Bush holds veto pen over stem cell bill

[vraiblonde]

I'm pretty sure you'd be biatching about them not doing enough to save lives.

You sure do like to make judgements about people you don't even know.

And, I might add, you are rather unsophisticated if you can't conceive of someone who would do something differently than you, or thinks in a different way.

 

[sugarmama]

Well, I hope you didn't get that from me.

While I don't believe that embryonic stem cells are human beings, I have never denied their importance nor the significance of their potential to become something more than the sum of its parts.
The potential is definitely there for the research to get extremely ugly.

But there is also the potential for incredibly great things to happen.






You can't make an omelette without killing some people.

Agreed.

 

[sugarmama]

You sure do like to make judgements about people you don't even know.

And, I might add, you are rather unsophisticated if you can't conceive of someone who would do something differently than you, or thinks in a different way.

That is what we unsophisticated people like to call.... exaggeration.

 

[Larry Gude]

I aksed you...

Have you?
The point is that it COULD save lives one day. And what if you didn't do anything to try to save that kid's life? You'd probably always wonder if stem cell treatment could have saved them. No pain, no gain.
I don't get the whole "doctor's just practicing" thing. Are you a pessimist? Don't you see the possibilities? Do you expect doctor's to know EVERYTHING and ALWAYS get everything right? If they didn't "practice" or experiment with different treatment/drugs, I'm pretty sure you'd be biatching about them not doing enough to save lives.

...several pages ago, what if stem cell research leads to immortality?

By your argument, because we can, we should.

To me, that makes life meaningless.

I know two people who were beat to a horrific pulp for several years and both say they'd go through it again. I also know that the medical field can not prive that the treatments they received were the correct ones of if they wouldn't have gotten better on their own or if they would have died.

I know, second hand, a person who allowed themselves to be butchered and died.

My kids and their lives are precious precisely because there is death. Their health is precious because there is sickness.

 

[vraiblonde]

That is what we unsophisticated people like to call.... exaggeration.

Then why do you keep telling strangers on the internet what they would and wouldn't do?

 

[ylexot]

I COMPLETELY agree with you Kerad! I just don't get why everyone else doesn't understand that/? It's so simple to m e.

Maybe you're a simple person :shrug:

 

[crabcake]

What do you all think about a couple having one or two spare children to use as parts in case something happens to the kid they want to raise? They could keep the other bodies frozen in case they need them for something.

Someone fed you Liberal beer, didn't they?

Nobody is talking about birthing babies for the purpose of having a body-part junkyard; we're talking about cells ... something you can barely see without a magnifying glass. Not a living, breathing baby ... a cell that doesn't have a head, heart, lungs, brain, etc. formed.

Besides, there's no reason to birth babies for back-up parts; that's what organ donation is for.

 

[crabcake]

I can tell you right now that I wouldn't have a child to use for spare parts. The very thought of that is revolting to me.

There's a BIG difference (IMO) between having another child for potential marrow donation, and having another child so you can take it's heart, kidneys, corneas, etc. I don't think anyone is suggesting the latter of the two.

However, if a couple was already planning to have another child, and they speed that process up to save their other child, I see no problem with it. If my parents told me that yes, they wanted me (another kid) and at the same time, I was able to save my brother's life by having given him my bone marrow or something (and I likely don't even remember the procedure), I'd be tickled pink ... I'd have something to hang over his head for the rest of his life!

Seriously though, think about it from a sibling standpoint. What's the difference in donating your kidney now as an adult to your brother/sister if you are a match, and donating some marrow as a 6 month old? :shrug: Only difference I see is age.

Vrai, I think you're looking at this issue with too much emotion and "ick" factor, and not enough practicality, which I NEVER thought I'd say to you.

 

[vraiblonde]

Vrai, I think you're looking at this issue with too much emotion and "ick" factor, and not enough practicality, which I NEVER thought I'd say to you.

I already stated my objections. And again, all Bush did was veto federal funding for embryonic research - you can get stem cells from other sources and now that I've done a little more research of my own, I'm even more against it than I was before.

It's like these freaks sit around getting stoned, thinking up gross things to do to embryos and unborn babies.

 

[crabcake]

Bone marrow transplants are reportedly very painful. And isn't that your child, too, or just the kid you already have? What would they have done with the rest of the baby once they got the bone marrow they wanted?

