Contributors

Monday, July 24, 2006

With God On Our Side

Last week, President George W. Bush finally exercised one of his most potent weapons. No, I am not talking about his keen intellect. Nor I am talking about his nose for "evil doers." I am talking about his presidential power to veto. For the first time in his presidency (many were quietly wondering if he would ever have the nuts to do it), he vetoed legislation, sent to him by the Republican controlled Congress, that would have continue to allow federally funded stem cell research.

Now, what this means is that private research will still continue. So, if you have loads of extra money laying around (i.e. Bush Co. gulf buddies), then you will get the benefit from the research. If, however, you are an average citizen like myself or a Federal employee, like a member of the Armed Forces for example, chances are you will not see any potential benefits from this research.

I didn't think it was possible for our President to cup the collective balls of the religious right MORE than he already has done in the past but I guess he has proved me wrong again. The fact that he is pandering to these Cro-Magnon simplistics makes me want to horke up my intestinal fluid. I mean, do we really want this country to return to those glorious times of leech bleeding and witch burning? Oh, wait. We are already there, thanks to fuckstick!


To our left we see our President announcing his veto in front of the world with all of those babies that were "saved" because stem cell research was not allowed.

"These boys and girls are not spare parts," the president said in a speech that was interrupted repeatedly by hoots of applause, and twice by standing ovations. "They remind us of what is lost when embryos are destroyed in the name of research."

Huh. That's interesting that he cares so much for the sanctity of a cell that is no larger than a grammatical period but yet.......not really all that concerned about the boys and girls who have lost their lives in Iraq. Or how about the ones that are alive and lost the "parts" they already had? What a dick....

First of all, a cell is not a "boy" or "girl." A cell is an organism that eventually grows into life. We have cells that fall off our body everyday when we shed skin. These stem cells in question are thrown away anyway so what difference does it make?

Two thirds of this country supports the federal funding of stem cell research. There are millions of people who could benefit medically from this research and yet we are allowing a minority of narrow minded people decide whether or not we can cure Alzeimers? Or cancer?

People always talk about democracy working but it has really failed us here thanks to these assholes who have once again moved us back on the evolutionary scale. And they got a double victory this week. Thank the Lord that the House managed to block federal courts from ruling on the Pledge of Allegiance so the "Under God" portion of the pledge will remain in place.

I, for one, will sleep better knowing that my children will have religion forced on them in a public school. It's a good thing because we all know that God is all about forcing people to do things. It's important to note that God is not about all that pussy shit like love, kindness and doing unto others....he is about punishment and smiting all those who are against him.

Alright, well that's enough of the digressive sarcasm. I am sure you are all sick of it by now. But while we are on the subject of God, this whole stem cell thing made me think. The main reason why the religious right is against this is because they feel we are tampering with God's work. I don't get it. If God created us in his image and we are all his children, doesn't God, as the almighty Father, want his kids to grow into something that is greater than He?

I am a parent and would love it if both of my kids became geneticists, doctors, or biologists. It would certainly beat out, by leaps and bounds, what I have done with my pathetic excuse of a career. Wouldn't God be overwhelmed with pride now, as he sees us progressing to the point of being able to manipulate life?

I think SHE would!!

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

Your second paragraph is a little confusing. So any benefits to mankind that are discovered via stem cell research will have to be "purchased" by people?

You say "Two thirds of this country support the federal funding of stem cell research" and in the comments section of your last column you say "support for gay marriage nationally has gone up from 29 percent to 39 percent in the last 15 months". By your own admission, two thirds of the people are against gay marriage. Just looking for some consistency.

It's funny how a loss for the left is always described as a "failing of democracy" or some other grandiose statement. Our constitutional republic is doing just fine.

So "Under God" being in the pledge can be described as "forcing religion on children"???

Looney. Very Looney.

Mark Ward said...

No, our republic is not doing fine. If you took the time to read the "other side," as you put it, then you might learn something.

What if someone doesn't believe in God? Then saying the pledge of Allegiance with Under God in it is against what they believe...

Anonymous said...

Hi Mark-
Thanks for the post. In case you didn't see it, there was this quite splendid clip on The Daily Show related to the veto.

Let's play tennis soon!
bailey

Anonymous said...

On the one hand, I have to give credit to GWB for staying true to his beliefs. Like his stance or not, you know what position he is going to take. He took a stand 5 years ago with the initial legislation and he stayed true to that message with his veto. This is particularly noteworthy when considering most political observers feel continuing that stand may be detrimental to the political health of his party this year and in '08.

