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Report: Millions of jobless file for disability when unemployment benefits run outPublished February 19, 2012 | FoxNews.com Being unemployed for too long reportedly is driving people mad and costing taxpayers billions of dollars in mental illness and other disability claims. The New York Post reported Sunday that as unemployment checks run out, many jobless are trying to gain government benefits by declaring themselves unhealthy. More than 10.5 million people -- about 5.3 percent of the population aged 25 and 64 -- received disability checks in January from the federal government, the Post wrote, a 18 percent jump from before the...

In this morning's Cashin's Comments, Art Cashin points to some disturbing research regarding the recent bump in disability benefit applications:I’m Sick Of Being Unemployed - A couple of strange and rather disquieting reports circulated among the Friends of Fermentation yesterday.  The topic was unemployment or, more specifically, where do those people go who have stopped looking for work.  Their absence is credited with distorting the unemployment rate and making it lower than most expect or believe.The reports I allude to, contended that many went on disability.  In fact, they projected that nearly 25% of those not actively seeking a job...

ART CASHIN: The Unemployed Are Now Going On Disability And It's Costing The Government Billions Sam RoFebuary 14, 2012 In this morning's Cashin's Comments, Art Cashin points to some disturbing research regarding the recent bump in disability benefit applications: I’m Sick Of Being Unemployed - A couple of strange and rather disquieting reports circulated among the Friends of Fermentation yesterday. The topic was unemployment or, more specifically, where do those people go who have stopped looking for work. Their absence is credited with distorting the unemployment rate and making it lower than most expect or believe. The reports I allude...

  Disrespect for the Disabled + ObamaCare = ? David C. Stolinsky Feb. 2, 2012 Recently the Los Angeles Times devoted two entire columns to the misuse of disabled parking placards by people who appear not to be disabled. This makes the few spots reserved for the disabled even less available, a real problem. But the author’s chief complaint was the fact that the placards allow drivers to park at meters without paying or obeying time limits − thus depriving the city of money. Like a typical leftist, he saw the problem as economic. The author seemed to condemn...

The National Confederation of Disabled People called the action "incomprehensible," and said pedophiles are now awarded a higher government disability pay than some people who have received organ transplants. The Labor Ministry said categories added to the expanded list - that also includes pyromaniacs, compulsive gamblers, fetishists and sadomasochists - were included for purposes of medical assessment and used as a gauge for allocating financial assistance. But NCDP leader Yiannis Vardakastanis, who is blind, warned the new list could create new difficulties for disabled Greeks who are already facing benefit cuts due to the country's financial crisis. "What's happened is...

Sun, sand and 80-degree temperatures distract most winter visitors to this U.S. island territory from the visible signs of aging at the 57-year-old Luis Muñoz Marín International Airport, a critical hub to the Caribbean, but increasingly expensive to run and maintain. That’s not good enough for Kenneth McClintock, the secretary of state for Puerto Rico, who says the airport is about to undergo world-class upgrades made possible through a long-term lease with a private company that will finance, design, build and operate the facility. “It’s a showcase project that will generate hundreds of millions of dollars in new revenues,” says...

The prolonged economic slump has fueled a surge in applications for Social Security disability benefits, with many desperate Americans seeking refuge in the program as a last resort after their unemployment insurance and savings run out. Two new studies, one of them co-authored by the White House's top economist, show a correlation between when people seek Social Security disability payments and when their unemployment benefits are exhausted. Some economists say that connection shows many people now view the system as an extended unemployment program. The Social Security Disability Insurance program was created in the 1950s to provide financial support and...

DECEMBER 22, 2011 Two Lawyers Strike Gold In U.S. Disability System BY DAMIAN PALETTA AND DIONNE SEARCEY Lawyers Harry and Charles Binder began representing applicants for Social Security disability benefits in the 1970s, when the field was a professional backwater. Last year, their firm collected $88 million in fees for guiding clients through the system, government data indicate, making it the nation's largest Social Security disability advocate by far. "We'll deal with the government," a cowboy-hatted Charles Binder proclaims in his firm's ubiquitous television ads. "You have enough to worry about." Having firms like Binder & Binder deal with the...

