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Contributor
Ray
Haynes
Mr.
Haynes is an Assembly member representing Riverside and
Temecula.
He serves on the Appropriations and Budget Committees. [go to
Assembly Member Haynes
website at California Assembly][go to Haynes index]
 Clone
and Kill
Good government is less government...
[Ray
Haynes] 10/5/04
Stem cell research
generates more misinformation than any other single issue in
the current public debate. The debate is usually cast in terms
of being
pro or anti-science and progress. The truth is you can be concerned about
the direction of some of the research and still promote scientific progress.
The major source of
confusion is that there are two distinctly different types of
stem cell research. The first—human somatic
stem cell research (SSC)—holds great promise for medical
science and human health. The second—human embryonic stem
cell research (ESC)—is a monumental failure with little promise
of help or advancement in promoting the health of people. Companies
engaged in SSC research have been able to raise millions in the
private sector, because the promise of profit is real. Companies
engaged in ESC are struggling, and are now trying to use the success
of SSC to get voters to approve billions in borrowing to stay in
business, through Proposition 71, an ESC scam.
Somatic stem cells,
sometimes called “adult” stem
cells, are available from a variety of sources—umbilical
cord blood, nasal tissue, bone marrow, fat cells, and the like.
These stem cells are taken without harm to the donor, and they
have resulted in some amazing advancement in stem cell research.
Everybody supports SSC research, because it shows great promise.
Its success is best measured by the support it receives in actual
research dollars. Private capital is investing heavily in the research
in the hopes of being the first to profit from the medical advances
SSC research can generate.
Embryonic stem cells
come from one place—cloning. The researchers
create a human being through an embryo, kill the embryo, and then
extract the stem cells. Even given the moral issues surrounding
the creation of a human being to kill it for the advancement of
medical science (think Hitlerian style concentration camp research),
ESC has failed to generate a single medical advancement. In fact,
private capital, perhaps the best test of profitable research,
will not go near ESC research, because those with the capital believe
it to be a losing proposition.
Enter Proposition 71. It was put on the ballot to generate venture
capital for the ESC researchers. It creates this capital however
by having the government borrow $3 billion, lend it to these researchers,
and have them pay it back from the profits they make from the research.
Of course, if there
were profit to be made, government money wouldn’t
be necessary. So we California taxpayers are going to borrow venture
capital to finance this failed research.
Leave aside the idea
of borrowing venture capital, (a really stupid idea if you and
I were doing it), investing in a failed
research project is a bad idea all by itself. Proposition 71 does
not allow the state to invest in SSC research, only ESC, does not
allow the state to participate in the profits (only to lend the
money), and does not have any serious legislative or judicial oversight.
It is a scandal that will make the current Secretary of State scandal
look like child’s play. Is this really the kind of funding
decision we wish to put to a public vote? Should we vote by initiative
to determine how much government money is spent on every disease
and malady? How much for AIDS? Diabetes? Cancer? West Nile Virus?
Do we really need to go to the ballot to decide what is worthy
and how much to spend?
To justify the initiative,
supporters emphasize the advancements that SSC research has made
in medical science, then prohibit investment
in that lucrative research. It is money only a bureaucrat could
love. You and I are going to lose our shirts in this tax subsidized
scam, a couple of people are going to make a lot of money, lives
will continue to be created and destroyed in the name of “progress,” and
science will be hurt by the falsehoods of those who wish to profit
at the taxpayers’ expense. In the end, we will all be better
off by letting the private market finance and direct the research,
and leave government out of it. CRO
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