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Yesterday, as I went up the street in my wheelchair, a passing man looked at me, hoiked up, violently spat at me.

This has taken me this long to write.
Men spit into their hand when they rape you. It is a huge trigger for me. I fled, thinking about @BillShorten. 2/ Because every single day there is another news story, carefully manufactured by Bill's media campaign, demonising disabled people and the NDIS.

It has led to an increase in hate crime in disabled people - I hear more and more of these incidents. But they don't count it.

Neurotypical/allistic people, listen up.

If we do not want to do a thing, it's often because we cannot.

Don't be hurt. You asking us to a social event is like saying 'would you like to run 20kms with me, it's a really nice day and I'm your best friend?'

Most would say no. 2/ It's the same for us. Yes, it's a lovely day. Yes, you are my best friend and I love spending time with you and I enjoy your company.

But today, I just don't think I can run 20kms. You see, I ran fifteen yesterday and need to run another thirty tomorrow. Today, I cannot.

***Breaking***

We’re not in Kansas any more, Toto.

The situation with plan change requests at the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA) is dire. There are tens of thousands of requests languishing without action, with less than 10% assigned. 2/ Shockingly, nearly half of these requests lack any supporting information, suggesting a severe breakdown in the process. There is a lack of guidance to NDIS participants and nominees on what information the Agency requires to progress a plan change request, compounded by..

For those who want to know what #Budget2024 said about #COVID.

Here it is.
COVID-19 Public Health Response
2023-24 Funding: $142.6 million allocated to states and territories for COVID-19 public health response measures. 2/ 2024-25 Onward: No specific allocation mentioned for COVID-19 public health response from 2024-25 onward​​.
National COVID-19 Vaccine Program

Well, the Budget papers tell the story.

Despite the best spin in the world, spun by professionals, the numbers don't lie.

Radical reforms to the NDIS paint the picture. They will reduce participant support payments by $14.4bn over four years.

Death of the NDIS. #Budget2024 2/ Well, let's talk about how they are going to do it. Cos it's cost at least 200K in focus groups to work out how to sell this dead pup to the disability community & endless Mates in the Media favours, so let's just lay it all out on the autopsy table and dissect it.

Ready?

There was a knock at the door. I opened it, against my better judgement. This is a rough neighbourhood.

It was almost 11pm.

A much older woman stood there in a thin cardigan, huddled against the cold.

'Hello,' she said, her voice faltering. 'This used to be my mum's house.' 2/ I was instantly delighted. Old houses enchant me and this one, with the beautiful ceilings and the now demolished garden, had clearly been loved.

I invited her in. As she brushed past me, I realised she'd been drinking.

'I've been too chicken to visit,' she confessed.

Australians with disability do not want the changes Labor has put on the table and is trying to facilitate via legislation that was kept secret. I have been told that DROs were told if they made certain things public, they would be referred to the Dept of Public Prosecutions. 2/ I cannot begin to outline why this is wrong. Using bully boy tactics will not work. Threats and intimidation may work with those who are afraid for their jobs or positions. But this is about our LIVES. We will fight back with everything we have.

This cartoon was never truer.

I have trained chatgpt to respond in fluent homo

User
Continuing in this vein, please EXPLAIN, Einsteins theory of relativity, with no hint of heteronormativity? 2/ ‘Buckle up, darling, because we're about to dive into the fabulous cosmos of Einstein’s theory of relativity, a theory so elegant, it sashays through the universe, defying the mundane constraints of Newtonian physics with the grace of a drag queen owning the runway…

I've prepared a summary of the Government response to the long COVID 'Sick and Tired' report for those who have brain fog.

I've pulled out the main parts of the document in response to the Recommendations and have noted the gaps.

No commentary, just the response to the report. 2/ · Recommendation 1: Govt gives in principle support for establishing a COVID-19 database, acknowledging data integration projects and challenges in data linkage.

Fast history lesson about the rise of the right in the wake of the Spanish Flu.
The resulting economic downturn and political manoeuvring made the preconditions for the Holocaust possible.

These are the factors that informed it. 2/ Hitler's rise to power involved strategic political maneuvering within the democratic framework of the Weimar Republic. There are a number of paths to power that were involved. We are seeing some of those same strategies utilised today to garner power.

In five days a ‘free speech’ cookerfest will be held at the Norwood Town Hall - are South Australians happy about this? If not, give the council a yell.

Here’s the ad - on their local govt website. Cool and normal npsp.sa.gov.au/about_council/…
npsp.sa.gov.au/events/2433_na…
2/ The people advertised by this local govt authority include a group, NOSCAG, that thinks mind control devices will be implanted in people’s brains. Here they are protesting another council.

