Adventures In Autism

[Guest guest]

I Endorse McCain for President. He is the Autism Candidate.

http://adventuresinautism.blogspot.com/

Last year I decided that I would endorse whomever turned out to be

the candidate who would be the one most likely to address the autism

epidemic properly, and to end the government stonewalling that is

preventing real progress from taking place. I am a republican, but if

reforming the dysfunction in public health that is sustaining the

autism epidemic meant endorsing Hillary Clinton because she made a

180 in her position on autism and decided to earnestly fix the

problems, then I would endorse and vote for her, as difficult as that

might be for me.

But what has happened is something unusual. The conservative

candidate has turned out not only to be the better autism candidate,

he has brought more attention to the disorder than any other national

political figure in history.

So at this late date (I have decided you can either be an autism mom

or find time to write about autism, but rarely both), I am announcing

my endorsement of McCain as the autism candidate, and urging you

to vote for him for the following reasons, some of which you may be

aware of, one of which is new information:

1. McCain has brought autism to the forefront of the national

agenda during this campaign.

This started in March, even before the Hannah Poling concession was

announced, when he was the first presidential candidate to address

the autism/vaccine connection publicly, causing Barack Obama and

Hillary Clinton to add their comments on the topic.

It continued during the conventions, when McCain talked about autism

in his acceptance speech, declaring:

" I fight for Jake and Toni Wimmer of lin County,

Pennsylvania,... They have two sons. The youngest, Luke, has been

diagnosed with autism. Their lives should matter to the people they

elect to office. And they matter to me. "

And he did again during the debates when he brought autism into the

conversation.

2. McCain is meeting with and listening to parents. Barack Obama

is not.

McCain met with several of my friends in late 2007, when he had

been considered out of the contention for president. (I was actually

invited to participate in this effort, but family obligations

prevented me from doing so). He listened, he heard them, he acted on

their behalf, and he began talking about our kids on the national

stage.

Barack Obama will be introducing autism legislation shortly that he

has been preparing for the last six months. Our community has reached

out to him on several issues, and he has not responded. At any time

he would have had a chance to gain our input on his autism bill, but

we found out about this bill after it was drafted, from a source

other than the Obama camp, practically by accident. Even those of us

in regular contact with the Obama campaign had no knowledge of this

bill. Reading the bill it is clear to see why he may not have wanted

parents to read it. More on his upcoming legislation in a moment.

3. McCain, after meeting with autism parents, along with Joe

Lieberman wrote to the Senate Health Services Committee asking

them " to hold a hearing on federal research efforts regarding factors

affecting incidence and treatment in order to help determine where

research efforts can best be directed " . This included the

environmental triggers of autism such as vaccine additives,

pesticides, metals and other chemical pollutants.

Barack Obama is on that Committee and could have picked up the torch

and initiated hearings, but didn't.

4. Barack Obama will be introducing this legislation after the

election during the lame duck session of congress. This information

has not yet been made public, so most of you will be seeing this bill

for the first time. Some who have seen the bill in the last few days

are upset not only because it will do little to help our children,

but it will give even more money and more responsibility to the same

agencies who have been wasting autism money and failing in the

responsibilities thus far.

From one Generation Rescue staffer:

The draft Obama Research, Treatment and Services Bill Puts HRSA/CDC

At Helm:

1.) The bill had no input from the " biomedical " community (the fact

that our people had no clue about this bill speaks volumes

considering they've been in touch with the Obama camp for quite

awhile.)

2.) Individuals within Obama's office who worked on the bill have not

returned any of our calls asking for some background on the bill nor

have they replied to our request for GR to have some input on the

bill before it gets submitted.

3.) The bill is outlining many of the same mechanisms that are

contained in the original CAA bill. It is redundant.

4.) The CDC is put in charge of " facilitating the rapid dissemination

of evidence-based and promising practices " which, in my opinion is

one of the most troubling aspects of this bill! "

5. McCain has stated that parents should be the ones to be

making health care decisions for their children, Barack Obama has

stated that he is " not for selective vaccination " , implying that he

may be in favor of forced vaccination.

Our community has tried doggedly to get Barack Obama to expound on

this statement and let us know if he is in favor of forced

vaccinations like the kind that are taking place in New Jersey and

land. He will not respond.

