Jul 172006
This president hasn’t had a bill come across his desk that he didn’t like–until now. The Senate is expected this week to pass HR 810, which clears the way for expanded federally-funded research on embryonic stem cells absent the restrictions on available stem cell lines that the president imposed in 2001. The president has made it clear that he will veto the bill, most likely to ensure that religious conservatives will keep his approval ratings from plummeting into Herbert Hoover territory. Over at Slate, Michael Kinsley made it clear that he has no patience for the hypocrisy of religious conservatives who oppose stem-cell research on the grounds that it sacrifices human life in the process. If these ideologues are sincere in their desire to protect these blastocysts from meeting an untimely end, he asks, then why aren’t they equally opposed to the fertility clinic industry, which disposes of thousands of human embryos every year? Yet nobody on the right has ever said boo about this practice.
If this bill is vetoed, you can be certain the Dems will make an issue of it in the fall elections. If I was a Democratic media consultant, I would already be storyboarding 30-second spots featuring someone with advanced Parkinson’s staring directly into the camera and saying, “Everyone keeps telling me that a cure is on the way. But the Republicans are working hard to make sure that never happens.” It’s absolutely manipulative, but it’s also the truth. Republicans can bloviate until they’re blue about how they are protecting the sanctity of human life, but most voters will instinctively sympathize with the paraplegic in the wheelchair instead of the clump of cells in a test tube.
As a favor to a friend, I’m linking to Getella, his art auction website. I’m going to suggest that he reconsider the embedded .wav file, but otherwise it’s a good effort.
