Text 3664, 180 rader
Skriven 2004-10-16 13:48:58 av Alan Hess
     Kommentar till en text av FRANK SCHEIDT
Ärende: Krauthammer pissed at Edw
=================================
Whilst masticating on <Oct 16 04>, FRANK SCHEIDT (1:123/140)
wrote to ALAN HESS:

FS> -=> Quoting Alan Hess to All <=-

AH>> An Edwards Outrage
AH>> By Charles Krauthammer

AH>> After the second presidential debate, in which John Kerry used 
AH>> the word "plan" 24 times, I said on television that Kerry has a 
AH>> plan for everything except curing psoriasis. I should have known 
AH>> there is no parodying Kerry's pandering. It turned out days later 
AH>> that the Kerry campaign has a plan -- nay, a promise -- to cure 
AH>> paralysis. What is the plan? Vote for Kerry. 

AH>> This is John Edwards on Monday at a rally in Newton, Iowa: "If 
AH>> we do the work that we can do in this country, the work that we 
AH>> will do when John Kerry is president, people like Christopher 
AH>> Reeve are going to walk, get up out of that wheelchair and walk 
AH>> again."

AH>> In my 25 years in Washington, I have never seen a more loathsome
AH>> display of demagoguery. Hope is good. False hope is bad. 
AH>> Deliberately, for personal gain, raising false hope in the 
AH>> catastrophically afflicted is despicable. 
AH>> Where does one begin to deconstruct this outrage?

There's nothing false about the hope.  Edwards didn't say the research would
cure people like Reeve tomorrow, or during the term of a Kerry presidency.  It
is possible that it could lead to cure for SCI and other conditions.  Most
spinal cord injured people I've interacted with (web sites and chats) since
this occured have no problem with what Edwards said.  Krauthammer does.  That's
his prerogative.

AH>> First, the inability of the human spinal cord to regenerate is 
AH>> one of the great mysteries of biology. The answer is not remotely
AH>>  around the corner. It could take a generation to unravel. To 
AH>> imply, as Edwards did, that it is imminent if only you elect the 
AH>> right politicians is scandalous. 

Edwards didn't say it was imminent.  Even if they found a cure using embryonic
stem cells that worked on rats during a Kerry presidency, it would take years
to use it on most humans with SCI.  First would be clinical trials, on small
numbers of people (probably lower level paraplegics, assuming the treatment
involves surgery on the cord, as they can afford to lose a neurological level
or two if things go wrong.  Quads don't have that luxury.  Vent-dependent quads
like Reeve have no margin of error.)  

AH>> Second, if the cure for spinal cord injury comes, we have no 
AH>> idea where it will come from. There are many lines of inquiry. 
AH>> Stem cell research is just one of many possibilities, and a very 
AH>> speculative one at that. For 30 years I have heard promises of 
AH>> miracle cures for paralysis (including my own, suffered as a 
AH>> medical student). The last fad, fetal tissue transplants, was 
AH>> thought to be a sure thing. Nothing came of it. 

He's absolutely correct here - we have no idea where the cure will come from,
if it does.  We DO know that, if no embryonic stem cell research is done, we'll
never know if it could come from them.

AH>> As a doctor by training, I've known better than to believe the 
AH>> hype -- and have tried in my own counseling of people with new 
AH>> spinal cord injuries to place the possibility of cure in 
AH>> abeyance. I advise instead to concentrate on making a life (and a 

Obviously, care (which includes making a life) is important.  Regardless of
one's health problem, just waiting for a cure gets one nowhere.  Doesn't mean
we shouldn't be trying to find cures, and people shouldn't hope for them.

AH>> very good life it can be) with the hand one is dealt. The 

It can also be a lousy life.  Krauthammer's a paraplegic - he has full use of
his hands and arms.  He can live independently.  It's not the same to be
dependent, which is not to say quads can't live good lives - they certainly
can.  Krauthammer also doesn't have the severe pain problem that affects some
people with spinal cord injury, pain which is more disabling in some cases than
the paralysis itself.

AH>> greatest enemies of this advice have been the snake-oil salesmen 
AH>> promising a miracle around the corner. I never expected a 
AH>> candidate for vice president to be one of them.

I don't see it that way.

AH>> Third, the implication that Christopher Reeve was prevented from getting 
AH>> out of his wheelchair by the Bush stem cell policies is a travesty. 

And wasn't implied.  What was implied was that restrictions on ESC research
might keep current and future SCI victims from getting out of their chairs.

