The Pro-Abortion President
Many people don’t realize and the media certainly didn’t publish it, but when Obama recently signed the executive order to reverse funding on embryonic stem cell research, he did much more than just reverse the funding. He further advanced his radical views on his pro-abortion stance.
After the signing, Obama congratulated his administration for having the sophistication to ensure that scientific decisions are “based on facts, not ideology.”
But in the last paragraph of this Executive Order, you see that the previous Executive order 13435 is revoked.
THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release March 9, 2009
EXECUTIVE ORDER
- - - - - - -
REMOVING BARRIERS TO RESPONSIBLE SCIENTIFICRESEARCH INVOLVING HUMAN STEM CELLS
By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered as follows:
Section 1. Policy. Research involving human embryonic stem cells and human non-embryonic stem cells has the potential to lead to better understanding and treatment of many disabling diseases and conditions. Advances over the past decade in this promising scientific field have been encouraging, leading to broad agreement in the scientific community that the research should be supported by Federal funds.
For the past 8 years, the authority of the Department of Health and Human Services, including the National Institutes of Health (NIH), to fund and conduct human embryonic stem cell research has been limited by Presidential actions. The purpose of this order is to remove these limitations on scientific inquiry, to expand NIH support for the exploration of human stem cell research, and in so doing to enhance the contribution of America's scientists to important new discoveries and new therapies for the benefit of humankind.
Sec. 2. Research. The Secretary of Health and Human Services (Secretary), through the Director of NIH, may support and conduct responsible, scientifically worthy human stem cell research, including human embryonic stem cell research, to the extent permitted by law.
Sec. 3. Guidance. Within 120 days from the date of this order, the Secretary, through the Director of NIH, shall review existing NIH guidance and other widely recognized guidelines on human stem cell research, including provisions establishing appropriate safeguards, and issue new NIH guidance on such research that is consistent with this order. The Secretary, through NIH, shall review and update such guidance periodically, as appropriate.
Sec. 4. General Provisions. (a) This order shall be implemented consistent with applicable law and subject to the availability of appropriations.
(b) Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:
(i) authority granted by law to an executive department, agency, or the head thereof; or
(ii) functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.
(c) This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity, by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.
(d) Sec. 5. Revocations. (a) The Presidential statement of August 9, 2001, limiting Federal funding for research involving human embryonic stem cells, shall have no further effect as a statement of governmental policy.
(b) Executive Order 13435 of June 20, 2007, which supplements the August 9, 2001, statement on human embryonic stem cell research, is revoked.
BARACK OBAMA
THE WHITE HOUSE,
March 9, 2009.
Executive order 13435 had to do with support and funding for research that utilized non-embryonic cells and included the groundbreaking research to convert ordinary human cells into ones that resemble embryonic stem cells.
You will remember that in 2007, scientists in Japan and the US discovered they could engineer human skin cells to mimic embryonic stem cell. This could allow the scientific community to probe the benefits of these cells without actually destroying human embryos.
To most people, this development rendered the controversy moot, and vindicated President Bush’s moral and ethical caution. This was an enormous scientific step forward that all observers should support.
HHS/NIH Plan for Implementation of Executive Order 13435
On June 20, 2007, President George W. Bush issued Executive Order 13435. The Executive Order requires that "The Secretary of Health and Human Services shall conduct and support research on the isolation, derivation, production, and testing of stem cells that are capable of producing all or almost all of the cell types of the developing body and may result in improved understanding of or treatments for diseases and other adverse health conditions, but are derived without creating a human embryo for research purposes or destroying, discarding, or subjecting to harm a human embryo or fetus."
The Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has tasked the National Institutes of Health (NIH) with the responsibility to develop a plan to implement the Executive Order. You can download the implementation plan
So right after Obama told the country he supported alternative, non-destructive stem cell research, he signed the Executive order that revoked the exact scientific research that could have done this.
President Obama has a voting record that repeatedly opposed no-brainer, pro-life legislation (Born Alive Infant Protection Act) that passed the US Congress without a single dissenting vote.
Why is it that he can say one thing and simply do the opposite without any comments from the media. His repeated declaration of working along side republicans and being for alternate types of scientific endeavors in stem cell research is just a lie.
The bioethicist Wesley J. Smith pondered the question on why Obama would do this and on his blog; he wondered why on earth Obama would take the totally unnecessary action in undoing Executive order 13435. Smith’s conclusion: “I can think of only two reasons for this action…First, vindictiveness against all things "Bush" or policies considered by the Left to be "pro life;" and second, a desire to get the public to see unborn human life as a mere corn crop ripe for the harvest. So much for taking the politics out of science.”
