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FCC Chairman Michael Powell said in a statement last week that it was the first time the agency has pushed for fines against broadcasters for violating emergency closed-captioning rules.

"People with hearing disabilities have a right to the same timely emergency information as stations provide to their hearing audiences," Powell said.

During emergencies, broadcasters are required to present information in the form of closed-captions or graphics, such as a news "crawl" at the bottom of a screen or maps, "simultaneously or nearly simultaneously" as auditory information.

The FCC alleges that KUSI, KGTV, and KFMB together violated the regulations a total of 45 times on October 26 and 27 during the fires which claimed 24 lives and 3,600 homes in Southern California. The agency could have imposed $27,500 for each violation.

The stations have 30 days to appeal or pay the fines.

Related: Closed captioning found lacking during wildfires

The court will hear arguments in its next term, which begins in October, over former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft's attempt to block the state's voter-approved "Death with Dignity" law.

In a November 2001 memo to the federal Drug Enforcement Administration, Ashcroft interpreted the U.S. Controlled Substances Act as banning doctors from prescribing lethal doses of controlled drugs -- in this case barbiturates -- to patients wanting help to take their own lives. Ashcroft said that doctors are supposed to give medications to treat their illnesses, and that prescribing a drug with dying as the goal is not a legitimate use of that drug.

A U.S. District Judge ruled in Oregon's favor in April 2002. That ruling was upheld last May by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco.

At issue is whether the federal government has the authority to exercise control over an area of the law -- such as medical treatment and doctors' licensing -- that is traditionally reserved for the states. The state has argued that the Attorney General misinterpreted the Controlled Substances Act, which deals with drug abuse and prevention; and that any limit imposed on states regarding the practice of medicine should have come from the Department of Health and Human Services, not Ashcroft's Justice Department.

A dozen disability groups had filed a brief supporting Ashcroft's position in the appeal. Advocates have opposed assisted suicide laws, noting that a number of people who have been "assisted" in dying were not in the terminal stages of illness, but had disabilities or mentioned a fear of becoming dependent on others as a reason for committing suicide. Some also have pointed out that Oregon's law was approved about the same time the state began limiting health coverage.

"People with disabilities are already in daily contact with a callous health care system that is all too ready to deny necessary health services to save money," Diane Coleman, JD, president of the disability rights group Not Dead Yet, wrote in response to the appeals court's ruling last May. "Those national disability groups who filed with Not Dead Yet in this case have the shared and first hand experience of a system with almost no accountability that is all too often pressuring people with disabilities to get out of the way."

"Our position is that it violates the ADA civil rights and equal protection principles, and should be overturned," Coleman said of Oregon's law.

Since the law was enacted in 1998, at least 171 people have committed suicide under its guidelines. Disability rights advocates have been part of the movement to successfully block attempts to pass similar legislation in other states, including Hawaii, Vermont and, most recently, in California.

Even though Barrett, who uses a ventilator to breathe and a wheelchair, had been on nearly two dozen flights with US Airways in the past, airline officials decided this time that his ventilator was a life-support device and that he now presented a medical risk.

"I was discriminated against, embarrassed," said Barrett, 33, whose spinal cord was injured 13 years ago in a diving accident.

The airline provided Barrett with a taxi ride home and a full refund of his ticket, but did not arrange another way for him to get to Cleveland.

Fortunately for Barrett, an area business owner arranged for him to be flown on his company's private jet to Cleveland. There Barrett is expected to undergo surgery to implant electrodes into his diaphragm so he will have less need for a ventilator.

Florida Attorney General Charlie Crist learned about Barrett's ordeal on a local TV newscast.

On Tuesday, Crist wrote a letter to Bruce Lakefield, CEO and President of US Airways, demanding an explanation and remedies for Barrett.

"I am confident that US Airways would not condone discrimination against its physically disabled passengers and that you have policies in place to assist and protect such customers," Crist wrote. "Furthermore, as I am certain you are aware, federal regulations specifically prohibit air carriers from refusing transportation to an individual with disabilities, and federal and state civil rights laws provide protection for individuals from discrimination on domestic flights."

"No less than the United States Constitution affords the right of all Americans to interstate travel."

Related: "Crist Writes to US Airways President Over Disabilities Incident" (Office of the Attorney General of Florida)

That's the conclusion of an important study done through the University of Michigan Health System, the results of which are published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General.

Researchers gave handheld PDAs (personal digital assistants) to 49 patients receiving dialysis for severe kidney failure and to 49 people without a serious medical condition or disability. Over a three month period, the PDAs prompted the participants every few hours to rate their mood.

The results showed that there was little difference over time in how the dialysis patients felt compared to how the "able-bodied" participants felt.

In fact, the data revealed that the dialysis patients were in a good mood most of the time.

