I'd love to hold society to the standard that no child should have to risk death due to parental stupidity. That's just not California. If you really want to uphold this ideal, you'll have to crusade for myriad causes, including gun control, obesity-fighting measures, tighter distribution of driver's licenses, promotion of breastfeeding, etc, etc. On the list of annual deaths in California caused by parental stupidity, lack of vaccination is near the bottom of the list.

All of this is true. However, lack of vaccination will rapidly climb the lists if America's current anti-science, anti-education and anti-logic trends are allowed to continue.

Son, it sounds to me like you're ready to play Saint's Row.

I don't think there's a downside to a minimum wage, or at least, not a compelling one.

As to specific implementation details. I really don't know. Not my field. My lay opinion would be that, well, it needs to be tied to the local cost of living and what not, but it would be a bitch to administrate. But no, having the minimum wage in Buttfuck Arkansas and Los Angeles be the same is probably sub-optimal.

I intended more to point out that while a small increase is basically a cost-of-living raise, a large increase will, indeed, likely do more harm than good.

I don't think there's any downside. But there are all sorts of upsides to working towards eliminating preventable, fatal diseases.

No child should have to risk death because their parents are stupid.

Since apparently there is no downside to drinking water, some, why not drink a bunch?

If some is good, more is better, and much more is much more better, right?

Why not a minimum water intake of 5 gallons/hour?

I'd support a bill like this if it also included provisions for criminal charges against parents who 'opt out' and their child winds up having long-term effects, or dying, of preventable diseases.

Say, do you also believe that, say, seatbelts are a matter of personal choice?

I think the idea is that it would eventually render bad cops uninsurable, and thus, unemployable.

Really, though, these are all suggestions to get around the central issue; cops look out for their own, even in the face of blatantly criminal behavior. It's a cultural issue, more than anything.

Not being a Christian isn't a provable health hazard. Not being vaccinated is.

Put this another way:
If measles goes through a small town public school with a thousand kids, three of those kids will die. Several will have life-long aftereffects.

If you vaccinate every human being in a large city, *1* will have *some sort* of adverse effect.

If 'reducing possible harm to children' is actually your end goal, there's no way in hell you'd argue against vaccines.

The problem, really, is that there are entire generations who've never seen a playmate die of measles, or have the polio leg braces, or the like.

Sorry, but that's all on the level of pointing out that dihydrogen monoxide is a universal solvent, causes horrible burns in it's gaseous state, induces tissue necrosis in it's solid state, will suffocate you in it's liquid state, and that excessive doses will cause seizures, among other problems.

Yes, this. It seems like the logic here is 'to get a gov't job, you must pass a polygraph test. This man taught people how to skew the results of that test.'

Note that the requirement to get the gov't job isn't 'be truthful and accurate when answering questions about things like criminal history,' but 'pass the polygraph.' Validity of the polygraph doesn't enter into it.

Hey, there's a lot of science and engineering that goes into making a good combat-capable sword.

Well, that's the other issue; historical and cultural context.

"We shall spread the word of our God by the Sword!" -- heard many times in history.

"We shall spread rational inquiry and the scientific method by the Sword!" -- never heard in history, to my knowledge.

The bible is written that way because it is trying to translate Ancient Hebrew and Ancient Greek. You can make a readable translation or an accurate translation to English, but not both.

Correct. Personally, I would hope that, when translating what is purported to be 'instruction manual for avoiding eternal damnation, and methods for right thought and living,' they'd go with 'accurate.' This has, however, been objectively proven not to be the case.