The Pro-Cure Movement

With his obscene and cruel veto of federal funding for embryonic stem cell research, George Bush has caused a backlash against the radical Republicans that could give the Democrats a huge victory in November. Even in the Republican leaning Rasmussen poll Bush's approval numbers are down five points in recent days. To my mind, no one has clarified this issue as well as Jonathan Alter from Newsweek. And he has given us a precious, invaluable meme to describe those who support this research:

The Pro Cure Movement.

Excerpts from Alter's powerful article:

Because this was Bush's first veto—itself a newsworthy event—he found it harder to ignore the obvious questions: If destroying an embryo is "murder"—the Bush position, according to his spokesman—how can he support the existence of fertility clinics, which routinely throw out thousands of surplus embryos? His answer lay in last week's photo op, where he surrounded himself with cute babies "adopted" from these embryos. How many such "snowflake" babies are there? Despite federal funding and intense outreach, only 128 of 400,000 frozen embryos (.032 percent) have been adopted, says Sen. Arlen Specter. It turns out that couples using the clinics overwhelmingly prefer to donate their surplus embryos to science, while couples looking to adopt prefer babies already born who need homes, a large constituency of extremely needy children Bush seems to have put in second place.

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It is now almost five years since Bush's August 2001 stem-cell "compromise," which allowed for work on 60 existing cell lines. When most of those lines turned out to be unworkable or irrelevant to cures for humans, he didn't let the new facts affect him. In that sense, the whole issue is emblematic of what's wrong with the Bush presidency: his inflexibility, obsession with his conservative base, religious arrogance and contempt for scientific consensus. Most of all, last week's decision betrayed his oft-stated belief in the sanctity of life. The question, as in all moral issues, is whose life? I'll choose yours or mine over a piece of protoplasm no larger than the period at the end of this sentence.

Bush has handed it to us on a plate--a major issue on which the radical Right is opposed by almost 70% of the population. This is an issue we can build into OUR wedge issue, a sledgehammer we can use to smash the candidacies of extreme right Republicans all over the country. (The representative from IL-11, right wing Republican clown Jerry Weller, has been an adamant opponent of stem cell research. Am I going to use it against him? Damned right I am, at every opportunity I can think of.) Think of the stake that millions of Americans have in this research, not only the sick and injured but the people who love them, the people who are in emotional agony seeing their children, their siblings, their parents, or their life partners go through horrible suffering every day. A lot of Americans are OUTRAGED by Bush's veto and the radical Right's efforts to keep their loved ones from benefiting from what could be the most promising medical resarch in history. Bush has chosen to elevate the moral status of a blastocyst above that of a real, tangible, living, breathing human. If that isn't something worth fighting against, then why do the Democrats exist at all?

Make stem cell research an issue everywhere. Tie Bush's huge unpopularity around the neck of every right wing Republican Ann Coulter-loving bastard running for office anywhere, including Utah, Mississippi, Idaho, and Alaska. (Yes Howard, I've been listening to you.) By God, take a stand--and grab the leadership of what could be one of the most powerful political forces in recent American history--THE PRO CURE MOVEMENT.