Paralysis

He walks purely from memory, his numb steps fractioned into a series of movements called up by rote. Left foot forward 11 inches and slightly to the side, hike the hip, bend the knee, strike the heel. Now the right. Hours before he was to appear at the podium in the Curtis Center on Saturday night to pick up the highest award given by the Philadelphia chapter of the Fight For Sight, Jerry Segal was scoping out the territory. Two steps, no railing. "I think I can do it," he said.

Unless he can quickly raise $270,000, a Saudi man will soon face court-ordered surgical paralysis from the waist down, Amnesty International reports. Justice in Saudi Arabia in the 21st Century still revolves around the principle of lex talionis , better known to Westerners as "an eye for an eye. " The case stems from 2003, when, Ali al-Khawahir, then 14, stabbed a friend in the back. The crime caused al-Khawahir's friend to be paralyzed from the waist down. Finding him guilty in the assault, the court in the town of Al-Ahsa sentenced al-Khawahir to "qisas" - retribution - or pay the victims's family one million Saudi riyals in "blood money.

Alfred Thompkins was once arrested for beating his girlfriend and throwing his wheelchair at her. On another occasion he was taken to a hospital complaining of chest pains suffered while having sex. What's the significance? Well, at the time, Thompkins, 39, was in the middle of litigation against the city and its Prison Health Services and physicians, claiming they were responsible for his paralysis from a minor prison bus accident in 1995. He sought more than $3 million.

CHRISTOPHER REEVE leaves the world with an enduring example of courage, though not because he starred in "Superman" movies of the 1980s. It is no particular act of bravery, after all, to face bullets when you are bulletproof. It's what Reeve did when he was confronted, cruelly and suddenly, with human vulnerability that gave us all a lesson in heroism. In 1995, on a spring day in Virginia, Reeve was thrown from his mount during a riding competition. He fractured his neck, damaged his spinal cord and was instantly paralyzed from the neck down.

"We're gratified that Boscov's will remain a family business. " - department store chairman Albert Boscov, 81, on the appointment of his nephew Jim Boscov, 61, as vice chairman "I call them the black hole because they suck up everything and nothing comes out. " - Bill Quimby of TollFreeNumbers.com, on Philadelphia-based PrimeTel Communications Inc.'s aggressive acquisition of toll-free numbers for phone-sex services "If this...

Christopher Prendes, 18, was minding his business at a Miami park when some youths demanded his go-cart, and one pulled a gun. "I was getting off of it, and he shot me in the back," Prendes said. "After I heard the bang, that was it. My legs went numb. "A 15-year-old put me in this chair. " On that November day, Prendes, a high school senior, became part of a dismal trend - a growing number of paralysis cases due to gun violence. Drive down almost any urban street, and you will see them: young men in wheelchairs.

The family of Marple Newtown High School wrestler Louis Sciotto, alarmed at rumors about their son's spinal damage in a wrestling accident, issued a statement yesterday setting the record straight on his condition. He "suffered an injury to his spinal cord fairly high up," the statement said. "And he will be left with some paralysis. " Doctors are not sure of the extent of the paralysis, but Sciotto is expected to remain at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital for at least several months, said his uncle, Chuck Freels.

Challenges are nothing new to Edward J. Coyle Jr. He had polio when he was 2 years old. For years he went through the rigors of intensive physical therapy and managed to regain full function of all but his right leg, which suffers from residual paralysis. Coyle, of Wallingford, who has his own sports medicine and physical conditioning business, wears a leg brace to help compensate for the paralysis in his right leg. But the paralysis has never held him back. If anything, it has pushed and motivated him. While a student at Monsignor Bonner High, Coyle rowed on the crew team and played football.

A Philadelphia jury awarded a 60-year-old man from Mays Landing, N.J., on Monday $10 million for a medical misdiagnosis that he said led to permanent leg paralysis. Eric Davenport was diagnosed in 2003 with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrig's disease, by Leo McCluskey, the medical director of the ALS Association Center at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. Davenport was told he had from 18 months to three years to live. Three years later, Davenport sought opinions from other doctors and was diagnosed correctly with spinal-cord compression, which could have been corrected earlier with surgery.

Scholars have proposed a number of explanations for the muscle weakness and other ailments that plagued the Victorian poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning. But none of these after-the-fact diagnoses - from anxiety to tuberculosis - seemed to fit the symptoms perfectly. Now Pennsylvania State University researcher Anne Buchanan thinks she has cracked the case, as the result of an intensely personal connection. Her theory: The poet suffered from a rare condition called hypokalemic periodic paralysis, the same illness that plagues Buchanan's own daughter.

