More specifically, ADA says that you cannot discriminate against someone who
is "otherwise able to do the job."  The issue of hitting a golf ball into a
cup doesn't appear to be closely related to the endurance to walk the length
of a course.  If a golfer with a disability needs a cart, but can't hit the
ball into the cup, he won't be playing in the tournament anyway!  The
tournament play will be among those with the highest level of skill at
getting the ball into the cup, which is what the game is about.

ADA attackers always manage to find cases that are clearly miscarriages of
justice.  This is not a problem with the law, necessarily, but with the
lawyers who try cases, and the judges who hear them.  So long as we have
humans making the decisions, there will be mistakes.  That's why we have
appeals.

Denis Anson, MS, OTR/L
Assistant Professor
College Misericordia
301 Lake St.
Dallas, PA 18636


-----Original Message-----
From: * EASI: Equal Access to Software & Information
[mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Randy Horwitz
Sent: Thursday, January 11, 2001 3:08 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Law penalizes the able?

What this person misses here is that disabled folks are just as talented as
our counterparts. It serves an employer to give a Blind person a screen
reader, to provide interpreters. Then, companies have a talent pool they
were missing. In these days of technological need for speed, that is where
it is at. Of course, I am preaching to the choir.

randy

"Practice means nothing. Games mean everything."
    -- Thurmond Moore
----- Original Message -----
From: Dave at Inclusion Daily Express <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, January 11, 2001 12:59 PM
Subject: Law penalizes the able?


> Hi folks,
> I found this one during my search this morning.
> I'm still trying to get my heart rate and blood pressure to
> come down. It's amazing to me that some people still think this way.
>
> http://www.aynrand.org/medialink/op-eds/martin_case.txt
> ---Original Text Follows---
> SHAME ON CASEY MARTIN
> Disabled Golfer Asks Supreme Court to OK His Forced Entry into
Tournaments,
> via Law
> That Penalizes the Able
>
> By Thomas A. Bowden
>
> When a supporter of Tonya Harding attacked Olympic skating rival Nancy
> Kerrigan
> back in 1994, clubbing Kerrigan's right knee and leaving her writhing in
> pain, the
> legal system sprang to the victim's defense. The attacker was caught and
> punished
> for his disgraceful attempt to eliminate a superior competitor through
brute
> force.
>
> But now, seven years later, as golfer Casey Martin appears before the
> Supreme
> Court asking approval for his own forced elimination of superior rivals,
the
> legal
> system appears poised to punish the victims and reward the attacker. This
> sad
> reversal is made possible by a federal statute that penalizes ability in
the
> name
> of helping the disabled.
>
> Casey Martin is a talented golfer whose rare circulation disorder prevents
> him from walking the length of a golf course. This handicap disqualifies
him
> from
> competing in events run by the PGA Tour, a private organization whose
rules
> require
> each athlete to walk from shot to shot.
>
> Golf is a game of extreme precision. Tiny variations in the swing of a
club
> determine whether a shot lands on the green or in a sand trap, whether a
> tricky
> putt falls in or rims out. Only golfers with great stamina can maintain
this
> precise control while fighting the fatigue that sets in after walking many
> miles,
> sometimes over rough terrain, and standing for many hours. The PGA's rules
> require
> and reward such stamina.
>
> But instead of gracefully accepting his inability to beat able-bodied
> opponents under the rules of an organization he voluntarily joined, Martin
> chose to
> force his way into PGA competition by invoking the Americans With
> Disabilities Act,
> a law requiring "reasonable modifications" to accommodate the handicapped.
> At
> Martin's request, a federal court forced the PGA Tour to change its rules
> and let
> Martin ride in a motorized cart, while everyone else walked.
>
> If the Supreme Court rules in Martin's favor, as seems likely, it will
> probably not even pause to identify the innocent victims of such a
decision.
> The
> first victim is the PGA Tour, which should have an absolute right to set
its
> own
> rules for its own tournaments. The next victims are the spectators, who
want
> to see
> professional golf played at its highest level, in PGA competitions
winnable
> only by
> the ablest athletes.
>
> And there is yet another victim, nameless but equally deserving of
> sympathy--
> the able-bodied golfer who is cut from the tournament to make room for
> Martin, and
> who is expected to pick up his broken dreams and go quietly home. No
> newspaper
> photographs will show the pain in this man's face, the way they showed
Nancy
> Kerrigan's anguish after she was assaulted, but one can imagine his
torment
> at the
> injustice of being penalized simply for having abilities that another man
> lacks.
>
> The legal and moral principles at stake here extend far beyond the realm
of
> spectator sports.
>
> Under the ADA, which was designed by disability advocates who resentfully
> describe healthy people as "temporarily abled," no employers may simply
fire
> disabled employees--or even hire able ones--so long as "reasonable
> accommodations"
> might help the handicapped compete. The list of bureaucratically required
> accommodations, from wheelchair ramps to sign-language interpreters, is
> endless--
> and all at the employer's expense.
>
> In a recent case, a Pennsylvania elementary school fired a psychotic
> secretary who missed deadlines, forgot to deliver messages, and couldn't
> cope with
> rearranged furniture. When she sued under the ADA, a federal court ruled
> that
> instead of firing her, the school should have engaged in an "informal
> interactive
> process" to identify "reasonable accommodations"--such as slowing down the
> rate of
> change in the office.
>
> The ADA's backers count on decent people to support the statute as a
> sympathetic expression of benevolence. But genuine benevolence toward the
> disabled
> is possible only through voluntary good will; it cannot be achieved by
> coercion,
> which results in punishing the able.
>
> This last point would be more obvious if the government were simply
handing
> Casey Martin a baseball bat and letting him take a swing at Tiger Woods's
> knee. Yet
> the ADA achieves the same end through government force, penalizing
mentally
> and
> physically superior candidates by making it illegal for employers and
other
> organizations to prefer them over the disabled.
>
> In a rational society, everyone's life and happiness depend upon finding
and
> rewarding the very best people--the best athletes, the best teachers, the
> best
> surgeons. To recognize this simple fact is to see why the Americans with
> Disabilities Act must be repealed--and why Casey Martin deserves to lose
his
> case.
>
> Thomas A. Bowden practices law in Baltimore, Maryland, and is a senior
> writer for
> the Ayn Rand Institute in Marina del Rey, Calif. http://www.aynrand.org
The
> Institute promotes the philosophy of Ayn Rand, author of Atlas Shrugged
and
> The
> Fountainhead.
>
> THE AYN RAND INSTITUTE
> 4640 Admiralty Way, Suite 406
> Marina del Rey, CA 90292
> Phone: 310.306-9232 x224    TEAR SHEET REQUESTED
> Fax: 310.306-4925
> E-mail: [log in to unmask]
> Contact: Jason Sagall
>
> This Op-Ed and a photo of Thomas A. Bowden can be found at:
> www.aynrand.org/medialink/martin_case.shtml
> ---End of Article---
>