Bush Will Veto Stem Cells #2

[RedGlitter]

Second stem-cell bill, second veto

by Mark Silva

For the second time, President Bush today vetoed a bill permitting federal funding to support medical research employing embryonic stem cells – with the president calling this a moral line the federal government cannot cross.

This means that two in three of the limited vetoes which the president has issued in nearly seven years – including one for a war spending bill that set timetables for withdrawal from Iraq – involve the controversial question of embryonic stem-cell research.

“I made it clear to Congress and the American people that I will not allow our nation to cross this moral line,’’ Bush said in the East Room of the White House, the same stage he had used to veto the first bill. “Destroying human life in the hopes of saving human life is not ethical, and it is not the only option before us.’’

Bush brought some “brilliant docs’’ from Columbia and Stanford Universities who are conducting research with other stem cells “without violating human life’’ to his veto-address.

The controversy surrounding a field of medical research that could hold promise for the treatment of cure of chronic illinesses – versus the “culture of life’’ issue on which the president has based his opposition -- is an issue ripe for the 2008 presidential campaign.

And Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) was ready with a critique for the president’s second veto of a stem-cell bill.

“This is just one example of how the president puts ideology before science, politics before the needs of our families, just one more example of how out of touch with reality he and his party have become,’’ Clinton said. “And it's just one more example as to why we're going to send them packing in January 2009, and return progressive leadership to the White House.

And Clinton – who has pledged that if Bush does not end the war in Iraq, “I will’’ – issued a similar pledge on stem cells: “This is research that¦holds such promise for devastating diseases. And we know that stem cell research holds the key to our understanding more about what we can do. So let me be very clear: When I am president, I will lift the ban on stem cell research.’’



The White House insists that it is supporting stem-cell research – so long as the material doesn’t come anew from human embryos. It has supported research using existing embryonic stem-cell lines.

“The president hasn’t declared it against the law to conduct embryonic stem cell research,’’ Tony Snow, the White House press secretary replied today – but he has restricted federal funding for research involving new lines of embryonic stem cells.

As the president vetoed the embryonic stem-cell research bill today, he also signed an executive order committing the government to research using “pluripotent stem cells’’ – similar to embryonic cells in their ability to replicate other cells in the body, but taken from adults or from umbillical cords.

The president directed the Department of Health and Human Services and the National Institutes of Health to “ensure that any human pluripotent stem cell lines produced in ways that do not create, destroy, or harm human embryos will be eligible for federal funding.’’ The White House says this will expand the NIH’s stem cell registry – “so we can add new ethically derived stem cell lines to the list of those eligible for Federal funding.’’

“There’s a lot of interesting work going on that’s ethical, and moral,’’ Bush said in the East Room.

“This actually is the president putting science before ideology,’’ Snow said, insisting it is not necessary to destroy embryonic stem cells for research, but that other stem cells can serve as well. “There appear to be a couple of recent papers that indicate you don’t have to make that moral choice¦

“Politics before the needs of our families?’’ Snow said in response to criticism. “Hard to argue¦ when you are looking at ways of expanding the universe’’ (of stem cells that can be used.)

Nevertheless, the Coalition for the Advancement of Medical Research also protested the veto: “In the face of spiraling health care costs, President Bush once again used the stroke of his veto pen deliberately to hamper the progress of scientific and medical research, as well as endanger the future health and well being of the American people¦. With this veto, President Bush has sent the message that it is more important to throw an embryo into a IVF clinic’s garbage can, than it is to find cures and treatments for diseases and disorders like cancer, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, diabetes, and spinal cord injuries.

“With this veto, President Bush ignored the overwhelming majority in the medical, scientific, and spiritual communities who believe stem cell research holds the key to unlocking the future of better treatments and cures,’’ the group said in a statement issued today. “With this veto, President Bush turned the page to start yet another chapter in a Presidential legacy of errors in judgment and bad decisions that needlessly cost American lives in the process.’’

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said:

“President Bush won’t listen to the more than 500 leading organizations who support the bill – including AARP, the American Medical Association and the American Diabetes Association, just to name a few. President Bush won’t listen to the 80 Nobel Laureates or his own Director of the National Institutes of Health, who all support embryonic stem cell research. Most importantly, President Bush won’t listen to the overwhelming majority of Americans who call out for stem cell research.’’



House Republican Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) backed Bush’s veto with this statement:

“The president’s veto today is justified for both moral and scientific reasons and it will be sustained by House Republicans. It is wrong to force taxpayers to foot the bill for research that destroys human embryos and has consistently failed to produce results, particularly at a time when we’re seeing incredible advances on adult stem cell research that does not require living human embryos to be destroyed or damaged.’’

“It is a sad commentary on the 110th Congress that this is one of the few bills to have made it to the President’s desk,’’ Boehner said today, “and I’m pleased the president vetoed the measure.’’