Earlier this year, senior managers at the Social Security Administration in Baltimore, frustrated by a growing backlog of applications for federal disability benefits, called meetings with 140 of the agency's doctors. The message was blunt: The number of people seeking benefits had soared. Doctors had to work faster to move cases. Instead of earning $90 an hour, as they had previously, they would receive about $80 per case—a pay cut for many cases which can take 60 to 90 minutes to review—unless the doctors worked faster. Most notably, it no longer mattered if doctors strayed far from their areas of...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The jobs crisis has left so many people out of work for so long that most of America's unemployed are no longer receiving unemployment benefits. Early last year, 75 percent were receiving checks. The figure is now 48 percent — a shift that points to a growing crisis of long-term unemployment. Nearly one-third of America's 14 million unemployed have had no job for a year or more. Congress is expected to decide by year's end whether to continue providing emergency unemployment benefits for up to 99 weeks in the hardest-hit states. If the emergency benefits expire, the...

A 30-year-old California man who wears diapers and lives as an “adult baby” can keep his $800-a-month Social Security disability checks, the agency ruled. Stanley Thornton’s infantile lifestyle won him national attention after a National Geographic TV show revealed how he was spoon-fed and clad in baby clothes by his roommate and how he built furniture like oversized high chairs in his Redding, Calif., apartment. The show prompted Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., to demand a probe of Thornton's Supplemental Security Income checks, the New York Post reported. But in a letter to Thornton, the agency said, “We recently reviewed the...

Last week, President Obama's Justice Department asked the Supreme Court to hear oral arguments in a case that pits religious protections against the courts' ordinary ability to intervene in a labor dispute to prevent discrimination.In the early 2000s, Cheryl Perich was a "called teacher" or "commissioned minister" at Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School in Redford, Mich. As such, she taught religious classes, led students in prayer and incorporated religious teachings into secular subjects like math, science, social studies and art.But in 2004, she was diagnosed with narcolepsy and became unable to teach the fall semester that year. When she...

Dwight Darrow tells me he's not related to Clarence Darrow. Still, I think the attorney for Sheboygan Mayor Bob Ryan has a legal argument lots of folks in this state are, unfortunately, going to love. He argues Ryan — who has a habit of getting pie-eyed in public and acting loutish and completely embarrassing the city he represents — is disabled. In fact, the mayor is so disabled by his alcoholism, says Mr. Darrow, that he is covered by the Americans with Disabilities Act. As a result, the Sheboygan City Council cannot legally remove the disabled mayor from office, argues...

Laid-off workers desperate for money, many of them aging baby boomers, are flooding South Florida Social Security offices like never before to apply for disability benefits. Demand is so great nationwide that congressional estimates show the disability program will run out of money and won't be able to cover all beneficiaries in just six years. n Florida, applications are up more than 40 percent since 2007. Many are coming from people with mental or physical conditions who once were able to work and now can't, or who lost their job and are unable to find a new one.

An orphan among orphans Updated: 2011-09-02 07:57 By Guo Yali (China Daily) BEIJING - Being an orphan who lost both legs hasn't stopped Xu Yuehua from having a room full of her own children. The 55-year-old, who gets around by walking on a pair of stools, is "mother" to more than 100 children from an orphanage in Xiangtan, Hunan province. "She's got a way with kids after all these years nursing and caring for the children, many of whom are disabled or mentally challenged," said Li Yilong, deputy director of Xiangtan City Social Welfare Home. The home has around 80...

