That didn't really work all that well in WW2, did it? :)

Guess what? Not all wars are created equal. Some wars are good to get involved in, and others are bad.

The only thing that gets through to people who run their lives based entirely on emotions is ....wait for it.... emotions.

For some reason, this made me think of Yoda and then it hit me: "Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hatred leads to suffering!"

People feared autism/toxins/etc in vaccines. They listened to McCarthy and company and got angry with "Big Pharma." Their hatred of "Big Pharma" has led to suffering! Anti-vaxxers have fallen to the Dark Side!!!

If not vaccinating only harmed the children of the anti-vaxxers, I'd be right alongside you. I'd still encourage everyone to vaccinate, but I'd be against making it mandatory.

It doesn't work that way, though. If your child isn't vaccinated, they can infect someone who is too young to be vaccinated or someone who is immuno-compromised and so couldn't be vaccinated. Not vaccinating your child is putting others at risk of illness, injury, and death. At that point, it stops becoming a "personal choice" issue and becomes a public health one. You don't have the right to swing your fist if my face (or my child's face) is along that path.

Do you even know how vaccines work? They present the body with a "pseudo-virus" (either a dead one or proteins that the real virus would have). The body sees the invading "virus" and figures out how to kill it. Then, when confronted with the real thing, the body will know how to respond. Dealing with a real virus is the same thing except that the body actually has to fight off the infection while dealing with the virus AND there's a much greater risk of injury or death. Plus, your children can spread their diseases to other people (especially those too young to be vaccinated or those with medical reasons not to vaccinate like compromised immune systems). In your quest for some mythical "real immunity", you are putting other people's lives at risk.

And it wouldn't surprise me that much if those people, in their grief, actually blame everyone else for their bad decision.

They already do this. Anti-vaxxers often claim that they are more than willing to vaccinate when vaccines are 100% safe. "Your new vaccine is 99.9999999999% safe? Sorry, but that's not 100% and it's your fault if my child dies from a disease the vaccine would have prevented." (Obviously speaking as a hypothetical anti-vaxxer and NOT as myself there!) This way they attempt to deflect any responsibility for outbreaks from themselves (for breaking herd immunity by refusing to vaccinate over imagined or minimal risks) to the doctors/"Big Pharma" (who they like blaming anyway for various imagined slights/conspiracies/crimes).

Remember, everyone. Mama McCarthy says that the toxins in vaccines are bad, but injecting yourself with botulinum toxin is just fine!

As a parent of a child with autism (as well as someone who is likely on the spectrum as well, albeit not diagnosed), I feel qualified to clarify some of this:

Now a spectrum, not a syndrome or disease. This has enlarged the affected population, enhancing the power of their advocates and increasing the urgency of finding a solution;

Autism is a developmental disorder. (It was never a "disease" as that implies being contagious. You'll never "catch" autism from me or my son.) The term "spectrum" is used because autism can describe individuals with vastly different levels of developmental delays. My son is very high functioning, you might not know from a casual observance that he even has autism, until he can't cope any more and melts down because his schedule changed slightly. Other kids with autism around my son's age might be non-verbal or have other, more severe, issues that their parents deal with.

Being blamed (root cause) on vaccines, diet, environmental effects, technology, with a de-emphasis on genetics and prenatal care.

This is only true for the anti-vaxxers and other such groups. Scientists actually investigating the cause of autism are focused on genetics as the primary cause. There might be environmental factors as well, but it looks like those only trigger existing genetic markers. I often liken it to diabetes. You can get diabetes from environmental factors (eating too much high sugar food), but your risk for it is determined by your genes.

Used to describe many more behaviors, hence becoming a 'spectrum', not a syndrome or disease or even a process.

See my first answer as to why it is a spectrum.

Described as a growing treat, capable of potentially impacting a majority of the population, being caused by a multitude of toxins, exposures, and behaviors, hence the urgency to find 'a cure'.

Again, this is just those anti-vaxxer/etc groups. Personally, I don't want to be cured. My brain is just fine as it is. In fact, I credit my autism with helping me program computers. (One of the traits of people with Asperger's Syndrome/High Functioning Autism is thinking in If-Then terms. Horrible for social situations, but fantastic for working with computers which operate - at a basic level - on an if-then system.)

The "growing threat" is just due to better detection. Were I my son's age now, I'd likely get diagnosed, but back when I was a kid that didn't happen. I was just termed as "shy" and perhaps "weird." I took things too literally ("take off your coat" => I take it off and put it on the floor) and didn't understand why people seemed to "get" this socialization thing where I didn't. It was almost like everyone got some How To Socialize instruction book and they forgot to give one to me. (I could get a diagnosis now, but that would spend money we don't have and wouldn't really help me or my son.)

