This latest public gaffe doesn't shock or surprise me in the least - he is a fruitcake and that's the kind of think fruitcakes do; just as when he was caught on camera, during commercial break, grabbing the back of Maria Pope's sweater (David Letterman's producer) and using it to clean his glasses. :roll:

What does surprise me is that he just exercised his first Presidential veto, after 6 years of being a Congressional rubber stamp, to veto federally funded stem cell research. Not that this stops other countries from doing it mind you, but this is an area that the US could be a very big player with all the brain power and bucks there, bringing the fruits of this international research effort to bear that much sooner now.

Nor does it stop private industry from working with stem cells.

New Orleans; couldn't evacuate its people,
U.S. couldn't evacuate its people from Lebenon.

The lesson seems to be do not let Gov't do things tha private industry can do better ala Halibutron, MicroSoft, US Steel, General Motors, the Mom and Pop down the road.

That certainly isn't the lesson. Private industry doesn't do things better than government just because America has no real social safety net. If anything private industry has proven to be inefficient in doing anything except that which is profitable to them. Since the American government these days is being led by CEOs (along with many other govts) and is behaving in the best interests of, surprise!, their close associates the good of the people is left in the dust. Plenty of governments do a bang up job of taking care of its citizens. The US is just so conservative that the second you spend a dollar not on the military you are a heathen.

Here's the thing I have trouble making sense out of though: Bush's spokesman, Tony Snow, when answering why the President vetoed the stem cell research bill, explained it this way "the simple answer is he thinks murder is wrong". Okay, that's fine, I think murder is wrong too.

But why is it only murder if the federal government conducts stem cell research, since as you say, private industry is free to work with stem cells. Or is it that private industry is now allowed to commit murder? I mean, which is it?

Another Fella who wants others to make up for his inability to do for him self or his loved ones.

Thank you for your contribution.

I take it you are a proponent of the free market?

Another social-darwinist who doesn't give a crap about human suffering caused only by circumstance and not personal ability.

Thank you for your contribution.

I haven't heard Tony Snow on this topic, but this is my take on it, if you don't mind.

Stem Cell research in its self isn't the issue (I think it should be pursued with the utmost speed). The problem comes from where the stem cell are harvested and who should pay for the harvesting and research.

As of the year 2000, the U.S. Gov't reports 25,000 abortions a day in the U.S.
Some folks consider this to be the murder of the un-born, as opposed to the protection of a persons fourth amendment right to privacy as the Supreme Court ruled in Roe v. Wade. Today the abortions performed under the Roe v. Wade decision are not funded by the U.S. Gov't, but by contributions to private organization (read corporations).

That is how I see it.

Okay, you bring up an interesting point there. Given that murder in the U.S. is illegal, and that under Roe V. Wade the court ruled, in effect, that abortion was legal and therefore not murder, then, one's personal feelings aside there is no "murder" involved anywhere in the equation of stemcell research whether private or public.

As it stands now, those 25,000 aborted fetuses are medical waste, no matter what one's views on abortion are since it is legal and occuring anyway - unless some of them could be salvaged, and put to good use, through stem cell research. The US Congress and Senate voted in favour of this, while the President used his first ever veto to kill this bill.

The breakthroughs will come anyway, the momentum is there everywhere else, just not from the federal government that once upon a time had the vision to put a man on the moon. I don't get it. Sorry, I just don't.

What you don't get is that Bush doesn't care about the law or what is in the public good. He's following a blind path. He doesn't care what the courts say. He thinks that they're biased to towards the left. He probably considers Roe v. Wade to be a mistake or a Liberal conspiracy that was somehow allowed to get past when the Democrats were in control. Bush is fighting against the society he was elected to guard. Its funny really. Right wingers are always talking about the Left's desire to be social-engineers. Bush is counteracting the will of the two elected bodies of legislation to make sure what HE believes is right happens regardless of the will of the people. Who's the Social Engineer now?

You don't think I know that? :lol: You are preaching to the choir my friend, stick around and read some of my own posts here ;)

Forgive me. I am just used to having to actually argue the point that Bush is a joke.

No prob - been there, many times. Expect some flames from the unconditional flag wavers for daring to criticize the American Emperor but there's a few of us here who have your back. :)

I consider myself a socialist. Thus I am long since aclimated to life among the minority.:up:

I thought it was the MicroSoft Empire.

Ya'll are full of sour grapes.

What does that even mean? And its you that sounds sour.