Dear fellow progressives:
May I please have a moment of your time to tell you about an exciting Congressional race in Florida?
I'm Faye Armitage in Fruit Cove, FL, and I'm running to represent Florida's 7th Congressional District, which stretches in six counties, from the Jacksonville/Duval County line to Orlando. I've already driven some 18,000 miles and worn out two pairs of shoes getting nearly 6,000 petitions signed, meeting voters who tell me they're ready for change, from City Hall to the White House to Congress.
Republicans thought they had successfully gerrymandered Florida's Seventh Congrssional District, but Charlie Cook's rating and other campaign polls show a Democrat can win here, which would also help the entire Democratic ticket in Northeast Florida.
For those of you still clinging to the thought that New Jersey might come through for human embryonic stem cell research, here is more evidence that the New Jersey Program is NOT about embryonic stem cell research at all:
Moore and her husband, Ihor Lemischka, now director of the Black Family Stem Cell Institute at Mt. Sinai, recently left Princeton University after nearly two decades. "We were concerned with the direction that the New Jersey effort was headed, and the lack of prominent stem cell biologists in New Jersey."
Ihor Lemischka was the ONLY 2006 NJ grant recipient for hESCR out of 17 grants awarded that year, yet he has chosen to leave for NY after nearly two decades in New Jersey.
I am convinced that what is happening in New Jersey will keep my son in his wheelchair longer than necessary.
For years, I thought the pro-lifers were at fault, but now the "establishment" pro-hESCR ( human embryonic stem cell research) folks have joined them.
Please pass this message on to Michael J. Fox.
Clearly we are very much being misled in New Jersey by establishment Democrats.
How am I going to tell my son, we've been used, exploited, to build up the positive message of hESCR, to instead garner $$$ for adult stem cell research in New Jersey?
My son Jason, was only 7 years old when he became paralyzed from the nose down after colliding with another soccer player. While his four sisters' lives have moved forward, now at age 17, Jason is feeling terribly left behind.
You've probably heard of the $450 million Bond issue in New Jersey that will be voted on in 21 days, right?
You probably also know by now that I am a very active embryonic stem cell research activist with no ties to corporatism. It is therefor that I come to you to warn you that the pro-embryonic stem cell research hype in NJ is just that: HYPE!
While all of us were thinking the BLUE state of New Jersey would come through for us, an adult stem cell researcher by the name of Dr. Young and others including Assemblyman Neil Cohen(D) have led new Jersey heavily into Adult Stem Cell Research, while touting embryonic stem cell research at every opportunity they get.
So far in New Jersey Adult Stem Cell Research vs Embryonic Stem Cell Research has been funded 9 to 1. Why trust them to do better for embryonic Stem Cell Research with the tax payer dollars they hope to get their hands on if the $450 million bond issue passes in 21 days?
The Incredible inefficiency of the private market.
Bet you didn't expect an economist like myself to say this about the private market running our health care system, but Sicko makes it abundantly clear that the market system fails us in providing our population the most inexpensive and high quality care that you'd expect from a free market based system.
That's because basic healthcare never was meant to be a consumer good but rather it has always been a common good as evidenced by other market based industrialized nations which uniformly provide universal healthcare to their citizens.
Below the fold I'll explain how to debunk the "market based is better" talking point fed to us courtesy of the insurance and pharmaceutical industry.
Bush's supreme bullsh*t on stem cell research has got to stop. Bush's policies insist on a lifetime of misery or death for the sake of religious and moral zealots clinging to control.
I found some very targeted words from JFK to inspire us to break away from Bush and his enablers' deliberate and deadly nonsense in obstructing embryonic stem cell research.
Let's go back to a time when leadership and vision still meant something.
Many complaints have been made in past diaries pointing to little difference between democrats and republicans in policy making, because of their corporate ties.
So I bet few will be shocked to hear about the ploys used by democrats in New Jersey to paint their state as an embryonic stem cell research friendly state.
Just like the MSM buys into Bush's claim that he's the first president to fund embryonic stem cell research, they are just as happy to make out New Jersey is funding significant amounts of embryonic stem cell research, while quite the opposite is actually true.
Now, let's delve into how the democrats in New Jersey are mimicking Bush,........playing a dirty game of pretending to be an embryonic stem cell research friendly state with help from the MSM.