Obama’s actions are extremely hypocritical and demonstrate that his language about respect, inclusion, and unity are, in fact, just words.
I guess now that he has been elected, Obama has suddenly been graced with the knowledge of when life begins even though it was “above his pay grade” just a few short months ago!!!
After the signing, Obama congratulated his administration for having the sophistication to ensure that scientific decisions are “based on facts, not ideology.”
But in the last paragraph of this Executive Order, you see that the previous Executive order 13435 is revoked.
THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release March 9, 2009
EXECUTIVE ORDER
- - - - - - -
REMOVING BARRIERS TO RESPONSIBLE SCIENTIFICRESEARCH INVOLVING HUMAN STEM CELLS
By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered as follows:
Section 1. Policy. Research involving human embryonic stem cells and human non-embryonic stem cells has the potential to lead to better understanding and treatment of many disabling diseases and conditions. Advances over the past decade in this promising scientific field have been encouraging, leading to broad agreement in the scientific community that the research should be supported by Federal funds.
For the past 8 years, the authority of the Department of Health and Human Services, including the National Institutes of Health (NIH), to fund and conduct human embryonic stem cell research has been limited by Presidential actions. The purpose of this order is to remove these limitations on scientific inquiry, to expand NIH support for the exploration of human stem cell research, and in so doing to enhance the contribution of America's scientists to important new discoveries and new therapies for the benefit of humankind.
Sec. 2. Research. The Secretary of Health and Human Services (Secretary), through the Director of NIH, may support and conduct responsible, scientifically worthy human stem cell research, including human embryonic stem cell research, to the extent permitted by law.
Sec. 3. Guidance. Within 120 days from the date of this order, the Secretary, through the Director of NIH, shall review existing NIH guidance and other widely recognized guidelines on human stem cell research, including provisions establishing appropriate safeguards, and issue new NIH guidance on such research that is consistent with this order. The Secretary, through NIH, shall review and update such guidance periodically, as appropriate.
Sec. 4. General Provisions. (a) This order shall be implemented consistent with applicable law and subject to the availability of appropriations.
(b) Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:
(i) authority granted by law to an executive department, agency, or the head thereof; or
(ii) functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.
(c) This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity, by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.
(d) Sec. 5. Revocations. (a) The Presidential statement of August 9, 2001, limiting Federal funding for research involving human embryonic stem cells, shall have no further effect as a statement of governmental policy.
(b) Executive Order 13435 of June 20, 2007, which supplements the August 9, 2001, statement on human embryonic stem cell research, is revoked.
BARACK OBAMA
THE WHITE HOUSE,
March 9, 2009.
Executive order 13435 had to do with support and funding for research that utilized non-embryonic cells and included the groundbreaking research to convert ordinary human cells into ones that resemble embryonic stem cells.
You will remember that in 2007, scientists in Japan and the US discovered they could engineer human skin cells to mimic embryonic stem cell. This could allow the scientific community to probe the benefits of these cells without actually destroying human embryos.
To most people, this development rendered the controversy moot, and vindicated President Bush’s moral and ethical caution. This was an enormous scientific step forward that all observers should support.
HHS/NIH Plan for Implementation of Executive Order 13435
On June 20, 2007, President George W. Bush issued Executive Order 13435. The Executive Order requires that "The Secretary of Health and Human Services shall conduct and support research on the isolation, derivation, production, and testing of stem cells that are capable of producing all or almost all of the cell types of the developing body and may result in improved understanding of or treatments for diseases and other adverse health conditions, but are derived without creating a human embryo for research purposes or destroying, discarding, or subjecting to harm a human embryo or fetus."
The Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has tasked the National Institutes of Health (NIH) with the responsibility to develop a plan to implement the Executive Order. You can download the implementation plan
So right after Obama told the country he supported alternative, non-destructive stem cell research, he signed the Executive order that revoked the exact scientific research that could have done this.
President Obama has a voting record that repeatedly opposed no-brainer, pro-life legislation (Born Alive Infant Protection Act) that passed the US Congress without a single dissenting vote.
Why is it that he can say one thing and simply do the opposite without any comments from the media. His repeated declaration of working along side republicans and being for alternate types of scientific endeavors in stem cell research is just a lie.
The bioethicist Wesley J. Smith pondered the question on why Obama would do this and on his blog; he wondered why on earth Obama would take the totally unnecessary action in undoing Executive order 13435. Smith’s conclusion: “I can think of only two reasons for this action…First, vindictiveness against all things "Bush" or policies considered by the Left to be "pro life;" and second, a desire to get the public to see unborn human life as a mere corn crop ripe for the harvest. So much for taking the politics out of science.”
Obama’s actions are extremely hypocritical and demonstrate that his language about respect, inclusion, and unity are, in fact, just words.
