Micheal J. Fox, Parkinsons, and more...

[elehhhhna]

Below is a post from another political message board. My response follows.

"There is criticism due MJ Fox for going off his meds to appeal to the pure sympathy vote. Whether or not he was "acting" is not the issue. He is capable, when on his medications, to speak and act normally. The fact that he purposely went off them for this political advertisement is reprehensible." by N. Idiot.



My dear Father in law died three years ago next month from complications due to Parkinsons disease.

This man went "Downtown" with two best pals and enlisted in the Navy when the Big War broke out. Aged 18, Gil, Bob and Mike were sent to San Francisco for training. Gil was assigned to a ship. I can't recall the name. Bob & Mike were assigned, together, to another. The USS Indianpolis.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Indianapolis_(CA-35)

All three boys were lucky to come home alive. They married, worked hard, raised families, spent time organizing things for the VFW, had "card club" once a week all together with their wives, flew their US and Navy Flags, loved their country, parents, spouses, children and grandchildren. Cared for their aging Mothers, nursed their familes through illness. They bowled, fished, voted. At least one buried his own child.

They cried when their Grandchildren were born.

My Mother in law only told me this summer Dad's meds cost them 1,000. a month.

Their SS check was 1,100.

She (74 now) worked--she had to--at a job she found though the now-gutted Green Thumb Employment program for Seniors. She also cared for Dad. It was not easy.

We sent them checks on birthdays, holidays...whenever.

Gil insisted on giving me a bottle of Opium perfume every single Christmas. My favorite. He loved it, too.

Those who would disregard the very real plight of their fellow human beings are are misguided, broken people. Shame on you.

I'll leave this with a quote by Thomas Paine from The Rights of Man, part II :

"When, in countries that are called civilized, we see age going to the workhouse and youth to the gallows, something must be wrong in the system of government."

http://courses.essex.ac.uk/cs/cs101/paineex.htm

[sam sarrha]

1. is it a fact he went off is medication..??

[LA lady]

2. I don't know about this time

But in his autobiography, Fox admitted to going off medicine to do interviews and testify.

[sam sarrha]

6. then we should be careful about what we say....

[medeak]

13. he said it depends on the day..... his symptoms

and with husband experience the same..

and please know that meds cause the strange movements...not the disease. Husband is rigid and unable to move without meds.


... am learning what a failure Parkinson's education is.. Hopefully MJF will teach all.

[Time for change]

3. Very nice quote at the end from Tom Paine

Michael Fox had not gone off his meds. As explained on Keith Olberman's show the other night, and at least one DU post, the side effects he exhibited on TV were side effects CAUSED BY his meds.

But that is besides the point as far as Limbaugh and N. Idiot (an appropriate screen name IMO) are concerned. The point is they have no idea whether he was off his meds or on his meds or whatever, so their opinion is worthless, and they ought to be ashamed for voicing it in public. Their only point is that they see their Party being attacked, so they have to flail out with whatever stupid words first comes into their stupid minds.

[moobu2]

4. I don’t have a problem with M. Fox going off

his medication, it’s necessary to show what Parkinson’s is really like

The medication only treats the shaking/jerking symptoms and eventually the meds wont even do that. The meds are not a cure and the disease will progress even with them.

[moondust]

7. Agree.

I don't think it matters. Whether medications are temporarily hiding the symptoms from view or not, he's still being destroyed inside.

What will Limbunk say when MJ makes an ad after the medications cease to be effective?

[sam sarrha]

8. we live in too sanitized a society.. creates a false sense of Utopia when the

truth is within my generation the major case of death was infectious disease.. usually people didn't live long enough to get cancer, and if they did die of cancer they didn't know it was cancer. people just died, and a lot of people died.. my great grandfather died from pulling out a nose hair.. he got an infection and it killed him.

it is so sanitized we now blame people for getting sick.. go to your local video store and check out the ..'Little Buddha' it is stories within stories.. keano Reeves..<spl lots of top actors, excellent story, it is a present day story..

[elehhhhna]

10. Thomas Paine goes on the address theat "false sense of utopia":

"...It would seem, by the exterior appearances of such countries, that all was happiness; but there lies hidden from the eye of common observation, a mass of wretchedness that has scarcely any other chance, than to expire in poverty or infamy. Its entrance into life is marked with the presage of its fate; and until this is remedied, it is in vain to punish.

Civil government does not consist in executions; but in making that provision for the instruction of youth, and the support of age, as to exclude, as much as possible, profligacy from the one, and despair from the other. Instead of this, the resources of a country are lavished upon kings, upon courts, upon hirelings, imposters, and prostitutes; and even the poor themselves, with all their wants upon them, are compelled to support the fraud that oppresses them."


http://courses.essex.ac.uk/cs/cs101/paineex.htm

[sam sarrha]

11. thank you, can you be my new best friend.. i find it difficult to locate an intellectual

person here in the south..

[elehhhhna]

15. LOL I moved here from Chicago!

where you at?

[sam sarrha]

16. i just moved form Dyer in Western Tennessee, i'm in Winston-Salem NC now it is a lot

more progressively minded here.. they have a Whole Foods Store and a recycling place.. and an Arts district downtown.. a live jazz and blues tavern with an open mike nite and a Great library. i have just been here a few weeks.. i haven't got out yet. but this place has potential.

Tennessee was an intellectual black hole.. i didn't have one conversation there in 3 years, people there you never met before, and just introduced to, or just met, would get right up in your face a foot or 2 away and stare into your eyes for a long time figuring and think'n...i found out that they believed they could determine by a persons eyes whether you soul was governed by Jesus or Satan

we moved there from El Paso Tx, there was a great Tibetan Buddhist Chenrezig Center there. we had a Tibetan Lama we supported who had been an attendant to the Dalai Lama and was the Chant Master for the Dalai Lama's Monastery. he was a wealth of information. we had about 30 people there, 16 regulars, i did 3 meetings a week, it was nice to have a Monk teach meditation and Dharma. the experience changed my life. i haven't found a meditation group here yet.

[elehhhhna]

17. " i haven't found a meditation group here yet."

Don't you mean "founded"? (That's a koan if you make it so. lol)

Houston is so much less segregated and more cosmopolitan than Chicago...really, it's shocking!

Subtropical weather and neighbors from 15 nations, all on one block.

Hideous Downtown, no lake, a gulf w/atrocious "beaches", but cheap and easy fares to the Caribbean (and Chicago, and Europe, etc.)

Texas' vibe is more Western than Southern. Hell, more Midwestern than Southern, come to think of it.

Go west, young Duer.

[elehhhhna]

9. Imagine being MJF without HEALTH INSURANCE.

[mucifer]

5. It doesnt matter if he's on or off the meds Parkinsons will kill him

and he will suffer for years before that happens.

[NYCGirl]

12. Actually, the Fox you're seeing in that ad is ON medication. According to

the National Parkinson Foundation. Without the medication, he'd be stiff and still and less able to speak.

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/10/24/rush-stem-cell/



According to the National Parkinson Foundation, Limbaugh has no idea what he’s talking about. The Washington Post reports:

n an interview in Ladies Home Journal’s September edition, Fox said he was taking a medication that causes jerking, fidgeting and other abnormal involuntary movements, known as dyskinesia. Fox said he was taking another medication to lessen those side affects.

An official of the National Parkinson Foundation said movements like those exhibited by Fox are the result of taking medication to treat the disease, which would otherwise result in rigidity.

“When you see someone with those movements, it’s not because they have not taken medication but because they probably have taken medication for some time,” the official said. “If you don’t take the medication, then you freeze.”

[medeak]

14. THANK YOU!!!!

It's true!