"It needs to be a wake-up call about a broken institution that's letting down the American people." So said John Kerry in a fit of frustration after the Senate voted against ratifying the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
This was the sort of pro-forma vote that would have passed with broad bipartisan support a decade or so ago – a symbolic signing on to a UN treaty that aimed to raise international standards on the treatment of the disabled, not to some dizzying new height but to the level the US achieved more than 20 years ago under President George H W Bush.
America, it was hoped, would add its weight to the push to extend disability rights around the world.
Instead, the vote became a litmus test that pitted Main Street moderate Republicans against right-wing fear-mongers. The fear-mongers won.
In the process, the vote showed just how polarised and dysfunctional the Senate has become.....
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