On January 24th, 2015 in Minneapolis, Minnesota an event was held sponsored by a self-styled Autism Leadership group calling itself either the “Canary Party or “Health Choice,” whichever name, I think, sounds catchier to whomever they are talking to at the time.
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
The event, allegedly a book-signing at a University, by authors of ten books on autism issues, was advertised by hiring a billboard somewhere near Minneapolis, and the most meager of FaceBook campaigns. Of course, no one showed up. The event was a massive failure. The temperature outside in Minneapolis on an average January 24th was high of 32 and a low of 26. It was a grandstanding to NO audience. Authors flew in from all over the country to sign books for each other.
Just one more massive failure, by this group, to add to the list.
Like the characters in the old Children’s Song titled above, some of what is known as Autism Leadership, have been locked into a solution pattern that did not work in the past and will not work in the future.
Thankfully though, there is a big, long overdue, power shift going on in the autism community. The move is away from the Canary Party/Health Choice partying, preening, and posturing, towards determining actual solutions – then working towards actuating those solutions.
There is, of course, with this, discomfort. Those that think like the Canary Party/Health Choice posers, assuming that they can solve the autism problem by having their $40,000 photo taken with a Congressman (and, yes, that has happened – see below), are looking around kind of stunned, wondering where that Congressman went once the check cleared. For Autism Leadership REALITY is here in all its starkness. What works is over here. What does not work is over there.
And, it is ABOUT TIME.
As everyone has figured out, the effort to destroy Autism One, the biggest most inclusive event in autism, and replace it with a Canary Party/Health Choice Ken and Barbie Play Day, failed. Autism One is bigger, and stronger, than ever, with far more support once, as I reported earlier about Autism One “They threw out the trash…”
Threw Out The Trash?
Autism, as a solvable social issue, has been in a stall. The REALLY visible Autism Leadership (see the Canary Party/Health Choice party photos) clearly did not believe that there was, or did not want to allow, a solution to the overall autism problem. Visible Autism Leadership was a spectacle – with many individuals, and groups, not working together at all – and some actively working against others – tiny little fiefdoms of ego backstabbing each other.
Working against each other? Oh yeah…
The event that got my attention, and kindled my anger, was the hijacking of the November 29th, 2012 autism hearing in front of the US Congressional Oversight and Government Reform (OGR) Committee chaired by Congressman Darrell Issa. For months meetings were going on between Brian Hooker PhD and US Congressmen Issa, Buchanan, and Posey setting up that OGR hearing, dragging in the Center for Disease Control (CDC) people to answer tough questions about the so-called “studies” they had set up using federally indicted (for Fraud) scientific investigator Poul Thorsen, claiming “no relationship” between vaccines (death pus) and autism.
But two weeks before the hearing Hooker was informed that he, Hooker, would not be called to testify. When Hooker called me and told me what happened, he was in shock. What happened? Another self-styled autism leadership group had found out about what Hooker and the Congressmen were up to, hired an expensive lobbyist, and changed the entire subject of the hearing to something less harmful to Big Pharma, and their subsidiary, the vaccine (death pus) industry.
But, that hijacking had consequences in the autism world. Suddenly there was focus on the hijacking itself – and tough questions were asked. The hijacking became the key event, the catalyst, so to speak, of change. There was a volcano spewing anger, and despite their best rumor-mongering campaign, the guilty party was being called to task in the general community. And still is.
Which is, probably, why the autism community, itself, stayed away from the Minneapolis book-signing…
My educated guess us that the general autism community is tired of the “fake” autism campaigns that start out looking impressive but turn out to have gone nowhere and accomplish nothing. Each, one more Ken and Barbie Play Day, so to speak. Just below is an example of an earlier debacle I wrote about:
Let’s list the specific problems.
Last March I wrote the third article in this series “Why Autism is Going to Be Here Much, Much Longer… Unless Major Change Happens… ” Then, I just walked away from the Autism world, not appearing anywhere, not getting involved with issues, just doing other things. Just to let the situation marinade – see what happened.
It seemed for a while that things were changing over there in the Autism world. So I was told. That something might happen, for new ideas were coming forward. People were moving. So I heard.
Then Autism One, which appeared, at first, to have a very good agenda, actually happened and it became clear that there was, in fact, no change at all. Autism One, like the Congressional hearings last November, at virtually the last minute, got co-opted with money.
Money? Yup. $40,000 to be exact.
What actually happened? There had been scheduled an actual panel of Congressman, as of May 11th, 2013, according to this YouTube video:
The AutismOne & Generation Rescue 2013 Conference Congressional Panel featuring Congressman Burton (R-IN), Congressman Weldon, MD (R-FL) and Congressman Bill Posey (R-FL). More information at www.autismone.org.
Some time between that May 11th video and May 24th, the day of the panel itself, things changed. Suddenly, the Canary Party was sponsoring the panel, the panel moderator was changed from attorney Bob Krakow to Mark Blaxill, and the panel was increased by one member Darrel Issa, the Chairman of the US Congressional Oversight and Government Reform Committee.
Sound impressive? Wow, Darrell Issa was coming? Now we’ll get something done? Wrong.
It was all just another “Ken and Barbie” show.
Darrel Issa was there because, my informants tell me, Ken (Mark Blaxill)’s girlfriend, Barbie (Jennifer Larson), donated $40,000, at the last minute, to Issa’s Republican Party PAC to get him there.
