"Everything and Nothing at All"

In light of an important breakthrough in which scientists successfully manipulated skin cells to take on the qualities of pluripotent stem cells, long-time opponents of federal funding of embryonic stem cell research were quick to claim victory and vindication.

In the words of Michael Kinsley, “The issue has been agony for many Republicans, torn between the majority of voters, eager for the benefits of this scientific advance, and the small but intense minority who believe that a clump of a few dozen cells floating in a petri dish has the same human rights as you or I.”

In a compelling column recently in Time, Kinsley offered a number of reasons for why this issue will not go away - that “even the scientists who achieved the latest success believe strongly that embryonic-stem-cell research should continue”, that we can not make up for the time we have already lost, that the “moral dilemma” posed by politicians is still not real, and that “the position a politician takes on an issue (still) tells you something about his or her character, values and intellect.”

As Alan Leshner and James Thomson, two respected experts on the issue, contend - this breakthrough “changes both everything and nothing at all.”

Perspective

On ABC’s This Week, Michael J. Fox discussed the effects of his Parkinson’s, advocated for embryonic stem cell research, and addressed criticisms from Rush Limbaugh and other partisan hacks. Despite the tremors which dramatically affect his physical behavior and the ability for him to communicate as effectively as he’d like, it’s a powerful interview that puts the entire issue into perspective.

E.J. Dionne, who followed Fox on the show’s next segment, summarized it well: "If you put Michael J. Fox up against Rush Limbaugh in a public debate, which is in effect what you did today, what's happening all over the country, we know that except for Rush Limbaugh's conservative base, the vast majority will shift to the Michael J. Fox side. And I think that what Fox did is made the most compelling case for embryonic stem cell research, which is if you're against it, you also have to be against in vitro fertilization. And no one who is against it really wants to say that, because you're going to create these embryos that will be destroyed."

A few excerpts:

Stephanopoulos: Rush apologized — I guess he apologized for saying you were acting. He didn't call you, did he?

Fox: He would've had more qualifications at an AA meeting. No, you know, that's beside the point. It really isn't germane to the issue. It's funny because, what I'm talking about is about hope. It's about promise. It's about moving forward. It's a forward-looking attitude about what this country is capable of and what we can accomplish for our citizens.

And so if we get sidetracked into a dialogue about whether sick people have a right to display their symptoms in public, you know, that reaction. I think it was more disappointing, from the point of view of— The campaigns, like the [Republican Senate candidate Michael] Steele campaign, their spokesman said, "It was in poor taste," which really— I mean, I'm out here and I expect that. Being in the lead, I'll take some hits. And that's fine. I'm a big boy. Well, not height-wise.

I'm experienced enough and mature enough to take my licks. But I know the community was really hurt by it. And it really brings up the specter of, "Go away. Shut the windows. Shut the doors. Close the curtains, and suffer, and don't let us know," because it's a fearful response.

And what the irony is, is that those people that are being pitied or being asked to suffer in silence don't want to suffer, don't see themselves as pitiable, don't see themselves as victims — see themselves as citizens, participants in the process, and people with aspirations and hopes and dreams for the future. They are way more positive as a whole than what I've seen from the community that opposes them.

[Later]

Stephanopoulos: You mentioned the Steele campaign. Both the Steele campaign and the Talent campaign have said you're not being fair to them, because they want to expand stem cell research, too, they say, but it's adult stem cell research.

Fox: Right, and I agree with them on adult stem cell research. I mean, let's talk about what we agree on. I agree that stem cell research is fantastic; we should pursue it. I agree that we should have no human cloning. We're against that. We're against egg farming, that notion. We agree on all of that.

The only thing is, we would like to include embryonic stem cell research, which our scientists say has the best hope for cures and breakthroughs. See, we're in agreement. I think that when they say talk about not being fair, there has been, again, not as much focus on the content of the ad. It's really the appearance of the ad. But really, because all the statements are verifiable and to direct comparison, it is, in effect, an ad for their position. If you see the ad and you agree with their position, and there are people that do, then it should incentive you to vote for them.

[Later]

Stephanopoulos: Do you think there's any way to finally find common ground with people who do believe in the end that this is tampering with tiny lives?

