All human cloning is wrong Fri Jan 3, 5:51 AM ET HYPERLINK "http://us.i1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/my/my16.gif" Add HYPERLINK "http://rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/addtomy/*http://edit.my.yahoo.com/config/ set_news?.add=usnustcm&.src=yn&.done=http%3a//news.yahoo.com/%3ftmpl=sto ry2%26cid=679%26u=/usatoday/20030103/cm_usatoday/4750582%26printer=1"Op/ Ed - USA TODAY to My Yahoo! Sam Brownback The announcement of the possible first live-born human clone came as a shock to many. And it should. HYPERLINK "http://rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/usatoday/cm_usatoday/*http://www.usatoday .com" • HYPERLINK "http://rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/usatoday/cm_usatoday/*http://www.yahoo.us atoday.com/travel/news/business-travel.htm"Check out today's top travel tips! • HYPERLINK "http://rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/usatoday/cm_usatoday/*http://asp.usatoday .com/registration/newslettercenterlite/newslettercenterlite.aspx"Books in your inbox. Sign-up for your Books e-mail newsletter! • HYPERLINK "http://rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/usatoday/cm_usatoday/*http://www.yahoo.us atoday.com/travel/today/sky.htm"Today in the Sky: Real-time airport weather, delays, and travel news • HYPERLINK "http://rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/usatoday/cm_usatoday/*http://www.usatoday .com/chad/email-newsletter/travel-control.htm"Travel deals, news, and features straight to your inbox. Click here to sign up! HYPERLINK "http://rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/usatoday/ad/*https://subscribe.usatoday.c om/index.jsp?pub=UT&keycode=YNFG8" However, what the Raelians claim to have done is at its most basic level no different from what numerous biotech companies in this country, and elsewhere, are attempting to do. As observers of this issue know, there are several biotech companies and university research labs engaged -- or soon will be -- in the mass production of human embryos for research purposes. The human embryos will be harvested for their material, then destroyed. This grisly prospect -- creating human life merely to conduct research on it -- must be outlawed. Some proponents of human cloning would have society believe that there are two different types of cloning: so-called reproductive and so-called therapeutic. Science, however, tells us that there are not two types of cloning -- there is only one, and it always results in the creation of a new human embryo. The essential point: Cloning is cloning is cloning, and all cloning is the same. Whether the embryo created through the process of nuclear somatic-cell transfer (the technical name for cloning) is destined for implantation or for destructive research that ultimately kills him or her -- it is the same, and it should be banned. Some Congress members who favor cloning in certain circumstances are offering a bill that bans the implantation of clonal human embryos while at the same time authorizing biotech companies to create thousands of human embryos. Let us be clear: This proposal is not in any way a ban on human cloning. It is an endorsement of human cloning that attempts to restrict some of the ways the human clones may be used. If we do not ban the cloning of human embryos now, we will quickly find ourselves unable to put the genie back in the bottle. The only solution to the problem now facing humanity is to act quickly and to ban all human cloning now. Along with Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., I have authored a bipartisan bill that bans all human cloning. The House has passed such a bill, and the president has indicated his strong support for this measure. Congress and the country can afford to wait no longer. Sen. Sam Brownback is a Republican senator from Kansas. Thomas Berdine President Young Onset Parkinson's Association www.yopa.org Founder www.youngparkinsons.com The Young Onset Parkinson's Association is a legal corporation, incorporated as a not-for-profit in New Mexico and headquartered in Albuquerque. We are in the middle of applying for our 501C(3) federal tax exemption status and expect to have it within 2 - 6 months. If this exemption is not approved, at first, your donation may not be tax exempt until the time that we are approved federally. --- Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free. Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com). Version: 6.0.434 / Virus Database: 243 - Release Date: 12/25/2002 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask] In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn