Lakeland FL, Register:

Published Friday, July 21, 2006

Stem Cells Draw a Veto


President George W. Bush finally used his veto pen Wednesday. He's let bloated budget bills, laden with pork, cross his desk. He has been in office longer without producing a veto than any other president since Thomas Jefferson.

For 51/2 years, it seemed Bush would become the first president in modern history to leave office without throwing a bill back in the face of the Republican-controlled Congress.

Action was swift, coming hours after the bill was passed. Unfortunately, Bush's veto of a bill that would have overturned limitations he imposed over stem cell research five years ago means that finding cures for cancer, Parkinson's and Alzheimer's and other diseases will be severely restricted.

"This bill would support the taking of innocent human life in the hope of finding medical benefits for others," Bush said. "It crosses a moral boundary that our decent society needs to respect."

The stem cells for research would have come from frozen embryos. Those embryos were once candidates for in vitro fertilization and then implantation in the mother's womb. But the embryos used for stem research under the proposed bill would have been those rejected for implantation and would be destroyed eventually.

Yet, at a news conference Wednesday, Bush said he vetoed the legislation because it would encourage the destruction of embryos not used in the fertilization process.

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If the illogical inconsistency of Bush's position is not obviosu from the above, you are probably a neocon, or some other sort of dullness-gifted being...




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