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From the Los Angeles Times

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Mexican federal police patrol the streets of Acapulco last week after the suspected abduction of a group of 20 tourists.

The case of the 20 missing Mexican tourists doesn't add up Relatives insist they are ordinary guys. The government focuses on their unusual travel arrangements. Police have little to offer, and Acapulco expresses skepticism about what the travelers were up to. By Ken Ellingwood, Los Angeles Times October 18, 2010 Reporting from Mexico City It's one of the more puzzling episodes in a drug war heaped with unsolved cases: 20 Mexican men travel to Acapulco together and are kidnapped en masse as soon as they arrive. Two weeks later, there has been no trace of the men. Investigators have yet to announce any good leads, even though two others from the group were not taken.

Against the backdrop of Mexico's extraordinary drug violence, it's tempting to write off the Sept. 30 disappearance as another grim skirmish between rival traffickers. Group kidnappings have been a common feature of the feuding, though generally with fewer victims.

But in the Acapulco case, the pieces don't add up neatly.

Relatives back in the western state of Michoacan insist they were no drug henchmen, but ordinary guys: mechanics, students, deliverymen, an accountant, a physician. Loved ones said the friends and co-workers saved up for months for an annual, guys-only weekend in the seaside resort.

"None of them had any ties or relationship with any group that is involved in illicit acts … and had no conflicts with anyone, or threats of any kind," the relatives said in a joint statement issued shortly after the men disappeared.

Family members listed the men's names and ages — 17 to 58 — and jobs. Nine of the missing worked in the same wheel-alignment shop in Michoacan.

Still, it's hard to explain why 20 law-abiding men would be seized at gunpoint on the way to beach-side relaxation. Authorities have made comments casting doubt that the men were mere tourists, but have not specified a motive for the disappearances.

The outcome of the mystery matters to Acapulco, which is struggling to recover some of its former cachet and can hardly afford the image of gunmen seizing innocent visitors.

Sensitive to the effect of violence on the country's crucial tourism industry, Mexican officials have said the rising bloodshed nationwide is not aimed at travelers. That has been largely true: Even though drug-related violence has killed more than 300 people in and around Acapulco since 2006, for instance, most of it has been far from the main tourist zone.

The missing men arrived in four cars from Michoacan, itself a violent, drug-trafficking hot spot, and were apparently heading to or hunting for a hotel when seized. The kidnappings were reported by one of two members of the group who had split off to go to the store when the others were taken.

A state police commander first raised an eyebrow, saying it was unusual for a group of men to go on vacation without family members. And Zeferino Torreblanca Galindo, governor of the state of Guerrero, where Acapulco is located, was also quick to express skepticism.

"We assume it has to do with organized crime," Torreblanca said a day after the news broke. "I don't think anyone comes to deliberately carry out an attack on 20 tourists."

When the families complained that officials appeared to be blaming the victims, the authorities backed off, announcing that checks showed that none of the missing men had criminal records.

When the men's vehicles were recovered, investigators found signs of a road trip — suitcases, beer, cookies — but no weapons or contraband.

But last week, Mexico's tourism minister, Gloria Guevara, reignited tensions when she said the missing men "didn't fit the usual profile" of a tourist.

"A tourist usually travels with family, has a hotel reservation, arrives directly at his hotel and fits certain profiles," she told a congressional committee when a question about the case came up. Guevara stopped short of tying the men to criminal activities, but the implication seemed clear.

Families of the men fired back, accusing Guevara of a "lack of responsibility" and offering papers showing the group had reserved rooms for the three-day stay in a hotel they did not publicly identify.

"We're very worried about our family members because we don't know anything about them, and now we are angry that [officials] keep insisting that they weren't tourists," a relative who identified herself only by her first name, Katia, said during a radio interview.

Early this year, President Felipe Calderon came under fire and apologized to grieving survivors in Ciudad Juarez after he initially said gang revenge was behind a fatal shooting attack that killed 15 people at a teen party. It turned out that none of the victims had anything to do with gangs.

The Michoacan families say they don't want the mystery of the missing men to be brushed aside. "What we want is to have news about them and for our suffering to end," Katia said.