The best thing for kids with autism is early intervention. Detect it early and give them therapy and other resources to help them deal with the neurotypical world. (That'd be the rest of you who aren't autistic. Never use the term "normal" to someone dealing with autism unless you want an angry diatribe directed at you.)

What about unvaccinated kids with a legitimate medical excuse? Where do you put them?

Also, what happens when Unvaccinated child coughs during lunch, touches the table, and then vaccinated-but-it-didn't-take or unvaccinated-for-valid-medical-reasons child touches the table next period? Unless you resort to full-on quarantine, you'll never separate them enough to prevent the anti-vax kids from infecting the non-anti-vax group.

Except that anti-vaxxers can (and are) causing people to get sick who can't vaccinate due to valid reasons such as illness/allergies or age (i.e. babies too young for the vaccine). Some of these cases result in death. If person A doesn't vaccinate and that kills person B's 6 month old baby, how is that evolution in action?

Herd immunity isn't rubbish. The reason we're worried is because of three things:

1) People who can't be vaccinated due to medical conditions. If you have an immune system disorder or are allergic to the vaccine, you won't be able to be vaccinated. In this case, you need to rely on herd immunity.

2) People who are too young to be vaccinated. Suppose you have an 8 month old baby and plan on vaccinating her. However, the MMR is given at 12 months. So your baby is still susceptible until then.

3) Vaccines aren't 100% effective. Nothing is. However, they are around 99.9% effective. Of course, with millions being vaccinated, this still means that thousands will still be susceptible.

If everyone was vaccinated who could be, herd immunity would protect these other people. When anti-vaxxers first started out, they relied on herd immunity also. Skip the measles vaccine and nothing happens! Because of herd immunity. As the numbers of anti-vaxxers grow, though, herd immunity breaks down and the diseases spread.

If anti-vaxxers were only affecting themselves/their children, I'd take a "it's a personal choice, albeit one I disagree with" stance. Since their choice affects (and kills) other people, though, I don't see this as a right of theirs. You don't have the right to kill someone else's baby because you want to listen to Andrew Wakefield and Jenny McCarthy.

Congress can't declare war because the American people have been brainwashed to believe that all wars are wrong. If WW2 were to happen tomorrow, we'd still sit on the sidelines as long as possible and you can be sure that the second we declare war there will be protests in the street.

The country is polarized in every which direction. How can you expect the government to do anything when the people can't figure out what they want to do themselves?

Not only is today Pi day, but it is Albert Einstein's birthday also (he would've been 135 today). Also, 3 * 14 = 42 so today is also the answer to Life, The Universe, and Everything!

Russia has always had the option of joining the EU, in fact, after the fall of the USSR there was even a lot of talk about allowing it entry into NATO.

But that aint going to work for Putin because the EU is a largely democratic organisation, and Putin wants to run a dictatorship all by himself, so he's always chosen to pursue conflict with them rather than cooperation, unlike his predecessors post-USSR who were more progressive and more willing to look to eventually becoming a more integral part of Europe and NATO.

Erm, because you want the Ukraine to become part of Russia and Putin is in charge of Russia, which would mean Putin would become in charge of the Ukraine?

The real question is why are you trying to pretend Putin ISN'T part of this equation?

The Berkut (acting as Yanukovych/Russian enforcers) were shooting at riot police AND protesters to try and provoke a bigger confrontation between the two - this is something eyewitnesses in both the police and protesters have both attested to witnessing. This did result in some police/protesters firing at each other in the confusion it caused.

"If it was in any way lawful Yanukovych wouldn't have to flee the country."

He didn't have to flee the country, no one made him flee the country. What he didn't want was to face justice though because the only thing that was unlawful was his used of the Berkut to kill civilians and police alike.

"Why do you think that polls manipulated by Ukrainian regime are any better than polls manipulated by Russian regime?"

Because when that poll was done there was no Ukrainian regime other than Yanukovych's.

"And even 33% wanting to secede is more than enough to demonstrate tension."

That's roughly the same amount of Scottish people that want independence from the rest of the UK, yet there is literally no tension between the English and Scots. Wanting something as a minority doesn't mean you're willing to kill, rape and riot for it - some people are mature enough to accept the democratic decision of the majority, and that if they don't, they always have the option to move to Russia if being in Russia is the most important thing to them (Hint: Ukrainians can't move to the Ukraine if they don't want to be part of Russia and the Ukraine no longer exists). What would create tension though is a minority forcing something down the throats of a majority, which is exactly what's happening with Putin's annexation of Crimea.

"It's really huge value that means that radical national stance is untenable for Ukraine."

Stop using "national", and "nationalism" like you know what it means. The only nationalist here is you, you're a Russian nationalist because you support annexation of Ukraine into Russia, you believe Russia is the mother state into which all states have been enveloped. No one here is as stupid as you though and hence no one is buying it. Go worship Putin in Moscow or something if you desperately want people who are stupid enough to follow your line of nationalist and fascist thinking.