I decided to check each of the websites of our candidates for president and see what their positions on disabilites were and how prominent they make their position.

Obama 08I started with Senator Obama’s site. On the main page, I selected the Issues drop down menu and the second item on the list was Disabilities. On the disabilities page, is a captioned video of Senator Obama talking about his plans to improve the lives of the disabled and his detailed plans for helping the disabled live richer lives with the dignity they deserve. I was impressed as his plan includes many of the things we worry about as parents of a child with a disability including IDEA funding and community-based independent living.

Hillary 08Next it was off to Senator Clinton’s site. Senator Clinton’s site doesn’t have an entry for people with disabilities, at least not that I could find. However she does have information scattered throughout the site. If you go to her health care plan, there is a list of How Hillary’s plan affects along the right hand side and one of the entries is for Americans with Disabilities. If you go to the Supporting parents section, there is an entry for Expanding Opportunities for Individuals with Disabilities. The information is good but I couldn’t find anything on community living. It would have been nice to put it all in one place.

McCain NeverFinally I went to Senator McCain’s site. There wasn’t any direct link to disabilities as an issue but there was an entry for Human Dignity. Surely, that would cover the disabled. Apparently not as “human dignity” seems to mean keeping gay people from marrying each other. Education? Not a word about IDEA. Health Care? No mention of the disabled but he does have two paragraphs on how he once sponsored a bill dealing with autism.

So what did I learn? That if you want to know what issues are important to a candidate, just go to their website. So check out their sites and see if the issues that are important to you as an American are important to the candidates.