In Russia's Ulanovsk region, Sept. 12 is Conception Day.

Workers are given the day off, and encouraged to go home and do their best to conceive a new Russian. The hope is to have a bumper crop of babies on Russia's national holiday, nine months off.

Conception Day has occasioned much mirth and ribald humor. But for Mother Russia, the issue of her children is no laughing matter.

Two decades ago, the Soviet Union was three times the size of any of the other giant nation &md ...

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