The study's authors explained that the research could have serious policy implications.

"People who haven't experienced such adversity assume that it would destroy their happiness when in truth it probably would not," said senior author Peter Ubel, M.D., a U-M professor of internal medicine and psychology.

"People are more resilient than they think they can be, and can get through things that they probably would have never thought they could. The fact that people seem to be so poor at estimating the effect of illness on mood calls into question some of the ways we use such quality-of-life estimates in policy making and research."

The researchers also found that the patients actually felt much better than either they or the other participants predicted they would feel.

Related:
"Unbelievably happy?" (University of Michigan Health System)
Journal of Experimental Psychology: General

"Hi, Mom," Sarah Scantlin, 38, said to her mother over a speaker phone last week.

"Sarah, is that you?" Betsy Scantlin asked.

"Yes," said her daughter.

"How are you doing?"

"Fine."

"Do you need anything?" her mother asked her later.

"More makeup."

It was the first time Scantlin's mother had heard her daughter's voice since September 22, 1984, when the then 18-year-old college freshman was hit by a drunk driver.

According to the Associated Press, Scantlin started talking last month, but asked staff at the Golden Plains Healthcare Center not to tell her parents until Valentines' Day. She changed her mind earlier last week saying she couldn't wait any longer.

A speech therapist at the facility was working with several patients in January trying to get them to speak when Scantlin said, "OK. OK."

There were times prior to that when she would blink in response to questions, but nobody knew whether she understood the questions.

And while nobody knows why she suddenly began to talk, her doctor said that certain pathways in Scantlin's brain may have regenerated on their own.

During the time since her accident, Scantlin apparently knew some of what was going on around her. For example, when asked if she knew what a CD is, she said it had music on it.

During a gathering of relatives and friends on Saturday, Scantlin was asked if she is happy she can now talk.

"Yeah," she responded.

In the past few years, there have been several incidents of people with severe brain injuries considered to be in comas or "brain dead" who have suddenly recovered or started talking, baffling doctors and giving hope to the families of others who are in similar situations.

For the third time in six years a proposal to make physician-assisted suicide legal in Hawaii has come before state lawmakers, and for the third time in six years, the proposal was effectively shut down in a hearing earlier in the month

The measure under consideration would have allowed a doctor to prescribe a lethal dose of medication to adults with terminal illnesses which they then could take on their own.

After hearing six hours of heated testimony on Feb. 5, the House Health Committee voted to set aside the measure for this legislative session. While it could be brought up in the next session, the committee's chairman, Representative Dennis Arakaki, said there does not seem to be much interest among members to make it a priority.

"At this point, the sentiment is against it," Arakaki explained.

"Unless we're able to assure quality of life, I think there's going to be more and more pressure to look at this alternative."

According to the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, nearly 500 people packed the Capitol auditorium where the hearing was held. More than 1,000 had submitted testimony on both sides of the issue.

"Legalizing physician-assisted suicide, the whole essence of society and the medical profession would change," said Chris Niemczyk, who has cerebral palsy. "It is ultimately the state making the decision on which groups can live or die, setting a dangerous precedent."

An Oregon physician, Dr. William Petty, had flown to Honolulu to voice his opposition to the measure.

"Care and treatment can be expensive," Petty said. "Manipulation of patients is a real problem when physician-assisted suicide becomes an option."

In 2002, the Hawaii House passed a similar bill which was later defeated in the Senate. During the last session, the House Judiciary Committee approved another assisted-suicide bill, which the full house decided not to vote on.

Oregon is the only state that has made doctor-assisted suicide legal for people in specific circumstances. Some California lawmakers are considering a similar measure in that state. Efforts to get a "Death with Dignity" bill passed in Vermont have been repeatedly rejected.

Many disability rights advocates have protested against such laws, arguing that they make people with certain disabilities more vulnerable, especially at a time when health care costs are climbing. They have pointed out that many of those who have died under the laws in Oregon and in some European countries were not in the final stages of terminal illness, but instead feared acquiring a disability or becoming dependant on others.

No, we're not talking about the results of who was elected and which issues were approved.

These are the results of surveys taken to find out which polling places were accessible to voters with disabilities as required under the Help America Vote Act of 2002, the Palladium-Item reported Sunday.

Every polling place in Indiana was reviewed for accessibility on those election days.

The bad news is that few passed the test. In Wayne County, for example, only five out of 58 polling places complied. Only one out of Fayette County's 25 voting sites was fully accessible.

The good news is that most of the fixes are easy and inexpensive, according to Mike Soddrill, project director for "Count Us IN," which did the survey.

Election officials have until January 1 of next year to make their voting sites accessible under HAVA.

Many counties are merging polling places so there are fewer to make accessible. A bill in the state Senate would also allow counties to designate an accessible voting site as far as five miles outside the county.