The Obama Administration is suing a trucking company for firing a driver who admitted he was alcoholic. Unreal. FOX News reported: Citing a violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Obama administration is suing a trucking company for taking the keys away from an Arkansas driver and eventually firing him after he admitted he was battling alcohol abuse. The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission filed a lawsuit this week arguing that Old Dominion Freight Line discriminated against Charles Grams by stripping him of his position and offering him a demotion even if he completed a substance abuse counseling program....

WASHINGTON (AP) — Laid-off workers and aging baby boomers are flooding Social Security's disability program with benefit claims, pushing the financially strapped system toward the brink of insolvency. Applications are up nearly 50 percent over a decade ago as people with disabilities lose their jobs and can't find new ones in an economy that has shed nearly 7 million jobs. The stampede for benefits is adding to a growing backlog of applicants — many wait two years or more before their cases are resolved — and worsening the financial problems of a program that's been running in the red for...

FRONT ROYAL, Virginia, July 29, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) - When a child is delivered stillborn, a small flower or other token often marks the door of the mother’s recovery room to help staff recognize the loss. According to one Catholic doctor, the same symbol was used in at least one Catholic hospital where doctors routinely induced labor to hasten the death of a child diagnosed with a genetic defect - a practice she says occurs in “a handful� of Catholic hospitals across the United States. Dr. Lorna Cvetkovich told a bioethics conference at Christendom College in Virginia this month about her...

Aurora High junior Julia Sullivan was born without legs or forearms. The district and her family disagree on whether that should have been taken into account at cheerleading tryouts. more... http://www.omaha.com/article/20110713/NEWS01/707139920#cheerleading-case-stirs-up-dispute

On the other hand, watch the clip below. If this guy’s not “disabled,� who is? “Given that Mr. Thornton is able to determine what is appropriate attire and actions in public, drive himself to complete errands, design and custom-make baby furniture to support a 350-pound adult and run an Internet support group, it is possible that he has been improperly collecting disability benefits for a period of time,” Mr. Coburn wrote in a letter Monday to Inspector General Patrick P. O’Carroll Jr…In an email response to The Washington Times, Mr. Thornton threatened to kill himself if his Social Security payments...

Move over, newts and salamanders. The mouse may join you as the only animal that can re-grow their own severed limbs. Researchers are reporting that a simple chemical cocktail can coax mouse muscle fibers to become the kinds of cells found in the first stages of a regenerating limb. Their study, the first demonstration that mammal muscle can be turned into the biological raw material for a new limb, appears in the journal ACS Chemical Biology. Darren R. Williams and Da-Woon Jung say their "relatively simple, gentle, and reversible" methods for creating the early stages of limb regeneration in mouse...

...Between 1971, when Invalidity Benefit was introduced, and the mid-1980s, there were typically around 700,000 claimants. Today, there are 2.6 million (the name was changed to Incapacity Benefit in 1995). We have, tragically, encouraged some people to arrange their affairs around qualifying for the allowance. Those who suffer most are not the grumbling taxpayers – they have rather more pressing things to grumble about – but the people who have been trapped in the squalor of dependency. Before you rage about scroungers, imagine you would feel if you relied – relied – upon a weekly handout of £91.40 (the maximum...

CAGUAS, Puerto Rico—This mountainside town is home to a picturesque cathedral, a tobacco museum and a Wal-Mart Supercenter. Another defining feature: Caguas's 00725 zip code has more people who receive a disability check than any other in the U.S. Puerto Rico has emerged in recent years as one of the easiest places in the U.S. to get payments from the Social Security Disability Insurance program, created during the Eisenhower administration to help people who can't work because of a health problem. In 2010, 63% of applicants there won approval, four percentage points higher than New Jersey and Wyoming, the most-generous...

