Troglodytes and Luddites #3

Here's a new wrinkle on the stem cell debate that, according to this view, puts the Republicans in a pickle: having to choose between their allegiance to right-to-lifers and to business.

Obama's overturning the Bush restrictions on stem cell research has posed a problem for Republicans, especially here in Georgia. Within days of Obama's action, the Georgia State Senate passed SB 169, pushed by the Georgia Right to Life group, which would prohibit stem cells from being used for therapeutic cloning, ie using an ill person's own genetic material to create stem cells that will have a therapeutic effect for that person. Left-over embryos from in vitro clinics are not useful for this, since it requires the sick person's own genetic material.

Their objection is that you are deliberately "creating life" in order to destroy it. The restrictive legislation is strongly opposed by the state university system, which is developing a major biotechnology and biomedical research center. Thus the dilemma for business and development oriented Republicans, who are also beholden to the religious right.

Governor Perdue has been noncommital on the bill but has been quoted as saying the legislation would not pose a threat to the biotech industry.

It's hard to see how that could be true, since it bans the very essence of a major technique for creating new treatments for a variety of diseases. Recruitment both of research funds and researchers would be seriously affected. Even if the bill is defeated in the House, or is vetoed by Perdue, damage has already been done. Why would a top scientist or a grant funding entity take a risk on coming to Georgia?

An amusing sidelight: the even more draconian House bill, which died in committee, would have declared every human embryo, whether in the womb or in a petri dish, to be a child "in the eyes of God."

Everywhere, that is, except in the state revenue department. The bill contained a specific provision that said embryos that had not experienced birth could not be considered dependents for the purpose of income tax deductions.

What a tangle they twist themselves into. It's ok to be super moralistic -- until it runs into business or tax interests. Just think how many potential tax deductions there are lying around in those in vitro clinics' deep freezes.

Ralph