Unless he can quickly raise $270,000, a Saudi man will soon face court-ordered surgical paralysis from the waist down, Amnesty International reports. Justice in Saudi Arabia in the 21st Century still revolves around the principle of lex talionis , better known to Westerners as "an eye for an eye. " The case stems from 2003, when, Ali al-Khawahir, then 14, stabbed a friend in the back. The crime caused al-Khawahir's friend to be paralyzed from the waist down. Finding him guilty in the assault, the court in the town of Al-Ahsa sentenced al-Khawahir to "qisas" - retribution - or pay the victims's family one million Saudi riyals in "blood money.

A Camden man purposely shot his 11-year-old daughter in the face late Thursday, and the child might be paralyzed, authorities said Friday. The shooting occurred about 9:30 in a rowhouse on the 1300 block of Thurman Street in the Whitman Park section. The girl was in critical but stable condition at Cooper University Hospital on Friday. "It was not an accident. He pointed the gun at her face and pulled the trigger," said Jason Laughlin, a spokesman for the Camden County Prosecutor's Office.

There's an old saying that liberals will support intervention in a foreign conflict as long as nothing resembling national interest is at stake. If the cause is purely humanitarian - if the refinement of American morality is the only possible benefit - liberals just might back military force to help a starved, invaded, or otherwise oppressed people. Which brings me to the baffling subject of Syria. Like many observers of the Obama administration, I've been confused by its unwillingness to take even relatively modest steps to bring about a decisive end to the regime of Bashar al-Assad.

Adapted from a recent online discussion. Question: I find that when someone I care about comes to me stressed out or needing support, I am woefully inept. I am adept at helping out financially or planning out something they need to be done, but if they need me to say something supportive or just be there, I feel empty. I feel myself stressing with them and getting panicky - and if it's someone very much involved in my life, like partner or parent, I feel guilty, like I am responsible.

WHEN PRESIDENT Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, many Americans, including some who voted for him, scratched their heads. Only a few years removed from the Illinois state Senate, our newly minted leader had won the Humanitarian Oscar for playing a bit role. He wasn't Bill Clinton, who'd seen the carnage in Bosnia and (finally) used the full force of NATO air strikes to stanch the flow of Muslim blood. He wasn't George W. Bush, who spent millions of dollars to eliminate AIDS in Africa.

I doubt that the average American is pondering the political death of Dick Lugar. Heck, most might think "Dick Lugar" sounds like the name of the hero of a spy novel. But what happened to Lugar last week is a sign of the polarization that cripples Washington and is likely to impede rational governance no matter who wins the White House in November. The six-term Republican senator from Indiana was knocked off in a primary for a number of reasons. But what really fueled his landslide defeat at the hands of a tea-party insurgent was this fundamental fact: He occasionally had the temerity to work with Democrats.

Don't get Dan Webb wrong. After becoming paralyzed from the waist down in a hunting accident, he's grateful to have a high-quality wheelchair. But there is nothing quite like being able to look someone in the eye. So twice a week, with the push of a button and a whir of motors, the 42-year-old Warminster man stands up. And walks. He is using an exoskeleton - a wearable robotic frame that moves Webb's legs for him, though he still does plenty of work with his upper body, using crutches.

One question members of Congress constantly hear is: "Why can't you people get anything done?" The truth is that there are all kinds of reasons: politics, disagreements about substance, and even the physical process of writing bills. For many, it defies common sense that these obstacles can't be overcome, but the Senate is about to demonstrate why not. For the past several weeks, the wheels have been grinding on cybersecurity legislation, which, in an ideal world, would protect the nation from computer hackers.

Scholars have proposed a number of explanations for the muscle weakness and other ailments that plagued the Victorian poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning. But none of these after-the-fact diagnoses - from anxiety to tuberculosis - seemed to fit the symptoms perfectly. Now Pennsylvania State University researcher Anne Buchanan thinks she has cracked the case, as the result of an intensely personal connection. Her theory: The poet suffered from a rare condition called hypokalemic periodic paralysis, the same illness that plagues Buchanan's own daughter.

At its core, the failure of Congress' deficit supercommittee comes down to the rift between Republican and Democratic ways of looking at the economy and the proper role of the government. Democrats argue that the affluent should do more to reduce the deficit by paying higher taxes, to avoid deeper cuts in government programs that might help the poor and middle class. Republicans say that raising taxes on anyone will only prolong the economic slowdown because that would take money away from productive investments.