Federal fraud: Healthy workers took disability Investigation finds $25 billion misspent on payments from 2005 to 2009; thousands of federal workers received questionable checks February 18, 2011 By Sharyl Attkisson * Play CBS Video Video Fighting federal disability fraud According to government estimates, fraud and improper payments ate up $25 billion dollars in federal disability payments from 2005-2009. Sharyl Attkisson reports on the double-dipping that's slipping through the cracks. * 111 Charged in Medicare Scams Worth $225M * Taxpayer Funds Paid for Bonuses, Casino Trips (CBSNews) You have no doubt noticed it when you get your paycheck, the deduction for...

Summary The Social Security Disability Insurance (DI) program pays cash benefits to non elderly adults (those younger than age 66) who are judged to be unable to perform “substantial” work because of a disability but who have worked in the past; the program also pays benefits to some of those adults’ dependents. In 2009, the Disability Insurance program paid benefits to almost 8 million disabled beneficiaries and about 2 million of those beneficiaries’ spouses and children. Between 1970 and 2009, the number of people receiving DI benefits more than tripled, from 2.7 million to 9.7 million (unless otherwise specified, all...

Both President Obama’s State of the Union and the GOP response from Rep. Paul Ryan suggest that it may take a crisis to force the two parties to confront Social Security reform. But the Congressional Budget Office forecast released a day later shows that the coming crisis has drawn one year closer — to 2017. That year is when Social Security’s disability insurance trust fund is projected to run dry, triggering sharp cuts in disability benefits — reaching about 18% in 2018 — without action from Congress.

Man with no limbs brings thousands to Jesus Christ Posted on 11 November 2010 At a recently-held event in Seattle, a man who was born with no arms and legs led more than 1,692 people to accept Jesus Christ into their lives. The man is Nick Vujicic, author of Life Without Limits. He can surf, swim, fish, play soccer and golf. He has degrees in accounting and finance. And, he heads the nonprofit organization Life Without Limbs, Pasadena Star-News reported. But last Sunday the Christian motivational speaker told the Seattle Harvest crowd of 15,000 people (plus some 93,000 viewers online),...

Did you know that this is National Disability Awareness Month? Unless you are part of the disabled community, you probably had never heard of it. We have National Hispanic Heritage Month, Black History Month, and even Earth Month. Then there are special days for various issues. All of these get media attention. The newspapers run series on how these issues have affected our lives, and television runs ads, news articles, and special programming to feature whatever special issue is being promoted. That is, unless it is concerning the disabled, and then the media is conspicuous in its silence.

On paper Israel has a social assistance program which rivals the best in the western world. On the ground it's the same as Bangladesh. There's nothing here. Judge for yourself. And this is coming from a Zionist.

Recently, my family and I went to Disneyland in California. In the California Adventure Park, we watched the otherwise splendid Alladin musical. What disturbed me was that in the chorus was a disabled actress in an electric wheelchair. She had no speaking roles and while her counterparts danced to the music she simply rolled her cart in circles. Having an autistic child, I am happy to see the handicapped perform. However ( and perhaps I am sensitive) I fid it distasteful to have someone one stage just to have gratuitous , politically correct window dressing. Obviously she couldn't play Jasmine...

Trashing the muscular dystrophy telethon is like dissing Christmas. It ticks people off. Even if the offender is a former Jerry's Kid. Laura Hershey was born with a form of MD and spent her poster childhood appearing helpless at fundraisers. She became a celebrity in the '70s as the face of the condition in Colorado. She remembers being a prop in the TV studio that was broadcasting local parts of the telethon. "To whole families driving by to drop their contributions in a giant fishbowl outside the studio; to the camera's blinking red light; to the anchorman who squatted next...

Benefits For People With Disabilities The Social Security and Supplemental Security Income disability programs are the largest of several Federal programs that provide assistance to people with disabilities. While these two programs are different in many ways, both are administered by the Social Security Administration and only individuals who have a disability and meet medical criteria may qualify for benefits under either program. Social Security Disability Insurance pays benefits to you and certain members of your family if you are "insured," meaning that you worked long enough and paid Social Security taxes. Supplemental Security Income pays benefits based on financial...