On Wednesday, Guerrero's state prosecutor, David Augusto Sotelo, announced that investigators were following two possible leads. But he refused to say what they were.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-mexico-missing-20101018,0,1540810,print.story

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Federal grants target mental health challenges in classrooms

By Linda Shrieves, Orlando Sentinel

October 15, 2010

One of the greatest challenges for teachers is kids who disrupt classrooms because of emotional or behavioral problems.

Last year, 2.8 million young people — ages 12 to 17 — received treatment or counseling for problems with behavior or emotions in classroom settings.

Researchers believe, however, that identifying behavior problems early can prevent the development of more complicated — and costly — mental and substance abuse disorders later on.

To help prevent aggressive and disruptive behavior among young children, the federal government's Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration is awarding $11 million in new grants to 22 school systems over the next five years. School districts receiving the grants include Broward County and Polk County public schools in Florida and Chicago Public Schools District 299 in Illinois.

This grant program specifically calls on elementary schools to implement the Good Behavior Game, a classroom behavioral management strategy that has been successful in children in first and second grades. In the Good Behavior Game, students are divided into teams, and their teachers provide positive reinforcements to inspire good behavior.

The Good Behavior Game was first tested in 1969. Several research articles have confirmed that the game is an effective way to increase children's on-task behaviors while reducing disruptions in the classroom

(To learn more about the Good Behavior Game, go to interventioncentral.org/index.php/classroom-mangement/131-good-behavior-game)

"Preventing substance abuse and mental disorders requires multiple and consistent interventions by all systems that touch children and youth," said SAMHSA Administrator Pamela S. Hyde, J.D. "The Good Behavior Game can help schools meet the social, emotional and behavioral health needs of students along with promoting their academic success."

Research shows that children with behavioral problems and whose teachers used this strategy in the classroom were much more successful than their counterparts in several areas, including improved academic achievement, reduced illicit drug use and reduced antisocial behaviors.

Each of the 22 grant awardees may receive up to $100,000 per year for up to five years, for a total of $2.2 million annually for all grantees. Actual award amounts may vary, depending on the availability of funds and the performance of the grantees.

http://www.latimes.com/health/os-mental-health-grants-20101015,0,990161,print.story

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EDITORIAL

Fighting gay bullying: The only 'agenda' is respect

It's silly to claim that anti-gay bullying efforts are part of an attempt to push some kind of homosexual 'agenda.'

October 18, 2010

A spate of suicides by gay teenagers has produced what looks like a united front against anti-gay bullying. But at least one conservative leader sees a sinister homosexual agenda in efforts to combat such bullying by acknowledging and affirming gay students.

As The Times recently observed, harassment of gay and lesbian students is part of a larger problem, and therefore, schools should pursue comprehensive anti-bullying efforts. That doesn't mean teachers and administrators shouldn't recognize anti-gay bullying as a distinct issue rooted not only in adolescent cruelty but in cultural condemnations of homosexuality. When they do so, however, they are accused by some conservatives of taking sides in a culture war.

An extreme example was a recent article by Tony Perkins president of the Family Research Council. Perkins accused the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network and similar organizations of exploiting the suicides of gay teenagers "to push their agenda of demanding not only tolerance of homosexual individuals but active affirmation of homosexual conduct and their efforts to redefine the family." For good measure, he said, "the homosexual movement, and their allies in the media and the educational establishment," may be creating despair that can lead to suicide by telling homosexuals that they are "'born gay' and can never change."

Perkins' characterization of GLSEN is unfair to the point of absurdity. But it is true that many of those who decry the bullying of gay and lesbian students also believe that schools should accept and affirm their identity, and treat homophobia with the same opprobrium with which they view racism. These advocates also believe, rightly, that schools shouldn't endorse the theory that gays and lesbians can be converted to heterosexuality, a notion dismissed by psychiatrists and psychologists.