On the other hand, like you, I disagree with his position. I find several of your arguments to be wrong, insensitive, and insulting, but I do agree with your ultimate point. Harkening back to the days of Hurrican Katrina you called for this country to set a higher moral standard even in the face of impracticality, so I think there's some wiggle room there to allow for the President's argument. (I won't run with the notion of another apparent argument of convenience on your part.) But in the end science is quite obviously leading us down the path of utilizing embryonic stem cells, so there's not much point in fighting it. And I would prefer that our country be a leader in arenas such as this. There are undoubtedly moral nightmares that need to be addressed (e.g. the practice of growing embryos just for the purpose of harvesting the cells is something that must be avoided), but I don't think we can let that stand in the way of progress.

Anonymous said...

Early on you said "private research will still continue" but then you say "because stem cell research was not allowed" and "we are allowing a minority of narrow minded people decide whether or not we can cure Alzeimers? Or cancer?". Your second two statements aren’t that accurate based on your first statement.

Talk to anyone who works in the research and development field of medicine and they will tell you that there is so much money for stem cell research available thru grants and private funding it would make your head spin. So research is being done...it just isn’t being done on our tax dollar. Why should the government pay for research that the different companies will be making profit off of from their breakthroughs? When and if that would happen, will we see a column about "corporate welfare" or "Bush and his big pharmaceutical buddies getting rich via the taxpayers"?

So he didn't "cut off" government funding for the research. He just refused to allow it. Research financed by the private sector is being done with the hopes of making a profit on the developments, which provides a great motivation for success (as we all know). The veto was based on FUNDING and not on BANNING of the practice. There is nothing that keeps stem cell research from happening, or people from donating embryos for it. The only thing happening is that government funds won't be used for the research.

Maybe GWB is using that money that would go there to pay down our national debt?!?! Heehee

Oh yeah, "forcing religion on children"...which religion is doing that? The Lutherans? The Presbityrians? The Catholics? If you think that saying "Under God" is the state endorsing religion, tell us which religion they are endorsing? All the religions I just mentioned believe in God.

You said "What if someone doesn't believe in God? Then saying the pledge of Allegiance with Under God in it is against what they believe...". Going back to your "two thirds of the people" statement you mentioned with the issue of stem cell research...more than two-thirds of the people in this country believe in God and, by rule, Democracy is rule by majority, not rule by a small percentage of people who get all worked up about any mention of "God" in the public square. This country has a religious heritage as the word "God" is all over the writings of the founding fathers and saying "Under God" is not an endorsement of religion, it is an acknowledgement of religion. If someone doesn’t believe in God then fine, but they should know that they aren’t going to be able to prevent anyone else in this country from acknowledging their religious beliefs...remember that whole "free exercise thereof" phrase in the first amendment?

The percentage of the people in this country who view "Under God" as some radical right-wing slogan is very small...they’re just really loud and they should just STFU when the rest of us acknowledge this countries religious heritage.

blk said...

It's very possible that Bush's veto is a two-fer, and not just catering to the religious right.

Stem cell research has the potential to permanently cure certain diseases. Diabetes, for example, occurs because the islet cells in the pancreas that produce insulin die off.

If stem cell research yielded techniques that allowed new islet cells to be produced using the patient's own DNA, then the companies that produce insulin, insulin pumps, glucose monitoring devices, etc., would lose their market.

And insulin is relatively cheap. There are much more expensive drugs that people take for essentially the rest of their lives. The companies that produce these drugs would lose trillions of dollars in future profit if permanent cures were found for the diseases they treat.

Remember, the new Medicare drug plan was written by and for the drug companies. The Bush administration is very good at hiding the true agenda, and I wouldn't be surprised if they're really appeasing Big Pharma once again.

Anonymous said...

I don't really see any basis for concluding that he's catering to either the religious right or the pharmaceutical companies. He doesn't stand to gain anything by catering to the religious right other than possibly a few percentage points in the polls. And, contrary to the drug examples cited, the pharmaceutical companies stand to make more $$$ as the stem cell research progresses even further. Companies such as J&J and Novarits are privately funding that research because they are acutely aware of that fact. So refusing to throw federal dollars at that research is, if anything, keeping the pharmaceutical companies from realizing bigger profits earlier. Besides, assuming that diseases such as diabetes can be cured as a result of this research -- and bear in mind that such a cure is purely conjecture at this point -- does anybody believe that the pharmaceutical companies are suddenly out of business? If nothing else, they'll always be able to fall back on the multitude of problems caused by these miracle cures.

Mark Ward said...

