Apart from wishing that he would just fuck off and stop trying to slow down research that will save lives, I wonder why he isn’t condemning in vitro fertilization?
George W. Bush is simply the worst thing that has happened to the United States in my lifetime.
But if George didn’t stand firm against stem cells he’d show the Religious Right that he was just bullshitting them and then they might become disenfranchised, stop working to subvert the democratic process through controlling the White House, and go back to bombing abortion clinics.
I suspect it’s because many of his well-to-do, demographically significant constituents are already exploiting that technology. Too late to nip it in the bud.
I’m glad that many states are taking the initiative to fun stem-cell reserach despite the Administration’s short-sighted fumbling of this historic scientific opportunity.
Two of my sisters had juvenile onset diabetes (type 1).
My great aunts suffered from Alzeheimer’s.
Breast and colon CA run in my family.
I cannot tell you how much I dislike Bush et al. It is no longer possible for me to shrug it off as political differences/seeing a different world view.
We are so screwed as a nation.
Not meaning to beat my chest and rend my garments here, but this news is just so depressing for us and future generations. Or does Bush truly want America to look overseas for scientific progress?
You know, creating legislation that lets Korea gain a research advantage of the United States is something that really ought to be thrown in Bush’s face at every opportunity.
His photo ops should be interrupted by people doing just that.
I feel compelled to interrupt this latest Bush bashing to interject a few facts into this discussion.
First of all, it is a fiction that the Bush administration has banned stem cell research. What it has done is limit federal funding to certain cell lines. Also, adult stem cell research and therapies are wide open, since they raise no moral objections.
I say adult stem cell therapies, because they actually exist. Over 80 of them are currently being used clinically, with many more in various stages of research. Adult stem cells save lives every single day.
Embryonic stem cells have yet to be used clinically, and some human tests have produced tumors.
The moral objections to embryonic stem sells revolves around the destruction of a human embryo to obtain the cells. This is a serious consideration, touching on major questions of medical ethics and public morality, and scientific considerations cannot be held above the law, whatever that law is.
In any case, I don’t think this qualifies as a stem cell derived from a human embryo, since it was derived only from donated eggs. I would have few moral issues with using them, and I oppose the use of stem cells from actual embryos. It is possible that their use will be permitted after some consideration for this reason.
Yeah. Because goodness knows that having moral reservations about cloning human embryos to kill them for their cells is, you know, crazy.
Why is there no similar outcry over the downplaying of adult stem-cell advances? And why is work on a morally uncertain science automatically hailed as progress? (The eugenics project is working wonderfully. If only those damned forces of reaction would stop obstructing…) And why are people holding stem-cell research out as a hope for those with Parkinson’s disease and the like, when cures, if any are found, would be developed far too late for those people? Odd, on a board that prides itself on its rationality and non-emotionalism.
Figured you would, and happy to hear from you, despite your attempt to dismiss the issue as Bush bashing. Your “facts” are somewhat slanted.
Who said he did? Why introject a fiction in order to dispell it?
It is not a fiction. What has been the effect of Bush’s executive order.
Yes, and many deadly diseases persist everyday for which adult stem cell therapies have shown no promise.
As you well know, this research has been around for less than a decade, and have been under assault by Bush for about half that time, so your argument here is at best weak, and at worst, intentionally deceptive.
Are IVF programs against the law? Have they been explicitly opposed by Bush?
I wonder why Bush made a point of condemning it then? Any idea? Perhaps because it involves growing a fertilized egg to the blastocyst stage (which is exactly the process involved in most all stem cell research). Still okay with it? If so, perhaps there is hope for you.
This is an oddly convoluted turn of phrase. A blastocyst is nothing but a few cells, so “killing it for its cells” is kind of strange.
Outcry over the downplaying? What does that even mean? Besides that, I love the second line of your link “Unfortunately, with the notable exception of a front-page story in the Boston Globe…” They are being downplayed, except when they get front page coverage!
Why is this science automatically condemned as “morally uncertain.” I have no moral uncertainty about it. I should suffer because of your religion? Why is the similarly “morally uncertain” practice of IVF allowed to persist under GW Bush?
How fucking stupid is this statement. 24 years ago, my father died from cancer, so I should no longer care if cancer is cured? Do you think that way? Wow, how self-centered could one be?
Haven’t mmost or all of the Stem Cell lines Bush okayed for reasearch been been contaminated, and are therefore unable to be used in reasearch?
I’m sure I heard it, now I’m off to find a cite.
Critics of Bush’s policy have said that the embryonic stem cell lines available for federal funding are not biologically diverse, are contaminated with nonhuman material and are useless for research into possible cures for degenerative diseases (Kaiser Daily Reproductive Health Report, 5/12).
If I’m reading that article correctly, it’s talking about a finding that adult stem cells can be made into many tissue types, and hence are “multipotent”.
Is this news? I haven’t followed stem cell news all that closely, and I thought it had been known for a long time that adult stem cells are multipotent.
The reason they are not as useful as embryonic stem cells is because they are not omnipotent. In other words, they cannot be made into every type of tissue type. “Many” does not equal “every”.
The fact that adult stem cells have use is not a huge story, because it’s already known. And it also does NOT mean that adult stem cells can completely take the place of embryonic, which I think the author does not understand (or is purposely obfuscating). That’s why it didn’t get the attention the author of that article thinks it deserved.
Where is the idignation of those fertilized eggs that are sacrificied in utero–I know several women who have had to have 4 eggs implanted IVF and then “culled” to 2. These are disposed of (I believe they are incinerated). Where is the outrage? Where is the fire bombing of the fertility clinics that perpetuate such evil?
This has to be one of the most selfish stances I’ve ever come across. Unfortunately, I believe it is how the GOP thinks nowadays. It really IS all about them. Or as a dear friend has characterized the Reps: “the I-got-mine” party. I don’t know if you are a Republican or not. But you sure don’t see much beyond your own nose.
Psst: It is quite rational to desire the end of type 1 diabetes–chronic diseases cost alot of money in terms of care and lost wages.
Good point. There are serious ethical and moral problems with embryonic stem cell research, and they may be avoided by simply allowing human embryos to sit on ice until they lose viability.
Because it’s certainly not the case that human embryos, being living human beings, shouldn’t be created in such massive numbers for fertility treatments and then allowed to slowly die. No moral trouble there. The moral trouble only starts when you decide to try doing something good with them.
Anyway, if we manage to halt the science completely, we’ll never know what possible good they could do. And thus we won’t have to think about it! Problem solved!
