Since May, several things have changed regarding this project. 

Of course, the most obvious change is that Senator Clinton dropped out of the race.  Instead of sending emails and letters and making phone calls to three campaigns I only have to deal with two. This welcomed reduction in work has been dampened by the fact that the Memorial Day deadline came and went without any candidate responding to my challenge.  While disappointing, it was expected.

Good things have occurred too, while in Washington DC for the “Green Our Vaccines Rally,” I was able to meet with the Disability Advisor for the McCain campaign.  The advisor was gracious and listened to my vaccine safety concerns very seriously.  I appreciated the time I was able to spend at the McCain campaign headquarters but I still came away with no answer to my requests. 

Immediately following the Rally on June 4th, I went to the headquarters for the Democratic National Committee. Again, I met the Disability Advisor for the Democratic Party. And again, I had a very sympathetic ear.  And yet again, I came away from this meeting with no answers.  I was discouraged, especially since I had to walk through a tornado on the way back to my hotel, but that’s another story.

In an effort to get more exposure for my video, Unlocking Autism and The National Vaccine Information Center invited me to be part of their booth at the Netroots Conference in Austin, Texas.  Netroots is a conference of political bloggers. The Conference had an impressive line up of speakers to include: Al Gore, Howard Dean, Nancy Pelosi, and Ariana Huffington.  It took me a split second to decide that I wanted to be part of this booth.

The day before leaving for Netroots, I received this letter from Barack Obama.

Click on the letters to see the full sized version in a pop up window.

 
I knew I would bring this letter with me to Austin to show the bloggers that I had been in dialogue with at least one candidate.  I quickly reached out to my contact at the McCain campaign to give them a chance to respond.  In a matter of hours, she sent me this letter:

This was great.  I now had proof that I had been in contact with both Senators and campaigns before leaving for Austin.   When I got to Austin, I saw that Shelley Hendrix Reynolds and Barbara Loe Fisher put together an amazing booth. The booth focused on the themes of vaccine safety and the notion of vaccination choices. Kevin Barry, Theresa Wrangham, Mark Blaxill, Jim Moody, Chris Fisher (Barbara’s son), Paul Arthur and myself were all assembled to work the conference.

At one point during the weekend, my fellow booth workers and I decided to grade the letters that I had received from the candidates. While I was still happy to have received correspondence from both candidates, neither had answered my requests. We thought grading their letters like a school teacher would be a good way of letting them know of their shortcomings.

Barack Obama received an F+ on his letter.  Harsh, I know, but his letter was boiler plate. He acknowledged that autism is a problem and that he had voted in favor of the Combating Autism Act, but his letter lacked a sense of urgency.  More importantly, his letter had nothing to do with the issues I raised brought up in my video.  I did appreciate that his letter was addressed to me, which is why he earned the + in F+.

John McCain’s letter earned a C, even though his letter was written for the Autism Society of America and was not a response to the video I sent him. The reason for Senator McCain’s better grade was that he recognized autism as a “national crisis” and that “the federal government must respond accordingly.” That one sentence distinguished Senator McCain’s letter from Senator Obama’s.

After assigning grades, we put the letters in frames so conference goers could read them easily.  We had many people stop by the booth and comment on the letters and their grades.  I was even able to show the Obama campaigners Senator Obama’s F+. 

Netroots was an interesting experience.  Overall there was a mixed reaction to our booth.  Many parents and grandparents of children with autism stopped by and said, “Right on. My child/grandchild was just fine until those vaccinations.” There were attendees who really had an open mind and became educated on the vaccine issue.

I also encountered opposition.  I was called a baby killer by a woman who wore a “Science 2008” political button. I found this so ironic. We were discussing the science of vaccine safety when she launched into her Ad Hominen attack against me. Ms. Science 2008 did not like it when I converted 25 mcg of mercury (the amount of mercury found in most flu shots) into 50,000 ppb mercury (hazardous waste is measured in parts per billion.)  She did not want to hear that anything over 250 ppb was considered hazardous waste by the EPA. I told her that when you do the math 50,000 is the product of 250 x 200. So the majority of flu shots are 200 times more toxic than toxic waste. That’s when I became “a baby killer.”   Later during the weekend, Shelley found out that Ms. Science 2008 had tried to shut down our booth and asked that we be removed from the conference because our message was so vile.  Ms. Science 2008 was not alone. It turns out there were about a half dozen requests for our booth to be removed.

While I did not enjoy being called names, it was at that point that it became apparent to me that our community must educate the masses about vaccine safety. At times, it is not going to be fun.  However, it does not do us good to spread our message back and forth at our own conferences and functions, talk about “preaching to the choir.”  We must educate America.  We must encourage discourse.  It’s not going to be easy and I hope the Vaccine Safety Request Video will have a small part in getting our message out.

I have another meeting scheduled with the McCain campaign this week.  Here is to hoping that I will get further with my Vaccine Safety Requests. As we get closer to the election, I am going to need our community’s help to get answers from Senator McCain and Senator Obama.  I hope I can count on you all.

Rebecca Estepp is Parent Support and Media Relations Manager for Talk About Curing Autism.