I don't think that the pharmaceutical companies would be out of business. They would just have to change their way of doing business and that always costs money. Change is not a good thing in modern day America.

And this speaks to your earlier point, PL, when you said you respect Bush for sticking to his guns. I have more respect for someone who can assess and re-assess a situation and move with the times....not someone who is bull headed and can't admit when they are wrong.

Anonymous said...

No, they would not have to change the way they do business. Adapting to the changing landscape of modern medicine is a standard practice of pharmaceuticals. To the contrary, change is a very good thing in successful modern day business. It's what separates successful businesses, even successful employees, from those that are not. Particularly when change (read R&D) translates to additional money that you can charge your customers, which is exactly the case with pharmaceuticals.

I can't say whether or not GWB's position is bull-headed. I happen to think his stance his wrong, but I don't know that you can conclude that he suspects he's wrong and is just unwilling to admit it. It would be hard for me to fault somebody for not changing their mind when they don't have any inkling that they are wrong. You obviously suffer from no such inhibition. In the end, the conclusion that I can draw is that he is incorrectly applying a concept that you yourself have espoused, which is to apply a higher moral standard.

johnwaxey said...

I think that it is ludicris to have a single individual decide the course of this democratic republic. The bill went through the House and Senate and that should give a good indication of what the PEOPLE want. I am not interested in what GWB wants, for a lot of reasons. That is beside the point.

The veto should be used to stop legislation that is dangerous or unsound. This legislation is neither. This is another example of government trying to impose legislation based on the social values of a minority (it is again beside the point that I don't agree with them).

Stem cell research has a big future in this country regardless of federal funding. I believe that it should be funded just as numerous other fields are funded for the betterment of the American people. There are funds for artists, there are funds for studying space, etc. From a scientific perspective, there is little difference between funding those fields and stem cell research. So, unless we are willing to say that no research should be funded, then we are definately treading on moral grounds when we talk about stem cells. Let us think about a society that does not fund things like the space program. What would our life be like without say...velcro...or plastics...or televisions...or radar...or computers...or the internet. Name a major breakthrough in science in the last 60 years and I will bet you dollars to donuts that the government has had some hand in it.

We could rant for hours about the close-mindedness of people who don't want stem cell research and eventually we would discuss the 5% of people in this country that believe the world is flat, the 50% of people who don't read (beside signs), the 50% that don't believe in evolution, etc, etc. If we are to continue to be leaders in science and technology, someone needs to take the initiative, be a leader, and encourage science and education to grow. It is easy to make war on someone, it comes naturally to humans. It is a far greater task (and incidentally, one that will have far greater implications)to push for bettering the society and world at large. But as has been demonstrated repeatedly, the current administration is not about that. For my part, I cannot support them as I believe that we all deserve better than that.

Mark Ward said...

John brings up an interesting point that I did not really address in my original column. We, as Americans, have always been leaders. Leaders of industry, technology, military power, and, quite frankly, thought.

It is my opinion, based on the actions of Bush Co., that this administration (and Congress) have caused us to fall behind the rest of the world in all of these areas. We are slowly becoming beholden to others who used to be beholden to us. Check out Thomas Friedman's The World is Flat for evidence of this...hard, factual evidence of this and then you will understand why everyday I become more and more exasperated with our leadership.

We are supposed to be the original pioneers and we are now off the path completely. Other countries are moving ahead of us because of this 14th century mentality our leadership has and that's just where we will end up in my children's lifetime if we don't get someone in charge who can put our country back on top.

To me, the future is about America leading the way. We are not doing that now.

Anonymous said...

I'm just glad your president, George Walker Bush, has restored honor and dignity to the white house.

Anonymous said...

To be fair, Friedman spends more time documenting the rise in the production and service sectors of Asian nations as he does the technology sector. A call center opening in India is not an indicator of India suddenly being a leader in anything other than cheap labor.

Also, I think you might want to consider just how far back the framework for failure in the technology sector goes in this country. Certainly budget cuts instituted by GWB have not helped the cause, but when the DoD, FCC, FTC, and, more recently, DHS each have their own technology responsibilities, budgets, and reasearch goals - a situation that has existed since the time we started chasing Sputnik - it's pretty unreasonable to lay the blame entirely at the feet of GWB, as you have done.

By every meaningful measure this country is still leading the technological revolution. That leadership is obviously threatened, just as it has been in the past, most notably in the '80s by the Japanese. We overcame those past challenges in large part through cooperation between government and private sectors, which is undoubtedly something that we once again must embrace. You might want to start protesting against that one right now, though, as you know what happens when government and business start working together - progress.