WHAT PART DON'T THEY GET?

CNN and others are reporting on Bush's reaffirmation of vetoing any bill that funds/encourages embryonic stem cell research. Bush's opposition to such measures is relatively straight forward:

"I made [it] very clear to the Congress that the use of federal money, taxpayers' money, to promote science which destroys life in order to save life, I'm against that," Bush told reporters.

Destroying life to promote science -- even life saving science -- is unacceptable to Bush. Fair enough. The obvious extension is that no matter how important the science, no matter what the research may end up curing, it is not worth destroying life to obtain.

So why do his opponents focus on the "but this will save lives" argument? Bush essentially concedes the life saving potential of this kind of research, but remains opposed on moral grounds.

The answer is that his mainstream opponents, especially Republicans supporting the bill, are unwilling to make the moral argument against Bush. Two questions must be answered by supporters of embryonic research...

1) Are those cells being harvested from living humans?
2) If so, is it worth destroying life for the sake of research?

Of course there are those who would argue, resoundingly, yes to both questions-- but they are not, as most would define it, within the political mainstream.

Any kind of solution-- and reasonable, moral policy-- concerning stem cell research will require a very unabashed debate between the parties. The supporters of the research, however, seem to be unwilling to take up their end of the debate.
Nemesis