In time, the idea that schools shouldn't take sides when it comes to the dignity of gays and lesbians will seem as quaint as the idea that teaching children about racial equality is furthering an "integrationist agenda." Meanwhile, schools should treat gay and lesbian students and families with respect and welcome efforts by students to oppose anti-gay bullying, such as the Gay-Straight Alliance groups that have been formed at thousands of U.S. schools. Preventing the harassment of gay students will require careful attention to the law (which gives students who want to criticize homosexuality the right to express their opinion in a nondisruptive way). But schools should recognize that protecting gay students involves more than protecting them from bullying.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-bully-20101018,0,3933510,print.story

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From the New York Times

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Mexico Watches California Marijuana Vote

MEXICO CITY — In two weeks, Californians will decide whether to legalize small amounts of marijuana for recreational use, in a vote that polls show could be close.

Now, for a change in the drug war, it is Mexico wondering about the possible spillover, this time of an idea. Will such a bold step by its neighbor to the north add momentum to a burgeoning movement here for broad drug legalization?

The backdrop is the drug war, which has left Americans worrying about many of the ills that spill over the border: kidnappings, murders and, of course, drugs themselves. At the same time, Mexicans chafe at the guns flowing in from the States, the nearly 30,000 people killed in drug-related violence here in the past four years and the American demand and consumption that largely sustain the drug trade.

Small steps toward legalization have already been taken on both sides of the border. California, where medical marijuana has been legal under state law since 1996, this month made the punishment for possessing small amounts of the drug the equivalent of a speeding ticket instead of a misdemeanor. Last year Mexico removed the penalty for possessing small quantities of a range of drugs, including cocaine, heroin and marijuana, though selling or producing them remain prohibited.

But the similarities pretty much end there. Even those here who are pushing for the legalization of drugs — and in some circles “hard drugs,” like cocaine and heroin — concede that any major change in Mexico would probably be years away, regardless of what happens in California.

For one thing, President Felipe Calderón, who has expressed frustration with the prospect of a “yes” vote in California as another sign of Americans' failure to bring their drug consumption under control, has not budged from his staunch opposition to legalization.

Because a rising number of intellectuals and some members of the political elite — including his immediate predecessor, Vicente Fox, and ministers who served under him — are advocating legalization, Mr. Calderón has called for a debate on the subject.

That raised eyebrows, feeding speculation that a change could be under way. But since then, Mr. Calderón has not done much to encourage it. In fact, two weeks after Mr. Calderón called for a debate, his health minister called legalization “absurd.”

Few people in the corridors of power have promoted the idea, and most polls show little support for legalization, particularly outside the more liberal confines of Mexico City. But even if the populace were clamoring for a change, Mexico, unlike California, is not known for citizen-driven lawmaking.

“Reform issues in Mexico tend to be top-down,” said Daniel Lund, a pollster with the Mund Group here. “If nobody in authority is championing an issue, it doesn't have oomph.”

Advocates for legalization in Mexico and California insist the motivation is not primarily to make it easier to get high.

In California, supporters of Proposition 19, which would allow anyone over 21 to possess up to an ounce of marijuana and permit municipalities to tax and regulate it, have pushed the notion that it could raise $1.4 billion in taxes while diverting law enforcement and prison resources to more serious crimes.

In Mexico, the main selling point has been that drug-trafficking organizations would be crippled by the creation of a legal, regulated market for their product that would cut off their illicit financial pipeline.

But as the vote in California draws closer, skepticism is emerging.

A study released last week by the nonpartisan RAND Drug Policy Research Center in Santa Monica, Calif., cast doubt on whether legalization in California would financially harm Mexico's drug traffickers.

It argued that cutting out the California market would reduce their revenue only 2 to 4 percent, in part because much of the marijuana consumed in California is already grown there, and the drug organizations derive their income from many sources. The study did, however, suggest that if low-cost, high-quality California marijuana was smuggled across the United States, the cartels could lose 20 percent of their income from exports.

Federal officials in the United States hardly see the proposal as a boon.

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. said Friday that the Justice Department would use federal law to prosecute “those individuals and organizations that possess, manufacture or distribute marijuana for recreational use,” throwing into doubt whether legalization would actually go forward.

Still, hardly a day passes here without some new wrinkle in the discussion.

