Vega's Voices

Fight HIV/AIDS Quarantine in Kansas!
Proposed Bill Could Force People with HIV/AIDS into Quarantine

Here’s a lesson in America’s weird political institutions: How Christian conservatives lead the Republican party to reject a treaty that endorsed existing American law.

The US Senate voted today on ratifying the UN Convention on the Rights of Disabled People 61-38, but the majority fell short of the 66 votes needed for ratification. The 38 votes against came from Republican senators, most of whom signed a letter promising not to support the bill. The letter was organized by Senator Mike Lee of Utah, who said the treaty threatened US sovereignty and could force the parents of disabled children to send them to public schools. It drew the support of home-schoolers who also fretted that the treaty was, among other things, a sly way to force America to adopt laws enshrining “abortion rights, homosexual rights, and demands the complete disarmament of all people.”

The last reference, obviously, is designed to scare American conservatives into believing that ratifying the treaty will empower the US government to take away their right to bear arms, enshrined in the American constitution. But the interpretation relies on the assumption that  vague, utopian boilerplate about disarmament in an entirely different UN convention will somehow be applied if the US ratifies the convention on disability. Nevertheless, this sort of stuff, promoted by evangelical politicians like former Senator Rick Santorum, has a galvanizing effect on Republican politicians who live in fear of losing intra-party challenges from the right. It is the preserve of an isolationist wing of a party already deeply skeptical of international institutions generally.

But aside from how overblown such fears are, the stranger fact is that the UN treaty is based on the Americans with Disabilities Act, enacted 22 years ago, and if it were ratified, no US laws would have to change. It was negotiated by the previous Republican president, George W. Bush, and is supported by prominent conservatives like Senator John McCain and former Senate majority leader Bob Dole (both of whom, thanks to war wounds, are Americans with disabilities). The US Chamber of Commerce supported the treaty, since it would help level the international playing field for American companies who already comply with the act, and potentially open foreign markets to US disabilities technology.

The treaty’s critics, like the conservative Heritage Foundation, were left arguing that the treaty shouldn’t be ratified if the US already complied with its intent, since endorsing the treaty could lead to problems down the road by unspecified means. That dismayed the treaty’s advocates, who see the treaty’s value in the message it sends to other countries about the importance of protecting disabled people. “It’s a treaty to change the world to be more like America,” protested John Kerry, the Democratic Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, before the failed vote.

If you’re watching the US Senate for signs of how the fiscal cliff debate will play out, take note. This is what a dedicated extremist minority can do when the consequences of a decision are incredibly anodyne. Imagine what could happen when real questions of tax and social insurance structures are on the table in the weeks ahead.

Source: http://qz.com/33919/why-the-us-just-rejected-a-treaty-based-on-its-own-laws/

hellomynameismaddy:

wheeliewifee:

vegawriters:

Former Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.) made a rare Senate appearance this morning, sitting in a wheelchair just off the floor so that members would have to see him as they entered the chamber. Why? Because they were poised to vote on ratification of the U.N. Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities, and Dole hoped to send a message.

It didn’t work. The Senate killed the treaty this afternoon, with a final vote of 61 to 38, which seems like a lopsided majority, but which fell short of the two-thirds necessary for ratification. Eight Republicans broke ranks and joined Democrats in support of the treaty, but the clear majority of the Senate GOP voted to block it.

The U.N. Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities, for those who’ve forgotten, is a human rights treaty negotiated by the George H.W. Bush administration, which has been ratified by 126 nations, including China, Russia, Iran, Cuba, Syria, and Saudi Arabia.

But most Senate Republicans saw it as a threat to American “sovereignty,” even though the treaty wouldn’t have required the United States to change its laws. When the Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved the treaty with bipartisan support in July, Chairman John Kerry (D-Mass.) explained the proposal simply “raises the [international] standard to our level without requiring us to go further.”

In other words, we wouldn’t actually have to do anything except say we like the treaty — and then wait for other signatories around the world to catch up to the United States’ Americans with Disabilities Act.

The treaty was endorsed by Dole, John McCain, and Dick Lugar, among other prominent Republican figures, but it didn’t matter. The GOP’s right-wing base, led in part by Rick Santorum, raised hysterical fears about the treaty, and most Senate Republicans took their cues from the party’s activists, not the party’s elder statesmen.

Update: Here’s the roll call on the vote. All 38 opponents were Republicans.

Source: maddowblog.com

What Vega said ^^^

UGHHHHHHH

also good job tumblr on not giving a shit about disability rights. if this had been any other social justice issue there would be outrage.

Reblogging my own link yes. For a reason.

We’ll be back in January! Tumblr, organize! Get the word out to your senators about the importance of world-wide disability rights.

If you’re looking for good information, check out Senator Tom Harkin. He’s a LEADER on Disability Rights.