When you have a child, any child, yes, you worry what will become of this child upon your death. And when this child is severely handicapped and you are its sole caregiver and guardian, I can’t even imagine the worry on your shoulders.
In the case of Bonnie Liltz, she was struggling with her own medical problems. She most likely knew she would not live long enough to always be able to give her daughter, Courtney, loving good care. So, yes, she worried about what would become of her daughter.
The reality is that if Bonnie Liltz had died back then, Courtney would have been sent to a cut-rate nursing home at best. She would not get loving care. She would be lucky to get minimum care. I have been in such nursing homes.
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Bonnie Liltz imagined her daughter dying lonely and miserably, and I can see why she did what she did. The state had no business prosecuting her for a crime. She should have been sent to a mental facility.
Where was Access Living, the disabilities rights organization, when Bonnie Liltz needed them? Where was anyone from any organization to tell her that if she died, her daughter would be lovingly taken care of?
Fact is, there are not enough caseworkers and there is not enough funding. We present a pie-in-the-sky ideal, but home-based and community-based placements for people like Courtney — with professional caretakers — barely exist. Parents have to fight to get their child into one.
Bonnie Liltz adopted a child that no one else would have adopted, and she gave her child loving care for years. This is a child who could not feed herself or speak and functioned at the level of a toddler. How would Courtney have told anyone if she had been abused in a nursing home?
Truth is, many of us would have done the same thing Bonnie Liltz did if we were in that position. That’s the truth of it. Face it.
Connie Orland, Plainfield
Don’t hand the internet over to the rich
Trump and the GOP continue to keep the Dreamers — young people who were brought to this country illegally as small children — in cruel, life-changing suspense. They pursue their never-ending efforts to dismantle the Affordable Care Act. They present a tax “reform” plan that favors the wealthy and threatens our country’s economic safety net.
Given all of that, it’s easy to miss the more “under-the-radar” bad moves the Trump administration is trying to foist upon the American people, such as ending an open internet. “Net neutrality” might not sound all that exciting, but it’s a big deal. Net neutrality ensures that pricing for internet access is the same for everyone, from the largest media companies to the smallest bloggers. Large users, such as Netflix, can’t get priority over smaller users by paying higher rates to the internet service providers.
If you’re a company with deep pockets, such as Google, eliminating net neutrality wouldn’t hurt a bit. In fact, it probably helps because those with not-so-deep-pockets wouldn’t be able to complete. The internet would be a fast lane for the Deep Pockets, but bumper to bumper for everyone else. Yet another scheme by which the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.
The internet is a fundamental piece of our economy’s infrastructure, just as the phone system is. It needs to be regulated as such. I know the word “regulated” sounds like “anti-capitalism” to some people, but reasonable regulation is a part of our economic fabric. It helps to keep the playing field fair, which, in the long run, enhances competition and innovation.
Michael F. DeSantiago, Niles
