[statecom-discuss] (no subject)

[Martina Robinson]

Dear Everyone,


Leroy Moore wants to interview me for Pacifica Radio on Wednesday.  This is 
his promo.  I guess I'm making more of a difference than I thought, I mean 
Leroy's famous at least in the disability world.
I about died when he called me.

I'm still working on the Western Mass Party.

-Martina
*************************************************************************

FDR Secret is Out: The Election of 2006 and  Disabled
Candidates

It's been seven decades since Franklin D. Roosevelt
hid his disability of post-polio to the world as
President of the United States.  Seventy years later
and there is a record number of people with
disabilities running in this year's elections from the
US Senate down to local supervisors.  There are
candidates with disabilities not only on the two major
political party tickets but also on third party
tickets as well, including the Green Party and the
newly formed Green-Rainbow Party in Massachusetts,
where thirty-year-old Martina Robinson, an African
American with cerebral palsy is running against three
White non-disabled men for Lieutenant Governor.

In Maine a two-time candidate for Governor and
independent, Phillip Morris Napier, who served in the
Air Force in 1965 but became disabled after being shot
by police, is once again running for Governor.   In
2002 Morris was a write-in candidate for governor.  He
is one of five candidates on the ballot for Governor.
This election year has also brought diversity among
disabled candidates running for office; from Tammy

Duckworth, a Filipino disabled Iraq war vet, running
in Illinois for the House of Representatives to the
late Chris Crowder, an African American disabled
community activist from Washington DC, who was running
for Mayor on the DC Statehood Green Party before being
shot and killed in his wheelchair on July 8th.

Duckworth is not the only war veteran running for
political office. Democrat Phil Avillo, a disabled
Marine veteran of the Vietnam War and a York College
professor, is running in the Pennsylvania's 19th
District for the House of Representatives.

Two Lieutenant Governor races also include disabled
candidates: Democrat David Paterson of NY and
Republican Kristen Cox of Maryland are both blind.
Paterson is the state Democratic Leader in the Senate
and Kristen Cox entered the political arena for the
first time.

This election year we are seeing young disabled
candidates who are political newcomers.  Brooke
Ellison 28 of New York City has wheeled into District
2, which covers Suffolk County, Long Island.  At age
11, Ellison was hit by a car and was paralyzed from
the neck down and now depends on a ventilator to
breathe.

In the San Francisco Bay Area there are newcomers and
incumbents who are disabled running for office.  The
Alameda, District 16 Assembly race is between Sandré
Swanson and Eddie Ytuarte who is on the Peace &
Freedom Party. Ytuarte has polio.  Sandré Swanson, who
served Congresswoman Barbara Lee as her Chief of Staff
for five years, and Congressman Ron Dellums as his
District Director and Senior Policy Advisor for 25
years. San Francisco Board Supervisor, Michael
Alioto-Pier, Democrat, who is up for reelection in
District 2, Pacific Heights and the Marina looks like
a shoe in.  Alioto-Pier was paralyzed from the waist
down in a ski-lift accident in 1981.

The record amount of people with disabilities running
for office this election year shows us that the
disabled community, Republicans, Democrats and third
parties are no longer giving their political power,
expertise, voices and votes to others and waiting them
to make good on their promises to our community. The
motto of the disabled rights movement, “Nothing About
Us Without Us” is in the 2006 election.

		By Leroy F Moore Jr.