Fox: Well, again, the point has been made that these lives are going to be thrown away, anyway. They are marked for destruction — thousands of frozen embryos that are a byproduct of in vitro fertilization. We have routinely, before this conversation started on stem-cell research, we have for years thrown them away.
And that's the other thing, you know, this idea of snowflake babies: We're in favor of that. The truth of the matter is that it is only going to account for a tiny fraction—

Stephanopoulos: Those are the embryos that are adopted and then brought—

Fox: Absolutely. Who would have a problem with that? That's fantastic. But it will, in the end, account for only a tiny fraction of those eggs. And so our point is that the pro-life position is to use that — what up to this point is waste, of literal waste that is going to be thrown away — use it to save lives and to ensure lives for the future. I
mean, they talk about unborn. Unborn kids are going to be born with diabetes.

People are going to be dealing with a genetic predisposition to Alzheimer's or to Parkinson's or kids that are going to be injured, have spinal cord injury. That those kids may be born into a world that has the answers for that. That's our position.

[Later]

Stephanopoulos: One of the things he says is that when you're talking about all these cures, you're giving people false hope and that it's cruel.

Fox: It's so funny. What is crueler, to not have hope or to have hope? And it's not false hope. It's a very informed hope. I mean, it's hope that's informed by the opinion of our leading scientists, almost to the point of unanimity that embryonic stem cells, because they're pluripotent, because they have the capacity to be anything, and, are truly— Will [it] be a straight path to victory? Probably not. Probably you'll have stutter steps along the way.

In fact, they just did some work where they found that it actually relieved the symptoms of Parkinson's in one test, but there some residue, some tissue residue that built up, which is not ideal. But two steps forward, one step forward, one step back, you know, it's a process, it's how this country was built. It's what we do, you know. It seems to me that in the last few years, eight, 10 years, we've just stopped, we've become incurious and un-ambitious.

And hope, I mean, hope is— I don't want to get too corny about it, but isn't that what the person in the harbor with the thing—? It's about hope. And so to characterize hope as some sort of malady or some kind of flaw of character or national weakness is, to me, really counter to what this country is about.

Stephanopoulos: You're supporting it through your foundation. A lot of states are supporting it. What do you say to those who say, "You know, we don't need the federal government to get in the middle of this right now, and it's too divisive an issue?"

Fox: Well, the federal government has to be involved, because on one level, you talk about limitations; it's not just a matter of the stem cells being limited, but the restriction on federal funding. If you have an institution, a facility that can do this kind of work and it receives any federal funding at all, you lose that if you do, if you take a cell out of a Petri dish on government property. So you have to have duplication of facilities.

So now our resources are going into scientists having to duplicate federal facilities at enormous expense in order to do the most rudimentary work with stem cells, with embryonic stem cells. You have researchers that can't get funding. And so you have young researchers that are not going into the field. It's the iterations of limitation are endless. So you say: Why can't the private sector get involved? Because they have to duplicate the entire resources of the federal government in order to do it. It's just not practical.

[Later]

Fox: ...You know, that's the other notion that was put out there, was that I somehow was recruited by the Democratic Party.

Stephanopoulos: Democratic shill, I think was the word.

Fox: Democratic shill, yes. I have to look up shill in the dictionary. I think it has something to do with supporting someone whose beliefs you don't believe in for ulterior reason or something.

But, yeah, no, I'm not a shill for the Democratic Party. I approached them. I sat down to find out what candidates are pro-stem cell in races where they're opposed by anti-stem cell candidates. And I had no predisposition toward Democrats or Republicans. It'd be fine with me either way.

In fact, a Republican candidate who's pro-stem cell would be someone I'd really like to talk to. And in fact in the past I've supported, I've done commercials for Arlen Specter, who is a very aggressive pro-stem cell champion. And I know that there are others, you know. There are people like Orrin Hatch and Danforth and others who've thought about it, weighed it really carefully and found that its pro-life possibilities aren't counter to their previous positions. This is a pro-life position, and this is the responsibility of our leadership to take it down this path. It will help Americans.

Politics Over Promise

The issue of embryonic stem cell research has reemerged in the 2006 elections and it’s been interesting to see how both sides have articulated their views. Those who oppose federal funding for embryonic stem cell research have mostly tried to skirt the issue but their statements have generally boiled down to something like this: “I have consistently been a proponent of stem cell research because of the promise it brings to millions of Americans. However, I am against the federal funding of embryonic stem cells because I believe it is immoral to utilize or destroy human embryos in the name of science.”

So, let’s break down that statement into its two suppositions.