Nexos, a magazine that has been sympathetic to Mr. Calderón's approach, devoted its issue this month — with a large marijuana leaf beckoning from newsstands — to advocating legalization. The back-and-forth in California regularly makes headlines.

Jorge Castañeda, the foreign minister under Mr. Fox, is among the chief promoters of legalization and says he believes the debate is shifting in his favor. He notes that four of six presumed presidential candidates for 2012 told Nexos that legalization should be at least considered if California approved it.

Just as legalizing alcohol helped dismantle organized crime in the United States in the 1930s, he says, legalizing marijuana could devastate major drug trafficking organizations. While Mr. Calderón and other political leaders do not seem to embrace legalization, “what does he do on the morning of Nov. 3?” Mr. Castañeda asked.

“It is going to be impossible to ask Mexican society to put up with the number of lives at risk and the violence for a fight that Americans, or at least Californians, would have said they don't want to fight anymore,” he said.

But some analysts think the debate here has given short shrift to another fundamental question: Does Mexico, which has enough trouble collecting existing tax revenue and regulating legal medications, have the institutional capacity to take on regulation of marijuana, let alone cocaine or heroin?

And there is the likelihood that any curb on the drug markets would drive the cartels to expand their increasingly diverse rackets in smuggling, extortion and kidnapping.

With a chronic lack of strong anti-addiction and anticonsumption programs, Mexico would probably experience more people taking drugs and provide little help for them, said Edgardo Buscaglia, a professor at the Autonomous Technological Institute here who has studied organized crime for years.

“To think organized crime would cease to exist is nonsense,” he said. “They are like any rational business, and they will go into other businesses for the rate on return.”

Marijuana and other drugs are readily available in several neighborhoods here, “like candy,” in the words of Victor Arroyo, 24, who said he was addicted to marijuana. Without using it several times a day, he said, he gets headaches and does not feel right.

The only change legalization would bring, he predicted, would be that consumption would be more out in the open, something he laments, since he has seen children as young as 9 smoking marijuana in the public housing project where he lives.

“It would really be the same,” he said, “or maybe worse.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/18/world/americas/18mexico.html?_r=1&ref=world&pagewanted=print

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Murder Trial Set to Begin in Levy Case

WASHINGTON (AP) — An illegal immigrant from El Salvador goes on trial Monday in the 2001 killing of the Washington intern Chandra Levy.

The investigation into Ms. Levy's disappearance led to the end of the promising political career of Gary A. Condit, a California congressman who was romantically linked to her in news reports and who was, for a while, the main suspect in her death. Mr. Condit never admitted to having an affair with Ms. Levy, but she had told family members that their relationship was romantic.

While investigators no longer believe that Mr. Condit had anything to do with Ms. Levy's death, his presence will continue to hang over the trial.

Bert Fields, a spokesman for the former congressman, said that Mr. Condit expected to be called as a witness at the trial of Ingmar Guandique, and that he would cooperate fully with the authorities.

Mr. Condit, who is writing a book about his experience, will not comment on the trial until it is over, Mr. Fields said.

Bill Miller, a spokesman for the prosecutor's office, declined to comment and would not say whether Mr. Condit would be called as a witness, citing the judge's order this month not to talk publicly about the case.

Defense lawyers are also subject to the order. But when Mr. Guandique was charged in 2009 with Ms. Levy's murder, they criticized what they called a botched investigation.

At a pretrial hearing on Thursday, the defense lawyers said the police were so desperate to get a confession from Mr. Guandique that they tried to establish a phony pen-pal relationship with him in 2004 and 2005, while he was serving a 10-year prison sentence.

“It goes to the sort of antics, the sort of shenanigans, the lengths to which they've gone to prosecute Mr. Guandique,” said one of the defense lawyers, Santha Sonenberg.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/18/us/18chandra.html?ref=us&pagewanted=print

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EDITORIAL

Death, DNA and the Supreme Court

In an age when DNA technology can help identify the guilty and avoid grave miscarriages of justice, states should not be allowed to block testing of available biological evidence before executing someone.

