Stem cells and Frist’s inconsistency
July 29th, 2005 ~ Current eventsAm I a dunce for thinking that the question of whether or not to explore stem cell research is a foregone conclusion if you’re pro-life?
Apparently so, because House Majority Leader Bill Frist is pro-life, and he’s made news today by coming out in favor of stem cell research. This NYTimes story covers it along with all the usual background and analysis. But it’s not so much the political impact of this (which the MSM can be counted upon to exaggerate) that disturbs me, but the incoherent logic expressed by this quote:
“I am pro-life,” Mr. Frist says in the speech, arguing that he can reconcile his support for the science with his own Christian faith. “I believe human life begins at conception.”
But at the same time, he says, “I also believe that embryonic stem cell research should be encouraged and supported.”
So he believes that embryos are not tissue but ensouled human beings. And he believes that research that harvests parts from those humans in order to investigate the potential benefit to other humans not only is permissable but “should be encouraged.”
I don’t even know where to go from there. I infer that the idea is that the potential benefit renders the necessary sacrifice of human life inconsequential. Or perhaps that human life should occasionally take a back seat to the quality of human life. I gather that no one wants to be the one to tell Alzheimer patients, paraplegics, diabetics and others that this research is morally untenable and that this nation under God has never been comfortable with the view that certain lives are worth more than certain other lives.
The NYTimes didn’t call Frist on this, of course. I’m sure they’re just pleased that one of the bad guys is finally speaking some sense and were all too happy to give him a pass. And I’m afraid that there are many other tender-hearted people who should know better who will begin to feel that stem cell research is just too good a thing to stand in the way of on the strength of the usual arguments against abortion.
I hate what’s happening to the dialogue on life and death issues in this country. Even the pro-life crowd is beginning to get swayed by this amorphous “quality of life” rhetoric that seems to get used more and more often to justify taking life away altogether, as if you can make multiple deals with the Devil and never expect him to collect with interest.
Lord, have mercy on us.
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July 30th, 2005 at 12:51 pm
I don’t know what Frist was talking about exactly, and I don’t expect the Times to get these details correct when it institutionally sneers on our qualms about experimenting on live human beings, but –
There have been some developments in the process of finding pluripotent stem cells that Frist may have been referring to. As pluripotent cells, they are essentially the same as embryonic stem cells, but because they use an unfertilized egg and an adult nucleus, the cell goes on to cellular division but not independent life, and no actual embryos are killed.
Again, I don’t know that that’s what Frist had in mind, but I think we should hear him out before declaring him departed from the pro-life ranks.
July 30th, 2005 at 7:56 pm
You make a good point, so I went and found the transcript of the entire speech — http://frist.senate.gov/index.cfm?FuseAction=Speeches.Detail&Speech_id=257
I can’t find anything to indicate he means anything different than anyone else when he says ’stem cell research.’ He does say that he proposes legislation that allows research only on the leftover blastocysts of couple seeking fertility treatment. If I thought there was any way to actually enforce that exactly as he says it, it’d be one thing. But there isn’t. I think you’d just have a rush of couple who suddenly “needed” fertility therapy. And if researchers came back after a year or two of this and complained that they needed more inventory (and Frist mentions that of the 22 stem cell lines that were approved in 2001, problems have appeared so they need more now) , do we really think we would hold the line, since we’d already erased and redrawn it once?
Anyway, apart from ticking off pro-life conservatives and giving the mainstream media a chance to hint that Bush is losing support, I don’t know that this speech accomplished much, so it probably doesn’t matter.
July 31st, 2005 at 4:08 pm
You’re right and I was wrong. I posted a full retraction (and then some) today.
Thanks for the speech link.
July 31st, 2005 at 6:07 pm
Boy and you made some *great* points to boot! Excellent blog.