AH>> George Bush is the first president to approve federal funding for stem 
AH>> cell research. There are 22 lines of stem cells now available, up from 
AH>> one just two years ago. As Leon Kass, head of the President's Council on 
AH>> Bioethics, has written, there are 3,500 shipments of stem cells waiting 
AH>> for anybody who wants them.

Lines contaminated with mouse cells, that couldn't be used on humans.

AH>> Edwards and Kerry constantly talk of a Bush "ban" on stem cell research. 
AH>> This is false. There is no ban. You want to study stem cells? You get 
AH>> them from the companies that have the cells and apply to the National 
AH>> Institutes of Health for the federal funding.

And NIH can't fund research on embryonic stem cells, save for those in the
approved (contaminated) lines.

Would someone explain to me why in vitro fertilization clinics are alllowed to
exist?  They result in the death of thousands of excess embryos - any embryo
produced in vitro and not implanted into a woman is doomed, whether it is left
alone, tossed in the trash, or used for research.  There is no logical reason
to not use these excess embryos for research, if the man and woman don't
object.  If Bush is truly against killing embryos, he shouldn't just stop at
not allowing them to be used for research - he should mandate that fertility
clinics only be allowed to produce one or two embryos per woman at a time, and
all must be implanted.  Otherwise, these clinics are killing embryos as sure as
researchers are.

AH>> In his Aug. 7 radio address to the nation, Kerry referred not once but 
AH>> four times to the "ban" on stem cell research instituted by Bush. At the 
AH>> time, Reeve was alive, so not available for posthumous exploitation. But 
AH>> Ronald Reagan was available, having recently died of Alzheimer's. 

AH>> So what does Kerry do? He begins his radio address with the disgraceful 
AH>> claim that the stem cell "ban" is standing in the way of an Alzheimer's 
AH>> cure. 

It's called politics, Mr. Krauthammer.  

AH>> This is an outright lie. The President's Council on Bioethics, 
AH>> on which I sit, had one of the world's foremost experts on 
AH>> Alzheimer's, Dennis Selkoe from Harvard, give us a lecture on the 
AH>> newest and most promising approaches to solving the Alzheimer's 
AH>> mystery. Selkoe reported remarkable progress in using 
AH>> biochemicals to clear the "plaque" deposits in the brain that 
AH>> lead to Alzheimer's. He ended his presentation without the phrase 
AH>> "stem cells" having passed his lips.

AH>> So much for the miracle cure. Ronald D.G. McKay, a stem cell
AH>> researcher at NIH, has admitted publicly that stem cells as an
AH>> Alzheimer's cure are a fiction, but that "people need a fairy 
AH>> tale." Kerry and Edwards certainly do. They are shamelessly 
AH>> exploiting this fairy tale, having no doubt been told by their 
AH>> pollsters that stem cells play well politically for them. 

I have no knowledge of the state of Alzzheimer's research, so I'll bow to his
knowledge here.

AH>> Politicians have long promised a chicken in every pot. It is part of the 
AH>> game. It is one thing to promise ethanol subsidies here, dairy price 
AH>> controls there. But to exploit the desperate hopes of desperate people 
AH>> with the promise of Christ-like cures is beyond the pale.

AH>> There is no apologizing for Edwards's remark. It is too revealing. There 
AH>> is absolutely nothing the man will not say to get elected.

Just like Bush and Cheney (and almost anyone who runs for office.)  Remember
Cheney's remark that we'd be hit again by terrorists if we elect the wrong guy
(meaning Kerry?)  I don't recall Krauthammer getting upset about that.  Or is
false fear better than "false hope?"

FS> He certainly got *that* right.  Both Kerry and Edwards should be 
FS> ashamed of themselves -- though they aren't.

FS> OTOH Kerry has put a lot of effort into explaining his comments referring 
FS> to Cheney's lesbian daughter.  Why is such a fuss being made over this.  
FS> Cheney's daughter has never tried concealing the fact that she's queer.  

She doesn't think she's "queer."  She thinks she's what God (or nature - I
don't know her religious beliefs) made her.

FS> Kerry actually referred to her in a very sympathetic way.  So why the 
FS> fuss?

Because Kerry made a good point in the debate when he spoke about her.  Since
the point he made couldn't be countered, the Cheneys attacked Kerry instead. 
It was the Republicans that made homosexuality an issue in this campaign, with
their proposed Constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.  *adh*

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