No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

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May 092006
 

I encountered this story a while ago and it pissed me off then.  It still pisses me off.  The FDA is close to approving a vaccine for the human papillova virus, which causes cervical cancer in women.  The vaccine will likely save thousands of lives.  Most people would struggle to see the controversy in such a thing.  But leave it to the paranoid, sex-obsessed religious right to crank up the histrionics and proclaim this medical advance a threat to public morality.  The vaccine is most effective when administered to girls between ten and twelve years old.  Social conservatives make an argument so absurd and ignorant that it’s completely horrifying: administering this vaccine to girls will instantly transform them into wanton hedonists. 
 
Religious conservatives love to depict themselves as defenders of family values, but I often wonder to what degree their worldview is influenced by a deep-seated, almost pathological fear and mistrust of female sexuality. 
 
Thanks to Digby for reminding me how much this story annoyed me. 

We Have A Winner

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May 082006
 

Keith Ellison, a state legislator and fellow University of Minnesota Law School alumni, won the DFL endorsement for the 5th District Congressional seat.  While it’s likely Ellison will be challenged in a September primary, the endorsement makes Ellison the odds-on favorite to succeed Sabo.  I heard Ellison speak at a convention a couple months ago and he was easily the most charismatic and passionate orator to take the stage that day.  I’m confident that he will make a great Congressman and that he will make all of us in the Fightin’ Fifth proud.  He certainly has my vote. 

Power In Numbers

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May 072006
 

One thing that really pissed me off about my server outage last week was that I missed out on participating in Blogging against Disablism Day on May 1.  The event was organized by Goldfish of Diary of a Goldfish and she did a magnificent job of spreading the meme; the list of participating blogs is long and varied.  I’ve spent some time looking at the various posts and I’m encouraged to know that there are some quite talented bloggers with disabilities out there in the ether.  Great work, Goldfish.  I look forward to participating next year. 

Speaking Truthiness To Power

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May 062006
 

In the latest CBS poll, President Bush has an abysmal 33% approval rating.  Even my Republican friends are starting to admit that Bush is not Ronald Reagan reincarnate.  And while the mainstream seemed determined to ignore it at first, Stephen Colbert’s scathing roast of the Prez is starting to get the attention it deserves.  C-SPAN, which originally aired Colbert’s monologue, is hoping to take advantage of the buzz and make a few bucks by selling DVDs of the event.  Then there’s the surprise resignation of CIA Director Porter Goss, which might indicate that things are not going well for the Administration as it continues to wage the War on Terror (or World War III, for the drama queens out there).  All in all, another bad week in a long string of bad weeks for the President. 
 
Things might be a little wonky around here for the next day or two as I move the blog to a new server.  I’ve decided to go with LivingDot for my hosting needs.  I like the fact that they market specifically to bloggers and they have gotten some good reviews from other customers.  Stay tuned. 

Blue Ribbon Panel

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May 052006
 

Today, I attended the first meeting of the Wireless Minneapolis Task Force.  Of course, I’m thrilled to be on the Task Force, especially after all the blogging I’ve done about the city’s efforts to set up a wireless network (and in case you’re wondering, my blog didn’t get me this appointment; it came through my work with the Mayor’s Advisory Committee on People with Disabilities).  Hopefully, my work on the Task Force will give me the opportunity to realize my vision of creating an assistive technology fund for Minneapolis residents with disabilities.  I’m also looking forward to getting to know the other Task Force members; the City seems to have recruited heavily from the non-profit, government, and private sectors.  I’m all about the networking. 
 
Yesterday, my primary physician told me I’m healthier than most of his more able-bodied patients.  Yet more evidence that I am indeed the toughest cripple on the block. 

I Am Not An Animal!

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May 042006
 

The Minnesota Opera and the Humphrey Institute are co-sponsoring a public forum on Wednesday, May 10th entitled The Elephant Man: A Conversation on Disability, Policy, and Opera.  More information on the event can be found in this PDF file.  This event is a tie-in to the Minnesota Opera’s new production of Joseph Merrick, the Elephant Man.  I’m anticipating a good discussion since the panelists include Senator David Durenberger and my friend John Tschida, Vice President of Public Affairs at Courage Center.  My only knowledge of the Merrick’s story is from David Lynch’s film, which is probably much trippier in tone than this opera.  I’d love to see part of the discussion focus on how people with disabilities are  portrayed in other media venues. 
 
I promised my friend Lani Willis, Communications Director at the Minnesota Opera, that I would spread the word about this event.  I’m asking all of you to do the same.  I mean, c’mon, how many times are we going to see an event with the words “disability” and “opera” in the title? 

If You Build It…

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May 032006
 

I’ll be at the Metrodome tonight to watch two baseball teams try to figure out which one of them sucks more.  Meanwhile, the Legislature seems poised to do…something…about the long-simmering stadium debate here in Minnesota.  I really like the current bill in the Senate, which would raise the sales tax in the seven-county metro area by a half-cent, which would pay for stadiums for both the Twins and Vikings while also generating additional funding for some much-needed transit projects.  The only thing I don’t like about the bill is that it would require voter approval through a referendum.  Referenda are wasteful affairs that allow legislators to shirk their accountability to voters while simultaneously undermining our system of representative democracy. 
 
But this bill probably has little chance of passage, given the fact that Governor Pawlenty and House throw their arms in the air and scream like adolescent schoolgirls when anyone suggests anything that looks like a tax increase.  The most likely result is that Hennepin County will foot much of the bill for a new baseball stadium.  I suppose I can live with that, but the new stadium better have killer disability seating. 

Primary Source

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May 022006
 

You can blame my web hosting company for missing your May Day edition of the blog.  I need to quit procastinating and find myself a new hosting service.  Affordablehost , my current provider, used to be excellent, but the quality of their technical support has steadily deteriorated over the past year. 
 
When I started writing this blog, I didn’t really intend for it to be an educational resource.  My initial motivation could be summed up in the following formula:
 
Blogging + ? = PROFIT! (oh, and GIRLS!)
 
But apparently, the youth of America are mining a rich vein of academic material from my daily blathering.  Or at least one youth is.  A couple weeks ago, I received an e-mail from Aviva, a college sophomore who was writing a paper about me and my blog.  She sent me the final version of her paper today and it’s insightful and, I must admit, flattering.  In my completely unbiased opinion, she deserves an A.  I look forward to the day when major universities offer seminars on my varied contributions to American culture and politics and scholars pore over my collected writings in hopes of gleaning some fresh perspective on my character that might have been overlooked in the innumerable treatises and books devoted to my singular life. 

Cinema Verité

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Apr 302006
 

After reading several strong reviews, I decided to see United 93 yesterday.  The film, as you might imagine, is grim and sometimes difficult to watch.  It is a powerful illustration of the cascading miscommunications between bureaucracies that contributed to the chaos of September 11th.  It’s also a respectful and straightforward recounting of the final minutes of the lives of the passengers on that flight.  The movie is careful not to make any political statements and the director and writer, Paul Greengrass, should be commended for the gracefully light touch he brought to a difficult subject. 

Everything At My Fingertips

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Apr 292006
 

Another day, another link to the 19th Floor.  This time, it gets a mention in a great article about e-books written by Bethany Broadwell and appearing in Quest magazine.  Thanks for the plug, Bethany. 
 
I’ve been playing around with Google Desktop Search today.  It’s an impressive utility and it should come in quite handy when I need to find a specific file, but it doesn’t seem to be indexing everything, especially videos.  I’ll need to tinker with it some more.  Good thing I like tinkering. 

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