Cheering Experimentation On Embryos

As expected, President Obama has reversed the Bush administration policy limiting federal funding for embryonic stem cell research.  No surprise, as the issue was cast as a right vs. left fight, with the supposedly “anti-science” right standing against “progress” and the “rational” left standing for those who might one day be helped by the results of such research.

Personally, I had a difficult time figuring out what I thought was the right answer.  But when I pose the question to myself in the simplest terms — Am I comfortable with experimentation on human embryos? — the answer I get is “no.”  Sure, I understand the arguments around whether or not an embryo is a “life”  — and I know that reasonable people can disagree about that.  But, after watching the development of my son, from a tiny, pulsating blob on an ultrasound screen, and feeling a connection to him from even that early stage, I cannot see human embryos as anything other than human.  Because that’s the way I see it, I’ve found that it now sickens me to think about embryos being torn apart in order to harvest the stem cells to be used in research.

Again, I understand that others do not see it as I do.  So, that brings us back to the question of what to do about it.  When he announced it, I was not particularly impressed with President Bush’s answer: limit funding to research conducted on existing stem cell lines (already taken from embryos), and otherwise do not allow federal money to be spent on the research.  This seemed like a very uncourageous approach.  It would not stop the research from happening (no outright ban), and, at the same time, would not promote much progress in the field.

But now I understand and appreciate it much more.  Such a policy does not attempt to make a determination as to the humanity of an embryo, thus avoiding the main issue at the core of the abortion debate.  It does not make the research illegal, but, it also doesn’t force someone like me to contribute financial support to something that I have come to find disturbing.  It puts the federal government exactly where it’s supposed to be — out of the picture.

What I don’t understand is, now that President Obama has reversed this policy, why people are cheering.  I mean, yeah, I get it, you didn’t think the government should be trying to stand in the way of science.  But the science was happening anyway.  So, in effect, you are cheering the fact that, now, people who find the idea of destroying embryos for research repugnant are being forced to financially support the practice.  That’s how it comes across.

And another thing, now President Obama is being portrayed as pro-science, as compared to the anti-science Bush.  But, apparently, there are some limits to Obama’s pro-science beliefs:

Obama also said the stem cell policy is designed so that it “never opens the door to the use of cloning for human reproduction.” Such cloning, he said, “is dangerous, profoundly wrong, and has no place in our society or any society.”

So, doesn’t this make Obama “anti-science?”  He set a limit to the type of research that is permitted — because he knows most people wouldn’t want their money spent on something they find morally repugnant.  Is that not pretty much the same thing that Bush did?  Also, “Mr. Obama revoked… the 2007 executive order that encourages the National Institutes of Health to explore non-embryo-destructive sources of stem cells,” (via WSJ).  That’s not anti-science?  Or does the science have to be morally debatable  to be worthy of government support?