Snip:...press coverage nowadays treats the ADA as if it were uncontroversial, with at best a nod to libertarian commentators who see it as a coercive and fabulously expensive government venture into what ought to be private decision-making....

Hundreds of federal employees may have improperly reaped millions in Social Security disability benefits, according to a government watchdog that caught workers at several major agencies pocketing fraudulent payments. The Government Accountability Office issued a report that showed at least 1,500 federal employees may have wrongly received benefits. The group's investigation, which focused on two Social Security programs for people who have limited incomes due to disabilities, found several specific cases in which beneficiaries were earning well above the income cap while still receiving benefits. In one case, a Transportation Security Administration screener was overpaid $108,000, according to the report.

Over 9 Million American are now on SSDI or SSI soon it will be 10 Million. I have wrote a few times about these corrupt programs and how they will soon be unsustainable because of how broad the definitions of disability and the broad language used in the Federal Statutes are that virtually anyone can get it. Also they refuse to put restrictions on who can receive benefits from SSI and SSDI such as Convicted Felons. No matter how many crimes on someone’s record whether felony or not they can still receive benefits. The Social Security Administrations website also provides...

Retired FDNY Lt. John McLaughlin probably should be paying taxpayers for his remarkable fitness as a top long-distance runner, given his years of strenuous work as a firefighter. Instead, as The Post's Carl Campanile reported yesterday, the 55-year-old "Iron Man" triathlete is collecting an $86,000 disability pension from taxpayers. No wonder New Yorkers are increasingly fed up with public employees, as a fascinating poll last week found. Since retiring in 2001, McLaughlin has run numerous marathons and other races, often finishing near the top -- and first or second in his age group. He's "an incredibly fast runner," a fellow...

<p>Retired FDNY Lt. John McLaughlin has literally run off with a fat, tax exempted disability pension - despite being known as "Iron Man" in the Long Island hometown where he regularly trains and competes as a triathlete, The Post has learned.</p>

While Michigan abortionist Dr. Abraham Alberto Hodari has admitted that he forcibly restrained a patient in order to continue with an abortion procedure when the patient wanted him to stop, he maintained that “it was the best option given the circumstances.” “The assertion that I forced this woman to have an abortion she didn’t want is outrageous,” Hodari said. “I don’t go into the streets to kidnap women so I can abort their babies. They come to me of their own volition.” “To allow a patient to change her mind in the midst of the procedure would be too risky,”...

John Huff/Staff photographer Rochester residents Ellen Edgerly, left, and her daughter Sara. ROCHESTER — A few years back, hundreds of bikers gathered in Representatives Hall in Concord to protest a proposed helmet law. Ellen Edgerly, 51, an advocate with the state's Brain Injury Association, was sitting in the middle of the room, a lone voice in a sea of leather and wild beards, when a lawmaker asked if anyone supported the change. "She stood up, passed all of these tough guys, and testified about brain injury and what it means," says Steven Wade, the association's executive director. "It took...

After 20 years with the New York Fire Department, he’s just been awarded a $95,000-a-year lifetime disability pension — amounting to three-fourths of his annual salary, free of state and local taxes — because of a heart ailment. State law, you see, generally presumes that any police officer or firefighter who suffers heart problems must be doing so as a result of his or her work. But Neil Coplan isn’t a firefighter. He’s never fought a fire — and, by most accounts, scarcely ever visited a fire scene. Coplan is a doctor — the FDNY’s chief cardiologist, in fact. Yet,...

TRAGEDY OF THE GIRL WHO CAN ONLY MOVE HER EYES By Tony Brooks A HEALTHY, fun-loving young woman has been struck down by a rare illness that left her ­paralysed from the neck down, only able to communicate by moving her eyes. Pretty Mia Austin, 21, went to bed as normal three months ago but woke up in the night and ­collapsed with a stroke. Doctors feared she would not make it through the night but, although she survived, she has become a prisoner in her own body. She has been diagnosed with Locked-In Syndrome, which experts describe as “the...