#1: “Even though I oppose embryonic stem cell research, I am a proponent of research on alternative stem cell lines that yield just as much promise.”

To claim that you fully support stem cell research because you support research on adult stem cells and cord blood is disingenuous because there is no serious opposition to those efforts. On the contrary, it would be more accurate to label them as impediments to stem cell research because nearly all experts agree that research on embryonic stem cells offers advantages that adult stem cells simply do not. That is despite the fact that adult stem cell research has a 40 year head start on embryonic stem cell research and has enjoyed a sustained funding commitment from the National Institutes of Health.

A group of 80 Nobel laureates addressed this point in a letter to President Bush on February 22, 2001:

“It is premature to conclude that adult stem cells have the same potential as embryonic stem cells -- and that potential will almost certainly vary from disease to disease. Current evidence suggests that adult stem cells have markedly restricted differentiation potential. Therefore, for disorders that prove not to be treatable with adult stem cells, impeding human pluripotent stem cell research risks unnecessary delay for millions of patients who may die or endure needless suffering while the effectiveness of adult stem cells is evaluated.”

A recent study by the National Academy of Sciences substantiates that claim:

“Adult stem cells are rare, difficult to identify and purify, and when grown in culture, are difficult to maintain in the undifferientiated state. It is because of those limitations that even stem cells from bone marrow, the type most studied, are not available in sufficient numbers to support many potential applications of regenerative medicine.”

#2: “Utilizing embryonic stem cells for research is immoral.”

The claim that utilizing embryonic stem cells for research is destroying human life is disingenuous. It’s disingenuous because the legislation that passed Congress would have allowed federal funding for this research only on stem cell lines derived under strict ethical requirements from excess in vitro fertilization embryos. Therefore, it simply would have used those excess embryos formed in fertility clinics that were slated for destruction. If you oppose the destruction of those embryos, that’s one thing. If you condone that practice while opposing embryonic stem cell research, then you’re either deeply confused or you’re shamelessly appealing to your evangelical base.

Senator Orrin Hatch, an ultra conservative and pro-lifer, is a staunch supporter of this legislation because he believes it’s possible to be both anti-abortion and pro-embryonic stem cell research. “A critical part of being pro-life is to support measures that help the living. And this research enhances, not diminishes human life. If encouraged, it can improve the lives of millions of Americans and could lead to new scientific frontiers not now in sight.” He further explains;

“As part of the fertility treatment process, it is inevitable that there will be some test tube embryos that will not be needed and will never be implanted in a mother’s womb. And let me be clear here, I believe that the highest and best use of a human embryo is to be used by loving parents to add to their family. I wholeheartedly support adoption of spare embryos and would give adoption precedence over use for research. I think most would agree with me on this.

But the fact of the matter today is that there may exist at any point in time more than 400,000 such unused embryos in the United States and each year tens of thousands of such spare embryos are routinely and unceremoniously discarded and destroyed. It is from these embryos that scientists have derived stem cell lines.

A stem cell in a petri dish or frozen in a refrigerator will never, even in 100 years, become more than stem cells. They lack the breath of life. I believe that life begins in the mother’s womb, not in a scientist’s laboratory.”

In 2001, President Bush permitted federal funding for embryonic stem cell lines created prior to August 2001. For a President who sees the world in black and white, it was an interesting decision because it placed a totally arbitrary date and time on such a “moral issue.” It was moral to conduct research on stem cells created prior to that date and time, but immoral to do so on those created after that date and time. Further, recent developments have cast doubt on the usefulness of the stem cells authorized for use by the President. It makes utilization of additional lines that much more critical. Senator Tom Harkin, the champion of stem cell research in the Senate, explains:

“The Administration originally said 78 stem cell lines were eligible for federally funded research, meaning they had to be derived before the totally arbitrary date and time of August 9, 2001, at 9 p.m. Today, only 22 of those 78 lines are available for research – not nearly enough to reflect the genetic diversity that scientists need. But more importantly, a recent study showed that all 22 lines are contaminated with mouse cells, making them dangerous to use in humans.”

The legislation that passed Congress overwhelmingly and was ceremoniously vetoed by the President would have lifted the eligibility date of August 9, 2001, as long as strict ethical requirements were met.