Those at the meeting found that Issa committed to nothing. In fact, in his talk, he was singularly uninformed.
Bringing Issa was a waste of time – especially since the only obvious reason was to put Mark Blaxill on the stage once again – just like Ken and Barbie’s money removed Brian Hooker from last November’s actual Congressional Autism hearing, and inserted Mark Blaxill, in front of that same US Congressional Oversight and Government Reform Committee. Isn’t that all so special?
Do you suppose Ken and Barbie both bought new outfits to wear for the event? (sarcasm intended).
Canary Party/Health Choice’s succession of failures…
(1) Probably the key event, the catalyst, so to speak, of change, was the, behind the scenes, big money spent, blatant takeover of that November 29th, 2012 Congressional hearing event, where Brian Hooker, and others, were pushed out of testifying in favor of whatever-the-hell-that-was where Ken (Mark Blaxill) couldn’t get the V word out of his mouth.
In Ken (Mark)’s defense, maybe he wasn’t just the namby-pamby elitist effete weakling he appeared to be in the hearing. He could, as we all know, just been too far hung-over from the vast amounts of alcohol he normally consumes, or he might have been addled from the emotional tongue-lashing he got from his now-former wife the night before, over his relationship with Barbie (Jennifer Larson). Either way, I think, the consensus in the autism community was the commonly used social phrase “what-the-fuck?”… meaning, probably, that perhaps Ken (Mark), and the others picked to testify, were NOT representative of the autism community’s thinking (sarcasm intended). And, that a great opportunity was lost.
(2) Then there was that goofy, and totally pointless, $40,000 photo opportunity with US Congressman Darrell Issa at Autism One 2013.
(3) Then there was the Canary Party’s attempt to claim credit for something the Health Freedom Movement did in Minnesota. I wrote about that here.
(4) The “Age of Autism” sop. Sop (definition) – “A thing given or done as a concession of no great value to appease someone whose main concerns or demands are not being met.”
The “Age of Autism” blog is a place where certain “approved” people can post articles and other “approved” people can comment on them. If the editors don’t like certain comments they can block them, and block the person from ever commenting on any other articles – a good way for Autism Leadership to root out and marginalize any one, or group, that disagrees with their tactics or focus, or lack of tactics and focus.
Their articles just serve as a relief valve giving frustrated Autism parents a way to blow off steam without actually taking any action to solve their problem.
Soporific – Tending to induce drowsiness or sleep.
Age of Autism should be MUCH more than this. It should be the flagship for ACTION – but it is not.
(5) Health Choice went off, with their own campaign, to convince the US Congress to listen to them about Autism and vaccines, and the subject of the CDC Whistleblower. Their efforts fell flat. They got NO response from Congress. Even Darrell Issa’s office (remember they gave him $40,000?) stopped returning their phone calls. I didn’t laugh over that. There’s that old adage “don’t send a boy to do a man’s job…” Another lesson dearly learned. They got NO HELP, it appears, from the general autism community.
(6) So, of course, “the posers, pretenders, and partiers,” pulled out their checkbooks, and held their own Event last October in Dallas, Texas billing themselves as “The Autism Education Summit.” My sources tell me that less than 300 people attended, including the organizers, speakers, exhibitors, hotel employees, and parking lot persons. But there, of course was Ken, center stage, billing himself as an expert on the CDC Whistleblower issue.
(7) The elitist yacht party – “Health Choice on the Hudson” – only $5,000 to attend… Just think, for only five grand you could have come aboard to watch Ken and Barbie cuddle.
(8) Their eviction from Autism One. I don’t know the whole story about this, but from what I am hearing, it may all have started when Ken (Mark Blaxill) showed up at the Karaoke Party at Autism One 2012 wearing a woman’s dress that, apparently fit him very well. It is not known whether Blaxill brought this dress with him in his suitcase, or whether he wore a dress that some woman had worn that day to Autism One. I don’t even care to hear an explanation.
(9) Time for a laugh – The Canary Party/Health Choice team went to the Health Freedom Congress Discussion Group, waving the checkbook, to try to get them to STOP me, Tim Bolen, from writing about the Canary Party/Health Choice activities. You can imagine my response. Think blowtorch, but handled nicely.
(10) Then – the (snort) big book signing…
Something to note…
At first glance a casual observer might make the assumption that the Canary Party/Health Choice leadership (Ken and Barbie) are just plain incompetent, with Ken coming across as one more narcissistic dipshit, and Barbie as a blonde joke come true. But let’s look a little closer…
Ken is actually an Intellectual Property Strategist with, at least in the past, an impressive client list, some of which, he admits, are Big Pharma. Got that? Absorb it.
Barbie runs two companies in Minnesota, she claims, from which she continuously, she also claims, writes checks for Canary Party/Health Choice promotions.
The bottom line – these two people have the skills to run successful campaigns, so how come they never do that?
Or do they?
But the power shift is happening…
The obvious thing is the Canary Party/Health Choice inability to generate interest in their grandstanding. Autism people are, these days, asking the hard questions about why nothing ever gets accomplished.
More importantly is the coming together of the real autism decision makers at the upcoming Autism One 2015, which I will tell you about at another time.
Stay tuned.
Tim Bolen – Consumer Advocate