are able to sit up on their own when they get ready to start to walk, but Rosie was not showing us she could do that on her own. So we decided as a team we needed to give her...

Now if they ran this on the daily C19 update, maybe people might wake up. All those whom have died from Vax...

Hannah Kauschke is excited about casting her vote — for the first time in her life, at the age of 30. “I’m really looking forward to it,” said Kauschke, adding “they really could have given people with disabilities in Germany more rights sooner. We have our own opinions.” For her, one of the most important topics that Germany needs to tackle is protecting the environment, especially after catastrophic floods struck the west of the country in July. Her biggest wish for the new government, she said, was “that they listen to us [with disabilities] and take us seriously.” Kauschke works...

Changes in societal attitudes toward Down syndrome diagnoses confirm what many parents, friends, co-workers, and teachers have known for years.Pregnancy can be one of the most exciting times of a woman’s life. It can also be one of the scariest and most unexpected times. Unexpected, however, doesn’t have to mean bad.Approximately 1 in 700 live births involves a baby with a Down syndrome diagnosis — the most common chromosomal disorder — meaning roughly 6,000 children are born with Down syndrome per year in the United States. While these numbers aren’t hidden, each prenatal chromosomal diagnosis likely feels quite shocking to...

Since COVID-19 mask mandates and social distancing, my mother has lost much of her ability to navigate through the hearing world, decreasing her independence and confidence. My mother is a very independent and somewhat private person, and at 94 still lives in her own home, helps care for my father, and drives (cautiously). So I was surprised during my last visit when she asked me to go with her to her doctor. The doctor’s office had just started offering face-to-face appointments again and she hadn’t been feeling well. We wore our masks and sat in the socially distanced chairs in...

Seven years had passed since Mena Hawkins had attempted the Las Vegas Great Santa Run. Her first attempt at the one-mile race ended after the streets had already been reopened, leaving the then 10-year-old to finish the race on the sidewalk. Her final time that year was 1 hour and 20 minutes. Despite finishing well behind the rest of the field, Hawkins wasn’t defeated by her effort. The Henderson, Nevada, native—who is now 17—has cerebral palsy, a congenital disorder that affects movement and muscle tone or posture, which has always made walking a serious challenge. In school and most places,...

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A harrowing scene unfolded in New Haven, Connecticut last week when 100 people overdosed on some form of K2, regularly and inaccurately called synthetic marijuana. While New Haven officials were responding to some 76 people, Rick Fontana, New Haven Emergency Operations Director, got a call on 19 additional reports of overdoses occuring in the same area in New Haven Green, a large park in the city’s downtown. 72 people were transported to the hospital but no one died. However, three people, considered “persons of interest,” were arrested last Wednesday in connection with the overdoses. The drug, K2, is a synthetic...

Many of us have hidden fears and hesitations when it comes to dealing with persons with severe disabilities. Their unfamiliar gestures, behaviors, and limitations can challenge us and infringe on our comfort zones. We may be tempted to apply a different standard when we deal with them. Even very young children with disabilities may suffer discrimination through denial of care as newborns, or through abortion in utero. During his presidential campaign, former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum and his wife Karen were often asked by people on the campaign trail about their daughter Bella, who was born with Trisomy 18, a...

A Parable to Ponder - Why Does God Permit Disability? Msgr. Charles Pope • June 16, 2016 • Photo Credit: Jaclyn Lipplemann, Catholic StandardAllow me to begin with a simple parable. Every now and then I take a perfectly good paper clip and untwist it, reconfiguring it for some other purpose. Once, I used them to hang Christmas ornaments on my tree. Another time I fashioned a paperclip into a hook to keep my broken file drawer from rolling open. Now if paperclips could see or think, they might be horrified and saddened to see a fellow paperclip so...

Accepting the Disabled in a World Obsessed with Physical Perfection Msgr. Charles Pope • June 15, 2016 • Photo Credit: Jaclyn Lipplemann, Catholic StandardAs mentioned in yesterday’s post, Pope Francis recently lamented the obsession of modern society with perfect bodies. Although our first thought on contemplating this might be cosmetics and plastic surgery, he was actually speaking about our increasing rejection of the disabled and the sick. This rejection is perhaps most sadly evidenced by the fact that more than 90% of unborn children with a “poor prenatal diagnosis” are aborted. Perhaps the parents are informed that their child...

Reviving the debunked claim that Trump mocked journalist Serge F. Kovaleski because of his physical disabilities Poor, poor Barbra Streisand whose initials happen to be B.S. This horrible, affective, whiny has-been is soooo unhappy that Donald Trump will become president in less than 10 days. After Meryl Streep’s ugly anti-Trump rant — she mocked “football and mixed martial arts,” falsely claimed Trump wants to deport all foreigners, and accused Trump of being a bully — at the Golden Globes awards show on the weekend, Streisand came to Streep’s defense.

Measure intended to protect people with disabilities who have wandered away A bill meant to help those with developmental disabilities would allow government agencies to locate people with tracking devices, which has some concerned the measure gives the federal government too much authority and power. In 2008, Kevin Curtis Wills, a 9-year-old boy with autism, jumped into a river near a park and drowned. In 2014, a 14-year-old boy with autism, Avonte Oquendo, left his school and drowned in a river. Rep. Chris Smith (R., N.J.), who chairs the Congressional Autism Caucus and the Alzheimer’s Disease Task Force, introduced a...

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Rep. Louie Gohmert (TX-01) released the following statement on his decision to vote against H.R. 4919, Kevin and Avonte's Law, which establishes a federal program to chip individuals with autism and developmental disabilities: “While this initiative may have noble intentions, ‘small and temporary’ programs in the name of safety and security often evolve into permanent and enlarged bureaucracies that infringe on the American people’s freedoms. That is exactly what we have here. A safety problem exists for people with Alzheimer’s, autism and other mental health issues, so the fix, we are told, is to have the Department...

Stephanie Parra was 32 weeks pregnant when doctors handed her devastating news. Her baby girl had a heart defect that was so severe they didn’t think she would live more than a few hours after birth. They told Parra that she should consider abortion. “I reminded the doctor that I was 32 weeks,” she explained. “But the doctor said that my baby was considered defective and that you can terminate up to 38 or maybe 39 weeks. I told her, no, termination wasn’t an option. We were going to continue the pregnancy.” Parra was determined to help her daughter anyway...