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I promised this young man of 36 with ALS I would send his letter to everyone i knew. He was diagnosed in 1993, has been on ventilator since 1997. How anyone could look him in the eye and say you cannot have this research I can't undertand. Rayilyn Brown Murrieta, CA 92562 60/68 "I have written the following letter and it has been getting broad support in my ALS community with over 120 supporters in a week. We will be submitting it and the list of supporters to media throughout the country and taking out an ad in the Washington Post to get publicity our position. We are hoping you will join us in our effort and help us spread the letter for support. The letter follows. Your friend in the fight, Jeff Lester Ellisville, MO <A HREF="mailto:[log in to unmask]">[log in to unmask]</A> Our Republican Leaders Have Mislead Us On Stem Cell Research and Therapeutic Cloning Because They Have Failed Us On the Anti-Abortion Front First, I want to preface my comments by saying I have been a life-long Republican, a dedicated Christian who believes that life begins at conception and finally that abortion is wrong and should be abolished or severely curtailed as an extreme last option. I have been fighting the effects of ALS, Lou Gehrig's Disease, for over 10 years. This fatal neuromuscular disease has left me a quadriplegic dependant on a ventilator. Finally, I am making this statement after years of careful contemplating of the issues, many hours of prayer and leaning heavily on my faith. Our leaders have tried to convince us that banning embryonic stem cell research because the embryos are destroyed and that by preventing it that they have somehow fought abortion even though most stem cells are obtained from discarded embryos that result from invitro fertilization. Not only is this thinking absolutely wrong, they are also using this as a ploy to cover up the fact that they have made little, if any, progress in stopping abortions. In fact I believe that by banning embryonic stem cell research, they are creating a whole new sin or at the very least compounding the sin of abortion. By banning the research they have essentially made these embryos, or children if you will, die in vain. They have denied them the chance for their deaths to serve a higher purpose of helping their fellow man for the betterment of mankind. Instead they have made their deaths to serve no purpose and they are thrown out with the garbage. There are many examples today where we celebrate people's deaths because they helped their fellow man and their deaths served the purpose of the betterment of mankind. The first example of this is our many fine men and women who die every day serving us in the police, fire and armed services. We rightfully honor them as heroes who gave their lives to help their fellow man and hopefully for the betterment of mankind. A much closer correlation to the embryos is the example of the thousands of people who in their death make the unselfish act of donating their organs or their bodies to science. We celebrate and honor their gift to help their fellow man and that their death served the betterment of all mankind. There are even examples where some of the most heinous sins result in something good, such as when we saw the best come out in people despite nearly 3000 people being murdered on 9/11. Finally there is the example that has a direct correlation to harvesting stem cells from discarded embryos, which is when families donate the organs of their children who died as a result of the mortal sin of murder. We do not tell the families that they cannot donate their child's organs but rather we celebrate their unselfish gift and even say that the donor's life lives on through the lives that received their special gift. I say do not waste these precious embryo's lives by letting them die in vain and be disposed of like garbage but rather give their deaths meaning by letting them donate their stem cells so that they can help their fellow man and they would have given us the incredible gift for the betterment of mankind. Now if you still think embryonic stem cell research is wrong, you must support the development of therapeutic cloning because it is the only way to really bypass the use of embryonic stem cells. This is another area where we have been hood winked by our leaders because they are using this issue to muddy the issues with abortion to cover up their lack of progress on abortion. First therapeutic cloning doesn't involve any form of conception nor can it lead to a cloned human being. Putting it simply, therapeutic cloning is where they hollow out an egg and insert the patients DNA to essentially create an exact match stem cell factory for the patient. Now where the politicians cloud this topic is that with quite a bit of additional chemical manipulation it MIGHT then be turned into a human clone. I have grown tired of our leaders playing politics with these potentially major breakthroughs that could rid mankind of some of the most hideous diseases we face all in an effort to deflect attention away from their inability to do anything substantial about abortion. Now if after reading this you still think these things are somehow wrong, please stop attacking these processes that bring hope to the millions of us fighting these fatal diseases and focus on the things that you really have a problem with: abortion, invitro fertilization, any organ donations resulting from a murder and most of all quit falling for our leaders decoys and hold them accountable for their shortcomings on the real issues. Sincerely, Jeff Lester Ellisville, Missouri ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask] In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn