Ehrlich only picked her to close the vote gap with women that his Democratic opponent has a lead on. It’s nothing more than a desperate window dressing to get votes.

It’s a great step in politics to raise awareness of disabilities in general. You have a great point about the barrier of a deaf person running for politics, but anything is possible! People need to stand up and speak, even if they’re speaking with their hands. We need a voice for the community other than the pompus ones that are out there and advocating themselves and in reality NOT HELPING THE DEAF COMMUNITY.

I just realized that my post above makes me sound very pro-Ehrlich. I’m not. I don’t even really care who’s governor of Maryland, so I’m going to default to the Democratic candidate here (O’Malley).

What I don’t like is that the news articles are putting her blindness (and gender too) in the headlines or in the first sentence, before even mentioning her name. Shows the type of emphasis that is being put on her gender and disability. T’would show progress when news articles like this would “bury” a person’s disability later in these articles.

… and bury her gender till later in these articles as well.

Adam — Kelby Brick ran for Greenbelt City Council twice and lost both times — narrowly.

Bruce White from Gallaudet’s English department also ran, and won, a seat on his town council. His term expired recently.

Remember Kevin Nolan?
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/f.....A960948260

Denny Voreck ran a few years back for the San Diego City Council– he lost. We’ve had a few brave individuals who have put their money where their mouth/hands are!

I really think that we need to start having smart Deaf people run for office in droves. When the names Denny and Kelby were brought up, I am reminded of amateur campaigns. Those campaigns were not run by candidates that did some serious base building. Even Kelby’s own campaign manager admitted to me that Kelby depended too much on getting donations from Deaf leaders instead of focusing on getting donations from the voters in his own district. Serious candidates for office need to be able to raise at least 25,000 and have the ability to solict PAC money to even have a shot and until we see a Deaf person figure that out and win a big seat then maybe more of us will start following suit and realize what it takes to run a serious and credible campaign to put Deaf people on the political map.

Also wanted to point out that Kevin Nolan is the only Deaf person I know of that has actually been elected to a political seat within the USA. I did hear about Bruce White but isn’t he hearing? He is a fac professor at Gallaudet but he is hearing, thats what I was told when I was at Gallaudet.
Any other Deaf people that have been elected before other than Kevin Nolan?

I live and vote in Maryland… I was even appointed by the Governor to serve on the Board of Trustees of the Maryland School for the Deaf (which I was almost surprised by since I do live in the People’s Republic of Takoma Park… but, I digress). As much as it pains me to say it, it is possible the governor might actually care about the rights and lives of people with disabilities…. at least enough to charge an agency with the responsibility of making sense of a tangle of policies and programs. On the other hand, candidate Ehrlich selection of Steele as his running mate in the last election was so gross in its intent and so lame that the very county he was hoping to win with this nonsense ticket went 76% to his opponent in what was otherwise a very close (2.5% difference) race. My gut reaction as a voter and taxpayer in Maryland is that his selection is just pandering to make himself look more liberal. We’ll see if he lets her talk during the campaign or if she’s just window dressing.

…. and we’ll discuss that whoo whoo after the City of Takoma Park takes away your passport. You won’t be permitted to cross Eastern Avenue to have lunch at Mark’s Kitchen anymore… it’ll be hotdogs from the Metro station cart from now on.

Kristen Cox is purely selected as a political token. Ehrlich is really brillant at political strokes unlike O’Malley!

I never forgot about the first Ehrlich inguaration which Jack Kemp (former veep candidate with Robert Dole in 1996) stupidly exclaimed “See that! We have the sign language interpreter for deaf people here! Whoa!”

That was a real patronizing on the part of Ehrlich people! Governor Parris Glending never done such things like that.

Ehrlich seems ahead in political maneuver. Let’s see who will win the MD gubernational race.

Robert L. Mason (RLM)

I recently checked out the Maryland’s Office of Disablities website which did not refer to any deaf people or any mentions of required communciation accessiblity for deaf people.

Of course, we, deaf people, really do not consider ourselves “disabled” in any way. The society at large tend to lump us, deaf people together with other disabled community. Brzzzzz!

The Maryland’s Office of Disabilities seems preoccupied with the needs for blind people! Plz!

I did not see any mentions of Maryland School of the Deaf or preschool intervention for deaf youngsters on the MDOD website. Why??

Ever not mention any emergency preparadeness for deaf people. Not the listing of state accessibility provider, ex. interpreter.

I almost forgot that we have the deaf and hard of hearing agency of the deaf in the state of Maryland. I did not see any links to the DHHA. Hmm!

Robert L. Mason (RLM)

Well, there are more blind people than deaf people. Also 2,000 blind lawyers in contrast to 20 deaf lawyers. Blind people are a political clout. there is no blind university but there are blind schools nationwide. How do blind people communicate with deaf people? I dunno. However, I can count the number of Republicans with disabled children compared to liberals who are always screaming abortion and support Peter Singer of Princeton who want to abort all disabled fetus. We need more deaf people, not less.