5. McCain has taken far less money from pharmaceutical

companies, and has been consistently tough on them over the years.

6. Political Base has listed Gerberding as a possible HHS

secretary in an Obama administration.

The fact that she is even speculated by dems to be in contention to

be in charge of this country's health services under Obama after all

of the debacles she has reigned over is upsetting. The ONLY thing

that our community agrees with the skeptic community is that

Gerberding has done a horrible job as the head of CDC, which is also

the opinion of many of the people who have worked under her. Her

public career should be over when Bush leaves office.

Hillary Clinton is also listed as a potential for the job. Hillary

Clinton is no friend of the autism community.

7. McCain chose a special needs mom as his running mate.

Palin is new to special needs parenting herself, but as her

sister Bruce has a 13 year old son with autism (hear Bruce's

interview on Autism One Radio), she has been touched by the disorder.

When you have autism in your family, you get a chance to see how much

more difficult it is than people imagine, and addressing it becomes a

much higher priority.

Her statement to the special needs community at the Republican

National Convention was, " To the families of special needs children

all across this country, I have a message for you. For years you've

sought to make America a more welcoming place for your sons and

daughters and I pledge to you that if we're elected, you will have a

friend and advocate in the White House " .

Palin's first policy speech was on the Mccain/Palin Special Needs

Platform (Please read to see what they are proposing), and the autism

group she invited to the event was not Autism Speaks, the ConGlomCo

of endless, fruitless autism research, it was a small local parent

group called AutismLink.

8. McCain has a Masters in Special Education and a heart for

children with autism as well.

Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks, and at this

point it seems that the McCain/Palin crew can't stop talking about

autism.

It should be noted that both McCain and Obama supported CAA and both

will fully fund IDEA.

The debate is broader than what I have referred to here, but it sums

up the differences between the two candidates.

You may be asking, " why should I vote for a candidate based on this

one issue " , so I will answer. This is more important than the

economy. It is more important than the war. There are few issues as

important as the autism epidemic, because what we are seeing

happening in this country will be blossoming into a disaster that

will effect every arena in this country in the next 10 years or so.

Autism now effects around 1 in 100 children. The CDC's number of 1 in

150 is several years old, and the Department of Defense reports that

1 in 88 of their dependents has some form of autism. The disorder is

believed to be growing at 10 to 17 percent per year. And CDC admits

that 17 percent of children have a developmental delay or disability.

Read that again... 1 percent have autism, 17 percent have

developmental problems.

This week Suzanne , co-founder of Autism Speaks talked about

how appalled she was to find out how prevalent and quickly growing

autism was when her grandson was diagnosed 4 years ago. When she

asked the CDC why they were not talking about this their response

was, " Well, we don't want to disturb people. Pediatricians aren't

sure of the diagnoses and it might just cause difficulty. "

The federal government is not just allowing the autism epidemic to

happen, they are now complicit in the escalation of the problem. The

decision has been made that this epidemic will not be addressed

because doing so will " cause difficulty " .

So more and more children get sick, stop talking and their parents

are told by doctors to just accept it.

Think about what it will mean for this country in ten years.

When somewhere between 1 and 17 percent of adults cannot reach their

vocational potential, what will that do to tax revenue? What will

that do to the economy?

A child with autism will cost between three and ten million dollars

over their lifetime. If the autism rate remains at 1 percent, that

means that those millions will be paid by the other 99 people. Which

means that for my high functioning son with autism, 99 of my friends

will pay more than $30,000 in taxes that will go to his care.

When 1 in 60 boys has an autism diagnosis, what will that do for

military readiness and defense in 2018 and beyond?

In 10 years a generation of disabled children age out of education

programs into adulthood. When their parents start passing on, or

becoming too infirmed to care for them, what will that mean for

homelessness in this country?

When a generation of people have melt downs when overwhelmed by loud

noises and confusion, some becoming violent, what will that do for

law enforcement?

1 percent of children have autism, yet the government will not even

declare it an epidemic.

Now... is the economy this year really more important that what

hundreds of thousands, even millions, of disabled individuals pouring

into society will do to this country over the next several decades?

Please vote McCain on November 4th. He is the only one who takes

autism seriously.

Ginger , M.S.