STEM CELLS! STEM CELLS! In the back of the latest issue of Time, Charles Krauthammer has an interesting article on the stem cell issue in which he says:

I would have drawn the line [regarding federal funding of stem cell research] differently. I would have permitted the conduct of all research using cells drawn from the discarded embryos of fertility clinics (unused and ultimately doomed) but not from embryos created purposely and wantonly for nothing but use by science.

Krauthammer then bashes Kerry for "politicizing" the issue. There are real and justified critiques of the bandwagoning that is happening on the left, whicha re cogently laid out here by Will Saletan, but it's just silly to say that the politicization of this particular line of scientific inquiry started with Kerry, rather than Congress' 1996 ban on federal funding of research that involves the destruction of embryos, or indeed Bush's 9/9/01 announcement of his stem cell executive order.

There are at least three problems with Krauthammer's little exercise. Breaking them down:

1. The "line" Krauthammer proposes is the one many people suggested at the time Bush should have drawn. Krauthammer's "politicizing" started when Bush announced his affirmative step of ending federal funding on new stem cell lines. The problem lots of folks have with Bush's position is the one Krauthammer lays out: in the course of every successful fertility treatment, embryos are created which are discarded. Under Bush's line, those embryos, which would otherwise by shitcanned, cannot be used in research. (Bear in mind that according to extreme right-to-lifers, every embryo has a human soul, and discarding an embryo is murder.) But I haven't heard GWB or any other mainstream Republican dare to criticize fertility treatment as tantamount to abortion (Alan Keyes doesn't count).

2. Krauthammer's "line" lacks moral consistency. What is intrinsically wrong with "embryos created purposely and wantonly for nothing but use by science"? How is a scientist working on a cure for cancer morally inferior to a woman who wants to have a baby? As Michael Kinsley says here better than I could anywhere, "How can you restrict embryonic stem-cell research because it encourages the creation and destruction of embryos, and yet praise the fertility industry that creates and destroys embryos by the thousands (and would supply the embryos for stem-cell research, if that were allowed)?"

3. Krauthammer wraps up with this:

There's nothing less compassionate than to construct a political constituency of sufferers (and their loved ones) by falsely and cruelly intimating that their disease is on the very cusp of cure if only the President would stop playing politics with the issue... When I was 22 and a first-year medical student, I suffered a spinal-cord injury. I have not walked in 32 years. I would be delighted to do so again. But not at any price.

Pot, meet kettle. That Krauthammer could conceivably benefit from stem-cell research gives his voice no special weight. Similarly, Ron Reagan, who spoke on the importance of the funding of broad-based stem-cell research at the Democratic National Convention, does not get an extra-large vote on this issue merely because his dad died of Alzheimer's. The difference is that Reagan's activism on the stem-cell issue is motivated by his family's experience with a devastating disease, while Krauthammer's injury does not bear on his stem-cell views, which derive from his more diffuse views on the sanctity of life, etc. So his relating his sad story is a mistaken attempt to run up his credibility.

4. And this isn't about Krauthammer's piece, but a frequent meme of anti-abortion folks is that embryonic stem cell therapies are unproven, and we're doing a lot with adult stem cells. This is pure look-at-my-thumb diversionary dopeyness. AIDS therapy has come a long way, with multidrug "cocktails" letting many HIV-infected people live normal lives. Does that mean we abandon other research efforts? Does that mean we don't look for a vaccine? Of course not.

UPDATE: I am once again late to the party--Kinsley deconstructed this whole issue better a long time ago.</a>
- posted by thegusdad @ 8/18/2004 02:47:00 PM