Disabilities Secretary Kristen Cox returned to a familiar theme on Wednesday before a group of mental health professionals ? the stigma attached to all people with disabilities, even by themselves.
She told the story of a recent conversation with her 10-year-old son Taylor. His class would be taking a trip to Philadelphia, and they needed chaperones. Cox decided she would volunteer.
She and Taylor have had many conversations about her blindness and disability, and she was surprised when he said, “Do you think a blind person can be a chaperone?”
Cox was takenaback, and she even paused to question her own competence. “Can a blind person be a chaperone?”
Of course I can, she decided, as she has decided about other things in life. I can put bells on them or something.
Remember, she said, not to put false limits on others ? or yourself. Doubters should have seen her give a 45-minute detailed presentation on complicated mental health issues, completely without notes.
O?Malley living on high note
Baltimore Mayor Martin O?Malley appears upbeat this week, either riding high from the consistently positive poll numbers or just punchy from the campaign for governor. Several times he referred to himself as “a recovering lawyer,” a predictable laugh line.
Responding Monday to a reporter?s question about campaign strategy, he said, “We?re targeting five primary groups,” then began by listing metropolitan Baltimore, the Washington suburbs, western Maryland. As he went on with southern Maryland and the Eastern Shore, the joke became clear. It was an all-of-Maryland strategy, no county left behind.
He then quipped, “I?m so glad we didn?t do that dollar bill idea.” Gov. Robert Ehrlich?s campaign is under investigation for sending dollar bills to supporters to encourage them to give more.
Giving cash for votes is against state law.
Take a Seat
My personal thanks to Phillip Sarnowski, a Johns Hopkins School of Public Health master?s candidate who gave up his seat for me at a talk by O?Malley at the school. Then the superefficient security honchos tried to throw him out of the room because he didn?t have a seat.
These public health students at one of the world?s best institutions in the field were a tough crowd, as a few interviews revealed. “He?s always charismatic,” said Nonya Collier, of Hampden. But “we want to heara more holistic approach” to health embracing housing, education and other social factors. “The issues were a little too narrow.”
Lisa-Nicole Danehy, of Rochester, found there was “not enough explanation behind the numbers. You can make any kind of statistics say anything you want.”
That was George Bush?s reaction to a Hopkins study indicating there have been more than 600,000 killed in the Iraq war.
Franchot
In the primary, Democratic comptroller candidate Peter Franchot almost always was on the attack, but now, at more than 50 percent in polling, he?s running like an incumbent. Last week, he named a Fiscal Advisory Council, including top Democratic committee chairs in the legislature and a former aide to William Donald Schaefer, whom he beat in the primary.
On Wednesday, he named a Business Advisory Council with 42 names, something of a who?s who in Maryland law, business and foundations, diverse by gender, geography and race, not by party, at least on the surface.
Len Lazarick is the state house bureau chief of The Examiner, he can be reached at [email protected]