In arguing for passage of the bill, Senator Harkin concluded, “We don’t require our astronomers to explore the heavens with 19th century telescopes, and we don’t require our geologists to study the Earth with a tape measure. If we are serious about realizing the promise of stem cell research, our biomedical researchers need access to the best stem cell lines available.”

On the day the legislation passed the Senate, Senator Hatch issued the following statement; “Today, the Senate made a commitment to the millions of patients who are waiting for cures. Together, Republicans and Democrats, we said: We hear you. We won’t stand idly by and allow Federal policy to hamstring one of the most promising fields of research.”

For the millions who are hopeful and awaiting much-needed cures, it’s truly a shame that the President feels differently.

Rush to Judgment

In today's Washington Post, Slate's William Saletan writes an entertaining and sobering indictment of Rush Limbaugh, whose recent accusations of Michael J. Fox served as yet another reminder to us of how deeply disturbed this guy is. Here's an exerpt:

In Limbaugh's world, "there never was a surplus" under President Bill Clinton. AIDS "hasn't made that jump to the heterosexual community," and cutting food stamps is fine because recipients "aren't using them." Two years ago, he said the minimum wage was $6 or $7 an hour. Last year, he said gas was $1.29 a gallon.

Limbaugh has particular trouble distinguishing reality from entertainment. The abuse at Abu Ghraib "looks just like anything you'd see Madonna or Britney Spears do on stage," he told his listeners. Last month, he defended ABC's Sept. 11 movie against the document on which it purportedly relied: "The 9/11 commission report, for example, says, well, some of these things didn't happen the way they were portrayed in the movie. How do they know that?"

Last year, Limbaugh, who used a tailbone defect to get out of the Vietnam War draft, accused a Democratic candidate of having served in Iraq "to pad the resume." He charged veterans -- including former senator Max Cleland (D-Ga.), who lost his legs and an arm in Vietnam -- with trying "to hide their liberalism behind a military uniform . . . pretending to be something that they are not." When war is just a television show, a uniform is just a costume. Liberalism is real; losing your limbs is a pretense.

Which brings us back to stem cells. Limbaugh says Fox's ads dangle a prospect of imminent cures "that is not reality." He's right. But the ads convey another reality: a man dying of a disease that might be cured more quickly if the government dropped its restrictions on research funding. Limbaugh dismisses this as a "script" being followed by Fox's "PR people" and "the entertainment media." Script? Entertainment? This is life and death.

If he didn't average 13.5 million listeners every week, he would be a joke. The fact that he does makes him dangerous in that he'll simply continue his campaign of character assassination and misinformation. By continuing to demonize those he disagrees with, he'll further divide his listeners from people of tolerance, and further drive them from reality. By continuing to spout unsubstantiated and often completely fabricated information as justification for his politics, he'll just add further to the growing number of duped Americans who would rather turn to others for direction rather than conduct their own independent thinking.

A Question of Life

Instead of manipulating people of faith by politicizing questions of when life begins and when it ends, what if we all focused on the quality of the time in between? Wouldn’t it be revolutionary to come together and actually work toward improving the quality of the lives we all lead? What could possibly be more pro-life?

The debate over embryonic stem cell research is a perfect case in point. Scientists, medical professionals, and the American public strongly support federal funding of this research because of the immense hope and promise it brings. Opponents characterize the utilization of these cells for medical advancement as immoral. To appeal to evangelicals, some claim it mirrors abortion or murder despite the fact that the cells in question are set to be discarded regardless. Nevertheless, they claim it’s a slippery slope that will undoubtedly lead to a complete disregard for the dignity of life and an inevitable rush to clone as many human beings as possible.

When confronted by those inflicted with disease and searching for hope, these lawmakers apologize and speak of questions of morality that take precedent over the potential to improve the quality of life for millions of Americans who may someday benefit from this research. No, they claim it’s an issue they’d rather punt to the private sector. After all, to whom else should America turn to pave the way and provide leadership and focus on an issue of this importance?

Congress recently approved the federal funding of embryonic stem cells overwhelmingly, 65-37 in the Senate and 238-194 in the House. Instead of quickly signing the legislation into law, President Bush chose to issue his very first presidential veto. To date, it remains the only veto in his six years in office. Not exactly what I would call presidential leadership.

To those lawmakers who voted to uphold the president's veto, it’s time to pay the piper. And to those who respond to proponents of stem cell research with ignorance and hostility, keep it up. It only provides yet another opportunity for the world to see your true colors.