I just find this attitude so callous toward life. I'm sorry that people lose loved ones and die themselves. I just don't think more killing is the answer.

Harvesting bone marrow doesn't leave a person with no bone marrow; they only take a small amount. They're not replacing one person's entire body's marrow with the marrow of another person.

And as I stated in my previous post, if they already wanted another child I suspect they'll go about raising it as most parents do. :shrug:

 

[vraiblonde]

if they already wanted another child I suspect they'll go about raising it as most parents do.

If they wanted another child they'd have had it and not used bone marrow as an excuse.

 

[vraiblonde]

One more thing (because I need to get some work finished):

Let's say these parents have another child to provide marrow for the existing sick child. Then the parts baby is born with something wrong with it as well.

Now what? Keep trying? What if they find that the fetus is defective before it's born? Abort it and try again?

 

[crabcake]

The problem with stem cells, and why some people see them as human beings is because, although a finger is just a finger, embryonic stem cells, left to their own devices, will very easily turn into a human being - that is, in fact, their defined purpose. Therefore any distinction between "embryonic stem cells" and "human fetus" becomes moot (to those people).

When I was a kid, we used to cut the stems off the end of carrots and put them in a dish with water. Ya know what -- we never grew a carrot.

Cells don't turn into a human being on their own. They require "help" to grow into a fetus and be born ... like carrots, they must be nourished in the proper environment to grow into a human being.

Carrot seeds aren't carrots; they're seeds. Embryonic cells aren't humans; they're the seed from which humans are created.

 

[crabcake]

If they wanted another child they'd have had it and not used bone marrow as an excuse.

If we're talking about a sick child (e.g., 4-8 years old), who's to say they HAD to have had the second child they had already wanted? :shrug: Maybe they wanted to put some space between 'em. Maybe the stress/time factors/medical costs up until then have prevented them from conceiving. There are a million rational reasons why ... but I'd venture to guess the cases of this happening are far and few between, to begin with. Most multi-kid families DO have more than one kid when something like this pops up, I imagine.

 

[crabcake]

...they are alive and they are human. There simply is no way around that. You can't mis-identify a human stem cell as being a tree or a snail darter or a bug. It is human.

I'm more likely to mis-identify a human stem cell as a speck of dust than identify it as a potential human being.

 

[crabcake]

...and taste good, would it be OK to open a stem cell restaurant so they don't go to waste?

What if we just shipped it off to starving people in famine struck parts of the world? What if it proves particularly nutritious and far more economical in terms of cost vs. benefit than, say, a sack of rice? It would save lives.

Unfortunately, I have to get graphic with this post, but I'm going to do it with as much tact as possible for the news section. :deepbreath: People already consume sperm for "recreational" purposes, yet you don't have the pro-lifers out there screaming to ban oral sex. And if you're belief is that sperm and eggs are "life", then there's just as much reason to at that as there is what stem cell research is about.

As for shipping them overseas, it's not as cost effective for the gov't to ship them to some 3rd world country b/c they wouldn't be near as filling as that sack of rice.

 

[Bruzilla]

I don't think I believe that. As many abortions that are performed here, why would we need to "farm" embryos?? Not to mention all of the cells that are sitting in petri dishes right now, never to be implanted into their mother b/c she just had quintuplets and can't afford anymore babies........

Money changes everything, and once medical research companies stand to make billions of dollars on new drugs derived from stem cells, and developed at government expense, the demand for stem cells will quickly outstrip the supply available from fertility treatments. And when that happens, what argument can be used to stop the harvesting/farming? If Bush allowed this law to pass the government would be officially saying that embryos are not life.

 

[Bustem' Down]

Ten bucks says the next president we have passes the bill though.

 

[Kerad]

Unfortunately, I have to get graphic with this post, but I'm going to do it with as much tact as possible for the news section. :deepbreath: People already consume sperm for "recreational" purposes, yet you don't have the pro-lifers out there screaming to ban oral sex. And if you're belief is that sperm and eggs are "life", then there's just as much reason to at that as there is what stem cell research is about.

As for shipping them overseas, it's not as cost effective for the gov't to ship them to some 3rd world country b/c they wouldn't be near as filling as that sack of rice.

 

[Kerad]

Ten bucks says the next president we have passes the bill though.

I'd take that bet...except I'm betting $20 that after the November elections this gets reintroduced with a veto-proof majority.

This thing IS going to pass. It's just a matter of now...or a few months from now.