ADAM KEIPER: Michele Bachmann’s Dangerous Flirtation With the Anti-Vaccine Movement. “With these remarks, Representative Bachmann has gone too far — irresponsibly aligning herself with the paranoid anti-vaccine fringe that has garnered so much attention in recent years for its celebrity-hyped lies about the dangers of vaccines.”

Also, Yuval Levin: “Whatever you think about the mandate debate, though, there is no excuse for Michelle Bachmann’s preposterously ill-informed assertion about the risks of the vaccine. . . . There is no evidence to support any link between this (or any) vaccine and mental retardation. None. Baseless assertions to the contrary about various vaccines have for years been piling needless guilt upon the parents of children with autism and other disorders, and driving other parents away from vaccinating their children against diseases that could do them great harm. A presidential candidate should not be engaging in such harmful nonsense.”