@CityofSalisbury @CityofNPSPia.acs.org.au/article/2023/c…

Once I was punished; I don’t remember why.

He took my childhood books away. I was very young.

I lost my friends, Silky, Moonface and the Saucepan Man. I was inconsolable.

And so I stole their books, the ‘boring’ ones. Shakespeare. The Works of Edgar Allan Poe.

He caught me. 2/ He had already confiscated my lamp. There was a fluoro light in my room. I dared not turn it on.

So I lay on the floor, reading avariciously by the thin ribbon of light that streamed below my door. I read, read until my eyes hurt.

I was so engrossed I didn’t see him coming.

This is so disconcerting to read.

Shame on you, @tasmaniapolice.

'She was obviously malnourished and frail. Her hair, grey in colour was matted into large clumps. Her eyes were glazed. In her discussions with the police, captured on body-worn camera, HJ made no sense.' 2/ 'She spoke rapidly of various conspiracies involving the police, people from China, Isis, and Jesus. It is abundantly plain viewing the footage, which frankly is uncomfortable to watch, that HJ was gravely ill - both mentally and physically.'

What people don’t recognise about #BenRobertsSmith is why he thought he was untouchable. Daddy served as Commissioner of the Corruption and Crime Commission of Western Australia and was a former Supreme Court judge. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Len_Rober…

But wait, there’s more. 2/ In 2002, Daddy Len was appointed Judge Advocate General (JAG) of the Australian Defence Force.

In 2012, he was appointed as chair of an independent Defence Abuse Response Taskforce (DART), to deal with individual complaints of sexual and other abuse in the ADF.

Good things about today.

I have a drivers license again after adulting. They asked if I lived in Margaret River. I have never lived there - the reason I had no license is that a fine was sent there, to someone else’s address! Then unpaid (of course) and then license suspended. 2/ I have now sorted it all out with a kind and professional man from the Dept of Transport. The concierge looked at my mask and the very crowded room and ushered me to a desk, which I so appreciated. People were coughing and coughing. Thanks, DoT!

Holy hell, @ChrisMinnsMP. Have you even LOOKED at what’s happening at Dubbo Base Hospital?

These are the most shocking reviews I have ever read. Something is rotten deep within the public health system.

IN A PANDEMIC.

Read these reviews. I dare you to. 2/ holy
shit

No offence Dr Harris

I bothered to look and see who treated Stephen with such unprofessionalism and dismissive superiority at Dubbo Hospital last night, because good Catholic schoolgirls do their homework.

It was a Dr Harris who left Stephen crumpled to his knees in a car park last night. THIS guy. 2/ Now, Dubbo healthcare has had their share of issues - isn't that right, @wnswlhd? And I am sure they will welcome my complaint today after, you know, dead babies and inquiries just last year. abc.net.au/news/2022-08-2…

So I had a mother's look at young Dr Harris.

Today a pharmacist told my gf when she casually picked up regularly (5+ years) prescribed opioids for me that I must a) go see a pain specialist (done x a LOT) b) go to a local GP (there isn’t one) & demanded to know who was ‘looking after’ my care. @PharmGuildAus @Mark_Butler_MP 2/ Of course we all know you need to see doctors for more than a year to prescribe opioids, and no doctor in this region is accepting new patients. So - yeah. I paid a private doctor yesterday, who said nah, can’t do an iron infusion without new tests >a week old.

Right.

Here is another film, and by now you should be seeing a common thread.

How many people are talking now about healthy immune systems, and health superiority?

collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog…

The rise of the right is all the more terrifying because it has happened before.

https://twitter.com/criprights/status/1663174809914859521

2/ Because this is what is happening now.

Here is the description.

Nazi propaganda film -- Aufklaerungsfilm [Instructional film] -- depicting life on earth as a permanent struggle for food, reproduction, and survival between strong and weak animals.

Let me explain some basic economic facts to people who do not get the importance of what was announced on Friday re #NDIS by @AlboMP. I have had much rebuttal, especially from Labor rusted ons who think that disabled people are being unduly critical and folk who have it wrong. 2/ This is the situation.

They say that under the current trajectory, the cost of the NDIS will reach $97 billion by 2032-33. But if the scheme achieves just an 8 per cent growth rate instead, the NDIS will cumulatively save more than $50 billion over the next decade.

How do we think that @AlboMP is going to 'rein in' spending on the NDIS, without talking to us about it first?

And we are talking about a lot of money here - growth is currently at 14%; he is saying they want to commit to a goal of 8%.

So listen up, disabled folk. Important. 2/ There are a couple of ways you can reduce costs and @billshortenmp has signalled that he will be introducing a couple of non controversial measures, including catching the bad guys, cutting red tape and reducing price gouging. It's not clear how he will do the third.