NO MEDICARE DRUG PLAN

Sorry, Charlie, but if you're insured by Medicare, you'll have to go on buying your own prescription drugsor doing without.

After what the New York Times called "an extraordinary commitment of time on the Senate floor," the U.S. Senate rejected four different proposals to cover prescription drugs under Medicare. One of those plans would have been means-tested, providing subsidies only to people with low incomes and high drug costs.

Debate in the U.S. House was furious, bitterly partisan. Charles Rangel, Democrat of New York, argued that Republicans seemed more concerned with "subsidizing the insurance companies.... You can put lipstick on a pig, but you can't call that a lady. You can take this bill and call it reform, but it does not alleviate the problems."

INSURORS WANT NO-PENALTY MALPRACTICE

Insurance companies, like nursing homes, buy ears in Congress. They came close to getting congressional passage of limits on an injured patient's right to sueyet never promised that the measure would bring insurance rates down. Conservative Senator Mitch McConnell made it an amendment to the Generic Drugs Bill.

AIR (Americans for Insurance Reform), a new consumer coalition, caught McConnell in the act and sent out an alarm. Pounded with calls from their home states, Senators voted down the amendment 57 to 42.

Let's hear it for our side.

Now AIR is at work to get malpractice and home insurance rates frozen in every state. A good time to put in your own two cents' worth.

"You can put lipstick on a pig but you can't call that a lady."

Rep. Charles Rangel

The president of the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, a.k.a. Big Pharma, was seen "hauling ass around the halls [of Congress], calling in his markers," one anonymous House aide remarked.

He wins. You lose.

THE HIGH LIFE

PROTESTS SAVE HOME CARE, WIN APOLOGY

Activists in Colorado, who camped out on the statehouse lawn for 17 days and nights in July when the state threatened to cut the wages of the support workers, triumphed when the state worked out a compromise that won't cut those wages at all. Members of Colorado Adapt were the movers and shakers at that vigil, joined by IL centers when it came time to make the deal.

Dawn Russell, an activist from Littleton, CO., saluted support workers, saying, "There is no glory in

The poor fellow can't even sit down to a posh dinner in peace. Peter Singer of Princeton University, the animal rights ethicist who crusades for quick disposal of disabled infants, was invited to dine with Philadelphia's bluebloods before his June speech at the University of Pennsylvania.

He hadn't figured on Philly Adapt and its ties with Not Dead Yet. The activist daughter of Singer's wealthy host joined the protesters when she learned from their leaflets what Singer stands for.

145 Not Dead Yet supporters in Oakland, Calif., protested a Singer speaking engagement there. A few were removed from inside the hall when they exercised their mouths.

The protest was a collaborative effort of Dredf, the Society for Disability Studies, and local Not Dead Yet partisans.

their job, but they assist us to live independently. The only other alternative for us is a nursing home."

Citizens Wanting Accessibility of Washington, PA., had complained and been rebuffedwhen a police car, maybe the chief's, used a designated accessible parking space in nearby Burgettstown. Then more than a dozen activists showed up at a town meeting. They got an apology from the Council, and a pledge to make post office parking accessible, too.

POLICE BEATING IN PROGRESS, DISABLED KID DOWN

Los Angeles police officers were caught on videotape punching 16-year-old Donovan Jackson. He has a disability and was handcuffed at the time. His father, driving, was pulled over for having expired license tags.

The cops, soon to be tried for assault, call it a "proper, reasonable use of force." Seeing is believing, or not. Watch the video online at http://media.videoaxs.com/denverpost/Crime/07082002-41.html.

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