The Supreme Court heard arguments on Wednesday over a request by Henry Skinner, a Texas death row inmate, for DNA testing of blood, fingernail scrapings and hair found at the scene where his girlfriend and her two sons were murdered in 1993. In March, less than an hour before he was scheduled to die by lethal injection, the Supreme Court granted a stay of execution to consider taking up the matter of the untested evidence.

Seeking to avoid the legal doctrines and deadlines imposed by the Supreme Court and Congress to limit postconviction appeals, Mr. Skinner filed a civil rights action rather than a habeas corpus challenge. Sparring over that mechanistic distinction dominated much of Wednesday's argument and nearly obscured the larger problem of prosecutors' selectively testing some DNA evidence but not all in a capital murder case.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor correctly noted that Mr. Skinner's trial attorney made a strategic decision not to request DNA testing of the contested material in preparation for his trial, likely fearing the testing would further implicate his client.

But to disqualify Mr. Skinner now from obtaining the testing would elevate game-playing over truth-seeking and ignore the need to ensure, best as possible, that the right person has been convicted. Testing such evidence should not be left to a strategic decision; it should be standard in a serious criminal investigation.

There is a value in criminal law to the finality of verdicts and not permitting prisoners endless legal challenges to their convictions. The state should not execute prisoners. But since it does, the justices should be more concerned with the finality of executing someone when untested DNA evidence might shed light on his culpability and the state cannot be completely certain of his guilt.

In a lamentable 5-to-4 ruling in 2009, the court denied a free-standing right of prisoners to obtain postconviction DNA testing that might prove their innocence. The new case is a chance for course correction.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/18/opinion/18mon3.html?ref=opinion&pagewanted=print

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From the Chicago Sun Times

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Chest compression put first in new guidelines for CPR The American Heart Association says chest compressions -- at least 100 per minute -- are the most crucial element of CPR.

BY MONIFA THOMAS

For decades, medical professionals have been taught the "ABCs" of cardiopulmonary resuscitation: clear the victim's airway, deliver rescue breaths and then start chest compressions.

But in new guidelines being released today, the American Heart Association now says chest compressions should come first, followed by clearing the airway and mouth-to-mouth breathing.

The organization changed its guidelines, last updated in 2005, because the old approach caused delays in starting chest compressions, which help keep oxygen-rich blood circulating throughout the body.

"When you're in cardiac arrest, there's no blood flowing to vital organs, the brain being the most important. Every second without blood flow is associated with cells dying, so the faster you can start CPR, the faster you get blood flowing and the better you stave off the damage from cardiac arrest," said Dr. Dana P. Edelson, director of clinical research for the University of Chicago's Emergency Resuscitation Center and a co-author of the guidelines.

Reinforcing a 2008 advisory statement from the heart association, the new guidelines also encourage non-medical professionals to use hands-only CPR if they don't feel comfortable doing a combination of chest thrusts and rescue breathing.

The change, aimed at getting more bystanders to attempt CPR, is supported by recent studies indicating that hands-only CPR is as good, if not better, than chest compression plus mouth-to-mouth for adults. For children, conventional CPR is still recommended.

Nationwide, about 310,000 adults die each year from sudden cardiac arrest that occurs outside of a hospital. CPR can double or triple a person's chances of surviving. But fewer than half of cardiac-arrest victims receive CPR from a bystander.

Other changes in this year's guidelines have to do with how fast and how hard rescuers should push on the breastbone during compressions. The heart association now recommends at least 100 chest compressions per minute -- roughly the tempo of the Bee Gees' "Staying Alive" -- since more compressions are associated with better outcomes. And the breastbone should be pushed down at least 2 inches with each compression instead of 1.5 to 2 inches, as previously recommended.

Though the new rules are a bit technical, Edelson stressed that untrained rescuers focus on the basics,

"The key point is that anyone can do CPR. If you aren't trained or you don't feel comfortable, you don't have to ventilate. Just call for help, put your hands on the victim's sternum, push hard and push fast and don't stop," she said.

The guidelines are scheduled to be published today in the journal Circulation.

Cops expand outreach to schools to curb violence

October 18, 2010

BY SANDRA GUY

Chicago Police are expanding a high school outreach program to prevent gang violence after the initial program appears to be making inroads, Police Supt. Jody Weis said at a news conference Sunday.