I guess now that he has been elected, Obama has suddenly been graced with the knowledge of when life begins even though it was “above his pay grade” just a few short months ago!!!
Labels: Obama, politics, stem cells
posted by Anonymous at 5:40 AM
7 Comments:
Very appropriate timing as Charles Krauthammer just published an op-ed in the courier journal today. Highlights from his commentary are as follows:
That part of the ceremony, watched from the safe distance of my office, made me uneasy. The other part -- the ostentatious issuance of a memorandum on "restoring scientific integrity to government decision-making" -- would have made me walk out
Restoring? The implication, of course, is that while Obama is guided solely by science, Bush was driven by dogma, ideology and politics.
What an outrage. Bush's nationally televised stem cell speech was the most morally serious address on medical ethics ever given by an American president. It was so scrupulous in presenting the best case for both his view and the contrary view that until the last few minutes, the listener had no idea where Bush would come out.
Obama's address was morally unserious in the extreme. It was populated, as his didactic discourses always are, with a forest of straw men. Such as his admonition that we must resist the "false choice between sound science and moral values." Yet, exactly 2 minutes and 12 seconds later he went on to declare that he would never open the door to the "use of cloning for human reproduction."
Does he not think that a cloned human would be of extraordinary scientific interest? And yet he banned it.
Is he so obtuse not to see that he had just made a choice of ethics over science? Yet, unlike Bush, who painstakingly explained the balance of ethical and scientific goods he was trying to achieve, Obama did not even pretend to make the case why some practices are morally permissible and others not.
This is not just intellectual laziness. It is the moral arrogance of a man who continuously dismisses his critics as ideological while he is guided exclusively by pragmatism (in economics, social policy, foreign policy) and science in medical ethics.
Science has everything to say about what is possible. Science has nothing to say about what is permissible. Obama's pretense that he will "restore science to its rightful place" and make science, not ideology, dispositive in moral debates is yet more rhetorical sleight of hand -- this time to abdicate decision-making and color his own ideological preferences as authentically "scientific."
well, if nothing else, you are going to have plenty of items to create to talk about for the next 8 years.
Rush would be so proud of you!
Executive Order 13435 did not provide additional funding for any type of alternative research. It forbid for certain types of research.
Likewise, this new order does nothing to limit support or funding for alternative research. In fact, the very first sentence in the new order states that research involving non-embryonic stem cells has potential.
To suggest that President Obama has somehow restricted alternative research related to stem cells or even chosen embryonic research over non-embryonic is incorrect. This new order allows existing federal funding to be used for either as opposed to just one.
Further, Executive Order 13435 contained language that forbade embryonic stem cell research. If both executive orders were allowed to coexist, they would stand in direct conflict with each other.
It would be like saying the speed limit is 55 and 75 along the same stretch of road at the same time which is nonsensical.
Apparently, when President Obama referenced the importance of using facts in opposition to blinding ideology, there was some truth to it.
bluegill,
Once again you misrepresent the facts. The executive order did open the door for government subsidy for the alternative research.
In addition, your example of speed limits is also incorrect. There are many stretches of highways where the speed limit is 70 MPH for cars and 65 MPH for trucks.
Both executive orders could co-exist with the proper wording and authority if Obama wasn't such an idealogical hypocrite.
How about more hypocrisy from Obama and his staff.
Senator Barack Obama received a $101,332 bonus from American International Group in the form of political contributions according to Opensecrets.org. The two biggest Congressional recipients of bonuses from the A.I.G. are - Senators Chris Dodd and Senator Barack Obama.
Here's the hope and change bluegill voted for!
Once again you misrepresent the facts. The executive order did open the door for government subsidy for the alternative research.
Funding for alternative research was allowed before Executive Order 13435, during it, and now, after it's been revoked. Nothing has changed in that arena, other than allowing the scientists involved, rather than the President, to decide which type of research should be given priority.
In addition, your example of speed limits is also incorrect. There are many stretches of highways where the speed limit is 70 MPH for cars and 65 MPH for trucks.
Yes, but there are no stretches where the speed limit is both 70 and 65 for cars or both 70 and 65 for trucks. That was my point.
Both executive orders could co-exist with the proper wording and authority if Obama wasn't such an idealogical hypocrite.
While campaigning for office, President Obama said he would overturn the restrictions on embryonic stem cell research issued by President Bush. A majority of the American public supported overturning those restrictions. He overturned them. How is that hypocritical?
The hypocrisy is not in this particular reversal. The hypocrisy is in the fact he claims to value life when his voting record is the most extreme pro-abortion candidate who has ever become president.
His opposition to legislation protecting born-alive failed abortions and his support of partial birth abortions are just two examples.
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