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My personal musings about anything that gets on my radar screen--heavily dominated by politics.

2004-07-31

And Another Thing. . .

My opponent asks "wouldn't it be good to have a President who believed in science?" Interesting question. So let me share with you what I believe about science.

I believe the federal government, by and large, is very bad at science. And not for lack of brilliant people--it's just that discovery and imagination are drastically inhibited by bureaucracies.

The federal government spent millions of dollars in the 1960s to develop a ball point pen that would work in zero gravity; know what the Russians did? Sent up a pencil. A former head of the National Institute of Health once remarked "if the government had been in charge of finding a vaccine for polio, we would now have the best iron lung money could buy--but no vaccine."

Of course, we know what the Senator from Massachusetts is talking about: he's talking about embryonic stem cell research. So let's talk about what the science really is on this issue.

For instance, we know that the research has been far more encouraging in the area of adult stem cell research. We know that the progress we've made in this area far outpaces anything we've seen in the area of embryonic stem cells. We know that research in the area of placental stem cells, skin cells and other sources of stem cells are generations ahead of anything that's happening in the area of embryonic stem cells. Research in these areas is vital, it is groundbreaking, and the federal government has a role in seeing this research moved forward.

Likewise, research on embryonic stem cells continues--it just doesn't have the signature of the federal government on the destruction of fetuses. This is right, it is appropriate, and the government that I lead will continue to value both life and science.
Posted by: Michael / 7/31/2004 10:26:00 AM

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