Isn't it nice to know we have a president who is still listening to alternatives

and has not closed his mind. This is wonderful news.

Norma Dikeman

Murray Charters wrote:

> The Dallas Morning News
> Monday August 6, 2001
> Bush ponders idea on stem cell study
> Proposal based on unproven theory
> 08/05/2001
> Chicago Tribune
>
> WASHINGTON – President Bush, eager to find middle ground
> on the volatile issue of embryonic stem cell research,
> is considering an unproven scientific theory that stem cells
> can be taken from a human embryo without destroying it.
>
> Mr. Bush's top political strategist, Karl Rove, and Vice President
> Dick Cheney's chief counselor, Mary Matalin, met separately
> recently with Rep. Roscoe Bartlett, R-Md., to discuss Mr.
> Bartlett's claims that the stem cells used in scientific research
> could be "cleaved" from the embryo in a way that would allow
> the embryo to reform and, possibly, still be implanted
> in a woman's womb.
>
> "This is a solution that I believe everyone in Congress can
> support to the perplexing controversy concerning embryonic
> stem cell research," Mr. Bartlett, a former physiology professor
> at the University of Maryland and a one-time researcher
> at the National Institutes of Health, said in a letter he circulated
> on Capitol Hill.
>
> The White House continued to grapple with the stem cell issue
> during a week marked by several legislative victories before the
> president's departure for Texas for a lengthy working vacation.
>
> So far, however, the ability to cleave cells while preserving the
> human embryo is an untested theory. Activists on both sides
> of the debate said the White House's pursuit of such an untried
> scientific technique is an indication of how eager the
> administration is to find politically safe ground on an issue
> viewed as a defining event of Mr. Bush's short tenure.
>
> The White House confirmed the meetings, and Mr. Bartlett's
> staff said there had been several follow-up discussions.
>
> But there was no indication from the White House when
> Mr. Bush would make a decision on Mr. Bartlett's proposal
> or what alternatives he is studying on federal financing
> of stem cell research.
>
> Even as the White House weighs Mr. Bartlett's proposal,
> researchers have said that the techniques he advocates
> are untested and potentially overly burdensome to scientists.
>
> The abortion foes Mr. Bush would seek to appease with such
> a proposal are lining up against Mr. Bartlett's plan, insisting
> there is no guarantee that embryos wouldn't be destroyed,
> an act they equate with abortion. One group,
> American League for Life, conducted a news conference Friday
> near the White House to deride Mr. Bush for "selling out"
> conservative voters by breaking a campaign promise in even
> seeking a compromise.
>
> Embryonic stem cells, which have been available to researchers
> for only the last three years, can be manipulated to create tissue,
> blood and nerves and have excited millions of people with their
> promise of new treatments for Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, juvenile
> diabetes and other diseases.
>
> What Mr. Bartlett proposes is that a small part of a days-old
> embryo could be carved away before the embryo is implanted
> in a woman's womb.  Stem cells would be taken from the
> cleaved portion of the cell cluster. The remaining embryo
> would be allowed to rejuvenate and, if the timing is precise,
> be implanted.
>
> But even the researchers Mr. Bartlett consulted caution that
> the technique is only "theoretically possible." No one has
> taken stem cells from a human embryo without destroying it.
>
> SOURCE: The Dallas Morning News / The Chicago Tribune
> http://www.dallasnews.com/national/436441_stemcell_05nat.html
>
> * * *
>
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