‘Every failure’ a step to success Born without limbs KUWAIT CITY, Feb 15: “Never give up, even after repeated failures, because each failure means a step closer to success,” says a man who had every reason to give up on life. Nick Vujicic was born without limbs and once contemplated suicide during his childhood out of frustration at his seemingly helpless situation, but thought better of it after realizing the guilt, pain and suffering it would bring his parents. He has since learned to deal with those circumstances and is now a sought after motivational speaker across subjects such as...

http://www.newsleader.com/article/20100222/NEWS01/2220318

n an interview with TPM, state Del. Bob Marshall (R-VA) disputed the full accuracy and context of a local news article that quoted him as saying that an increase of disabled children was a punishment from nature for abortion. "I don't believe that disabled kids are God's punishments, period, end of discussion," said Marshall. "I have defended disabled kids. I was almost kicked out of the Republican caucus because I forced a vote on a bill, because autism parents did not get a vote in a subcommittee." Marshall insisted that his comments had been taken out of context. (Here's the...

Family Guy joke a kick in the gut: Palin Updated 1 hour 55 minutes ago Disappointed: Sarah Palin said the Family Guy spoof was "another kick in the gut" (AFP Photo: Robyn Beck, file photo) RELATED STORY: Critics see writing on the hand for Palin RELATED STORY: Palin tells Obama to 'play the war card' Sarah Palin, the former US vice-presidential candidate, is used to finding herself the brunt of jokes but her humour snapped when animated TV show Family Guy appeared to mock her son who has Down syndrome. The Palin family have called the creators of the show...

True love, hope and family surmount disability By Theresa Harrington Contra Costa Times Posted: 02/11/2010 01:38:09 PM PST WALNUT CREEK — Little girls dream of finding true love, marrying and living happily ever after. Christi Hockel was no exception. The youngest of six, she watched her older siblings find mates. She caught bouquets at their weddings and yearned for the day when she would have her own magnificent ceremony. "I kept saying, 'Boy, I wish I had a husband who loves me,'" said Christi, 31. Her family and friends were not so sure her dreams would come true because Christi...

Former GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin on Monday called for President Obama to fire his chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, because of an offensive comment he reportedly made. At an August strategy session of liberal groups and White House aides, the Wall Street Journal recently reported, Emanuel told liberals they were "F-ing retarded" for planning to air attack ads against conservative Democrats opposed to health care reform. Palin, whose youngest child has Down Syndrome, said in a Facebook note that "our president is doing himself a disservice by seeming to condone Rahm's recent sick and offensive tactic." "I would...

Its new film The Princess and The Frog features a black princess, but Disney has still been criticised for its alleged lack of diversity. Disney has been praised for breaking down barriers by featuring its first black princess in the film The Princess and The Frog. Oona King, who was Gordon Brown's senior policy adviser on equalities and diversity, is not satisfied, however. "You never see disabled people," the former Labour MP complained to Mandrake at a screening at the Mayfair Hotel in London. "When are you going to see a Disney film with a disabled character in the lead...

Given the protections of the ADA and the FMLA, there is no need to hesitate to disclose your bipolar condition to your employer. Federal Law gives you a legal right to request reasonable changes in your workplace that will enable you to perform your job duties and to request time off when you are actively suffering the symptoms of bipolar. Does this mean that you have the right to call off sick with a bad mood?

When assisted suicide is legalised most of the people who will die are disabled. And American disability advocates take a very dim view of it. This is the theme of a hard-hitting series of articles in the latest issue of the Disability and Health Journal. The editor, Suzanne McDermott, of the University of South Carolina School of Medicine, writes that she changed her own mind after studying the issue. At first she believed that assisted suicide was solely a personal autonomy issue. But eventually she was persuaded that it is at the heart of the movement for disability rights: "Almost...