No, It’s Not! -- Part Two of Two

The Washington Post is second only to the New York Times in influence among policymakers. Partly that is because the content of its editorial and op-ed pages are miles beyond the hysterical pap the Times grinds out, day after day, year after year.

But the Post is no less relentlessly than the Times is in favor of federally funding research that requires the death of human embryos in pursuit of the contemporary fountain of youth: embryonic stem cells. Today’s Post editorial—“ It's time for the president to revise his stem cell policy”--is different only because the head of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) chimed in this week in support of altering the President’s policy which allows federal funding only for research on embryonic stem cells lines created on or before August 9, 2001.

For the record, and to clear up persistent misstatements, it is completely accurate to say that the President has placed strict ethical boundaries about the use of your tax dollars. But it is also totally incorrect to say there is no federal funding of embryonic stem cell research. And, of course, the states and private entrepreneurs are not prohibited from pouring their own resources into the pursuit.

Just three quick points on the substance of the Post editorial.

First, the Post is correct that there are now more votes for underwriting the lethal pursuit of embryonic stem cells. Not exactly a surprise when the entire media establishment stands foursquare behind it.

But, as is so often the case in politics, the wider support reflects not more evidence in favor of the proposal but less! In other words, more elected representatives are advocating for a proposal that, in fact, has less [and less] evidence to back it up.

Second, and related, is the comment of the head of NIH who, according to the Post, “insisted [in testimony this week] that studies showing stem cells taken from adults to be just as promising as embryonic stem cells ‘do not hold scientific water.’" Sir, that is flatly wrong. As we have pointed out countless times, it is the zany, promise-over-proof claims of proponents of embryonic stem cells research that do not hold any kind of water.

Third, the Post writes, “A huge majority of Americans, Congress and even Mr. Bush's NIH director have considered the implications of funding embryonic stem cell research and concluded that extracting the cells from embryos set to be discarded anyway is not objectionable enough to deny funds.”

Again, as we have written multiple times, how people respond is a function of how the question is asked.

The equally important consideration, however, is that advocates have long since moved pass an infatuation with culling stem cells from so-called “left-over” or “spare” embryos at fertility clinics. They want to clone human embryos—create life in order to destroy it—on the theory that such embryos would circumvent various problems, including rejection by a recipient’s body.

Please, Washington Post, tell it like it is, not the way you would like it.

The President should stay firm. And pro-lifers are confident he will.

If you have any comments or questions, please write Dave Andrusko at daveandrusko@hotmail.com.

Part One