The program, which started March 8 in high schools in the Police Department's Area 1 -- roughly from 2200 to 8700 south and from Harlem Avenue east to Lake Michigan -- has resulted in students seeking to get tattoos removed and to leave their gangs, police said. Students are transferred to new schools when necessary.

Weis said the high schools in Area 1 had no students murdered in gang violence from March through June, compared with five murders in that same time period of 2009.

Cmdr. Leo Schmitz said the effort has nothing to do with pressuring the students to "rat on" gang members or tell police "who is dealing dope."

Instead, police officers assigned to the Gang School Safety Team intervene after a killing or other gang violence to talk with the victim's friends.

"We'll talk about the kids' exposure to violence and try to stop any retaliation," said Sgt. Kenneth Boudreau. "We ask, 'What is gang life doing to you? Can you recall other friends who were shot? Do the gang members regularly visit and help the family of the victim? The students will say, 'No, no one cares about the family.'"

The program started this school year in high schools in the Police Department's Area 2, roughly from 55th to 138th streets, and from Cicero east to State Line Road.

http://www.suntimes.com/news/metro/2811114,CST-NWS-gangs18.article

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Jordanian man faces sentencing in Dallas bomb plot

October 18, 2010

ASSOCIATED PRESS

DALLAS -- A 20-year-old Jordanian man caught in an FBI sting trying to blow up a Dallas skyscraper faces a sentencing hearing Monday just blocks away from the building he tried to take down.

Hosam Smadi faces up to life in prison after pleading guilty in May to attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction. Under his plea agreement, however, it is likely he will receive a 30-year sentence and then face deportation.

According to the pleading documents, Smadi acknowledged leaving what he thought was a truck bomb in a garage beneath the 60-story Fountain Place building in September 2009. Smadi said he parked the truck, started a timer connected to the decoy provided by undercover FBI agents, then rode away to watch the explosion.

Smadi dialed a cell phone number from the roof of a nearby parking garage, where he had planned to watch the explosion. The number was supposed to set off his truck bomb. It instead alerted tactical agents hiding in a stairwell, who swarmed the rooftop and arrested the teenager.

Posing as members of an al-Qaida sleeper cell, three undercover FBI employees had monitored Smadi since January 2009. After he shared his plans to blow up the office tower, they helped him secure a truck and fake bomb used to carry out the mission, according to court documents.

Since the arrest, Smadi's public defenders have portrayed their client as a troubled and depressed young man, who exhibited signs of depression and mental illness when his parents separated and then suffered a breakdown after his mother's death from brain cancer. At the plea hearing in May, attorney Peter Fleury said Smadi had been diagnosed with schizophrenia by a prison doctor and a physician working for the defense.

FBI officials, however, tell a different story. After monitoring Smadi for nine months, they say the defendant was a committed would-be terrorist determined to connect with al-Qaida or Hamas. It was fortunate, they say, that they found him first, spewing hatred for America on an extremist website.

"Smadi was asked what he would do if he had never met the al-Qaida 'sleeper' cell," said Tom Petrowski, a supervisory special agent with the FBI in Dallas, in an affidavit. "Smadi replied that he would keep looking for such an entity to be a part of, even if it meant him having to leave the United States and go to Palestine and join Hamas or go back to Pakistan and join the Taliban."

http://www.suntimes.com/news/nation/2811658,dallas-bom-plot-101810.article

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Saudis warn of new al-Qaida terror threat against Europe  

October 18, 2010

PARIS -- Saudi intelligence services have warned of a new terror threat from al-Qaida against Europe, particularly in France, Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux said Sunday.

He said the warning of a potential attack by al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula was received "in the last few hours, few days."

European officials were informed that "al-Qaida in the Arabian peninsula was doubtless active or envisioned being active" on the "European continent, notably France," Hortefeux said. "The threat is real."

The warning from Saudi Arabia is the latest in a series of alerts that have put French security forces and others in high-vigilance mode.

Intelligence sources in North Africa also contacted France about a potential threat, as did the United States, he said.

