General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region Forums"Free Money" for people with disabilities, by Mike Ervin
Here's a post from Mike Ervin, self-described "smart ass cripple"
on the glories of "cashing in on one's disability."
Ervin's "smart ass cripple" blog is kinda like a "Rude Pundit" blog for people with disabilities. I love his work. And since the GOP is once again cranking up its campaign to "root out fraud" from the SSI/SSDI rolls (they even got "Sixty Minutes" to do a Benghazi style smear of the system), and in general are trying to convince us that people with disabilities "have it easy" in America, what with all those "frivilous lawsuits" and "out of control juries," I figured this would be a good way to introduce DUers to his work.
Tuesday, July 2, 2013
Free Money
As you know, I spent five of my adolescent years as an inmate in a state-operated boarding school for cripples, aka the Sam Houston Institute of Technology (SHIT). Well I heard a rumor that one of my fellow inmates is now a multimillionaire. I checked into it to find out how the hell he managed to do that, because everyone wants to know the secrets of how the rich get rich. From what I heard, he pretty much became rich overnight. And anyone whos really determined to get rich can do exactly what he did.
Heres the story I heard:
My fellow inmate was born with cerebral palsy. A couple decades after leaving the cripple school, he took a vacation. He landed at the airport and a vehicle with a wheelchair lift was dispatched to take him to his destination. En route, the vehicle crashed. And because the driver did not tie down my friends wheelchair, he went flying, chair and all. My friend broke his neck and now hes a cripple squared-- a quadriplegic with cerebral palsy.
But heres the lucky part. His destination was a Vegas casino and the vehicle was the van the casino used for toting crippled guests. So I ask you, if youre going to sue somebody for making you crippled, could you present a jury with a more unsympathetic villain than a Vegas casino? My friend collected $8 million, so Im told.
Okay so whos ready to get out there and strike it rich the same way my friend did? How about it? Lets see a show of hands! Whos with me? Anybody? Hello?
Come on! Its easy! Youll never have to work again! Its free money!
There are some cripples who never worked a day in their lives and they get free money every month from the government. Anyone can get in on this scam, too. All you have to do is become crippled. Youll receive about $550 a month from Social Security, so youll have just about enough cash to live a nice, spacious, wheelchair-accessible port-a-potty. Oh and in order to keep your checks coming, you also have to take a solemn vow that for the rest of your life you will remain as broke as a crack whore.
Any takers? And no, you cant have the monthly check without the crippledness and the poverty. Its the whole package or nothing.
Nobody? Going once, going twice... Maybe its not such a sweet gig after all, eh? I know the feeling. Ill tell you which cripples used to make me jealous. Im jealous of the ones who get big fat book deals! Talk about free money! Thats got to be the sweetest gig of all! I used to think Id do anything to land a big fat book deal. But then I heard about this guy who wrote a bestseller about how a bear ripped his face off. And it wasnt fiction.
No thanks. Id rather be a broke and obscure writer who never had his face ripped off by a bear.
Thats how it is with all those cripples and their free money. It surely aint free.
***
Here's the link to Ervin's blog: http://www.smartasscripple.blogspot.com
"expressing pain through sarcasm since 2010."
From my reading of this, Republicans (AKA the empathy-impaired) want to add yet another hurdle for smart-ass cripples like Mike Ervin to jump over (figurately speaking).
These Republicans of course have their own severe disability--they have no heart. No heart, but lots of spleen, and a shitload of gall, pushing all the nonsense they do.
Best wishes
Laelth
(32,017 posts)-Laelth
thucythucy
(8,069 posts)Laelth
(32,017 posts)-Laelth
Working link: http://www.smartasscripple.blogspot.com
Don't know why that wasn't working. I blame Obama!
Best wishes.
Arkansas Granny
(31,518 posts)stewert
(3,509 posts)I clicked the link http://www.smartasscripple.blogspot.com. and got this message:
The blog you were looking for was not found.
When I removed the period it worked.
http://www.smartasscripple.blogspot.com/
thucythucy
(8,069 posts)I knew it had to be something small.
Thanks!
SheilaT
(23,156 posts)For a while I was a paralegal for an attorney who does Social Security Disability appeals cases, meaning she took on clients who'd already been turned down by the SSA. And she only took those cases she felt were quite certain of winning. I didn't even get to know the clients very well, as I was mainly doing things like answering phones and photocopying. But I saw how incredibly little they got even when they won.
What I also saw was how every single client would have preferred to work, and for one reason or another (their disability!) just couldn't. I even saw clients who undermined their own cases by taking jobs when they were feeling pretty good and then losing them because of whatever their situation was. But it looked as if they could work if they just wanted to.
I'm not rich, but I am quite able-bodied and can work. I don't have a fabulous career or a job that earns me big bucks, but I can always get some more training or look for a better job if I want. I have the kind of choices these people don't have.
thucythucy
(8,069 posts)(which, alas, doesn't appear anymore) used to say being disabled was like being a citizen of an entirely different nation.
You really have to have a disability yourself, or be immersed in the issues like you were, to understand just how difficult it is. My feeling is that, well more than half the time, it isn't the disability itself that's such a problem (though it's usually no great shakes) but the way our society is structured, the way it treats people with disabilities, that compounds things and makes life that much more difficult.
Thanks for your work, and your understanding.
Best wishes.
freshwest
(53,661 posts)loyalsister
(13,390 posts)"it isn't the disability itself that's such a problem (though it's usually no great shakes) but the way our society is structured, the way it treats people with disabilities, that compounds things and makes life that much more difficult."
More ramps, automatic doors, etc. and using a wheelchair is actually enabling.
LisaLynne
(14,554 posts)Wounded Bear
(58,662 posts)bvar22
(39,909 posts)This was really well done.
KamaAina
(78,249 posts)For those of you just joining us, ADAPT is the Occupy of the disability rights movement. ADAPT members used to chain themselves to public buses to get them to add wheelchair lifts. Its focus these days is to FREE OUR PEOPLE! from nursing homes. That's right. One-quarter of the inmates in nursing homes are people under age 65 who have disabilities.
http://www.adapt.org
thucythucy
(8,069 posts)I can think of no other group that had the imagination and guts to occupy--quite literally--the Capitol Rotunda (during the campaign to pass the ADA).
There are a couple of films and a couple of books I can think of that tell the ADAPT story--and disability rights history--really well. Maybe you've seen and read these?
"When Billy Broke His Head"--film by Billy Golfus, with scenes of ADAPT demos
"Lives Worth Living" --which was a film shown on PBS a couple of years ago, on POV. Really worth seeing if you haven't already, and worth showing to friends you want to introduce into the movement.
"What We Have Done: An Oral History of the Disability Rights Movement," by Fred Pelka, which tells the ADAPT story from the beginning, in the words of the original organizer/activists. You can get it from the University of Massachusetts Press. I'm getting it for some friends for Christmas.
and "A Disability History of the United States," by Kim Nielson, also really good.
I turn people on to this stuff every chance I get.
Best wishes.
Prophet 451
(9,796 posts)I'm disabled for reasons of both physical and metal health and have to go through a yearly review to decide if I'm still mad and crippled enough to get disability payments.