Hortefeux said he had spoken at length with U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano.

http://www.suntimes.com/news/world/2811376,CST-NWS-qaida18.article

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Disabilities no longer a death sentence for pets

October 18, 2010

ASSOCIATED PRESS

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — When Beverly Tucker's dog Tobi ruptured a disc in his back, the veterinarian gave her a stark choice: expensive surgery with little chance of success, or euthanasia.

Like a growing number of pet owners, Tucker opted for a third choice thanks to medical advances and shifting attitudes about animal care. She bought a wheeled cart specially fitted for Tobi's hind legs, restoring mobility to her paralyzed pooch.

"I would never have my dog put down," Tucker said. "Our option was the wheels, and we're going strong ever since."

Pets with disabilities ranging from spinal injuries to deafness still struggle more than healthy counterparts, but their futures are no longer as grim as before. An industry catering to owners of disabled pets has sprung up, offering everything from carts to chiropractors specializing in canine spines.

Even in an economic slump, people are willing to pamper their pets.

Total spending on pets has grown each year since the recession began, rising from $41.2 billion in 2007 to an estimated $47.7 billion this year, according to the American Pet Products Association.

"The pet business has evolved greatly, especially over the last five years," said Leslie May, founder of industry consultant Pawsible Marketing. "When people think of pets as family members, they look for resources to meet their pets' needs."

Animal health specialists, rescue volunteers and medical supply makers all say they've seen a growing willingness in the American public to adopt or care for pets with ailments that once would have met with certain euthanization.

Dianne Dunning, director of the Animal Welfare, Ethics and Public Policy Program at N.C. State University, said that shift has shadowed breakthroughs in veterinary medicine.

"You're seeing in many cases now that pets are equivalent in status to children within a family," she said.

It was much different 21 years ago, when Buddha, a Doberman owned by Ed and Leslie Grinnell, awoke one morning unable to use her hind legs.

There were no online support groups, no doggy physical therapists. The only options offered by the vet were $5,000 back surgery with a 50-50 shot at recovery — or immediate euthanasia.

Instead, Ed Grinnell put his skills to work as a mechanical engineer and designed a wheeled cart for Buddha, who lived three more years. Ten years later, vets were referring so many people to the Grinnells that they went into canine cart manufacturing full-time.

Since 1999, Eddie's Wheels has expanded to 14 workers at their facility in Shelburne Falls, Mass., and now ships its carts worldwide for dogs, cats, bunnies, goats, sheep — even alpacas.

"I don't think people felt any differently about their animals 20 or 30 years ago," Leslie Grinnell said. "It's just the culture didn't support the view that this is an important member of the family."

That isolation the Grinnells felt was similar to what Joyce Darrell and her husband, Mike Dickerson, experienced when their dog Duke severed his spinal cord in an accident in 1999. Instead of euthanizing Duke, the Grinnells got him a wheeled cart.

They've since adopted another dog with paralyzed legs.

Those adoptions have since grown into a full-time rescue operation called Pets With Disabilities, which Darrell runs from his home in Prince Frederick, Md. The program rescues between 50 and 70 dogs a year, finding permanent homes for most.

He said disabled dogs often bond tighter with people than able-bodied dogs "because they need humans for more things." Still, there are more challenges in caring for disabled animals, including higher medical costs.

"Folks typically shy away from animals that are going to require medical care and cost is usually the No. 1 issue," said Gail Buchwald at the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Adoptions Center in New York.

Mary Dow, a volunteer with Independent Animal Rescue in Durham, rescued a cat named Daisy and paid $2,300 for surgery on its broken leg. She raised more than $1,800 to offset the tab.

"It's not necessarily a foregone conclusion that all people shy away from disabled animals," she said, however. "We've found homes for quite a few who would have been euthanized."

That second chance isn't just for the animals, Leslie Grinnell said, but for humans who stand to learn a lot from their disabled pets.

"These animals don't feel sorry for themselves one little bit," she said. "They really have a lot to teach us."

http://www.suntimes.com/news/nation/2811726,pets-disabilities-death-101810.article

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