The CNN reporter Heidi Collins got it right when she responded to Dr Morrone's answer:
COLLINS: Yes, understood. What should happen to this hospital staff? We do know that the chief medical officer and one nurse were fired, and we also know, of course, that the investigation is continuing. What should happened here?
MORRONE: I see the federal government using what they like to use as the big stick -- fines. When they look at a hospital, they say you get so much Medicare and Medicaid money, and that's all federal payment for your services, that they withhold the payment as a penalty, and I wouldn't put it past somebody to say, oh by the way, everything that you billed us in 2005 and 2006, we want it all back. You've hit them where it hurts.
COLLINS: Well, unfortunately, the people who are hurt the most then is that community where this may be the only medical facility where they can seek treatment.
Edith Isabel Rodriguez's preventable death while begging for help in the ER, brought back our own gut wrenching memories, of when I took my then 7 year old son to the ER ten years ago, only to experience the same type of devastating neglect, which left him in coma six hours later.
For the second time this year the House voted to expand stem cell research allowing the National Institutes of Health ( NIH) to fund research on hundreds of newer and better embryonic stem cell lines. In the past 6 years, NIH funding was permitted only for research on 11 old, Bush approved pre-2001 embryonic stem cell lines.
Bush had cruelly crushed the hopes of over 100 million americans who are suffering from debilitating and deadly medical conditions, by issueing an executive order in 2001 limiting NIH funding to what he believed were over 70 stem cell lines which had been created up until then.
Like the claimed weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, Bush's 70 stem cell lines however proved non-existent save for 22 stem cell lines identified by the NIH in 2003, of which only 11 turned out to be somewhat useful for research.
Thus Bush's weapons of mass deception where famously employed in the carefully crafted "balanced" approach which was billed as allowing some embryonic stem cell research, while discouraging any future "destruction" of embryos.
Today, he took time away from his G-8 meetings to give us another cruel "moral" lesson on the science of embryonic stem cell research.
Jonathan Tasini has a terrific commentary in the Huffington Post on Cerberus taking over Chrysler's $18 billion obligation for health care and pensions for employees and retirees, after its split from Damler-Benz. Tasini comments about the New York Times carrying the typical storyline of American auto companies in trouble caused by "generous" benefits to auto workers. He then cleverly puts these "benefits' in perspective by saying:
Health care is a big cost item---but, if the auto industry (not to mention the rest of corporate America and many of our political leaders) could get past ideology and focus on economics, there would be a much better solution: a single-payer health care system. If Cerberus wants to make a ton of money, its genius leaders should become immediate advocates for a single-payer system.
Let's remind ourselves of what Tasini means by Single-Payer Healthcare system, as the easiest and most straight forward universal healthcare plan.
S 30, which calls for the development of future embryonic stem cell lines from "dead embryos" is being rediculed by leading scientists.
"The scientific community is just laughing at this," said Thomas Okarma, chief executive of Geron, a company based in Menlo Park, Calif., that says it is close to starting the first U.S. human tests of a therapy based on embryonic stem cells. Even if live cells could be isolated from embryos that everyone might agree are dead, he said, such cells would be especially likely to be abnormal.
"I couldn't imagine using these for a therapeutic product," Okarma said.
The irony is that not a single embryo was lost in the war against disease thus far. The 300+ already existing embryonic stem cell lines, which are currently not eligible for federally funded research, were developed from medical waste, much like the way we recycle umbilical cord blood stem cells from medical waste.
Why does the MSM insist on calling ESCR detour bills: "compromise" measures?
The Senate will consider two bills, one virtually identical to a bill vetoed by President George W. Bush last year that would have expanded and encouraged federal funding of human embryonic stem cell research.
The other is a compromise measure worked out by Republicans Sen. Johnny Isakson of Georgia and Norm Coleman of Minnesota. It would encourage stem cell research on embryos that.....have died "naturally" during fertility treatments.
Yeah, sure......I know what we are compromising here: it's the lives of millions of americans who suffer incurable and deadly conditions who simply cannot afford to wait, with lengthy detours including funding for various types of adult stem cells instead of legitimate federal support for embryonic stem cell research.
The complexity of the provisions in S30 is a deliberate attempt to derail ESCR. And this bill in No Way deserves to be called a "compromise" bill by the MSM. As a matter of fact we must STOP S 30 altogether. Tell your Senators you want them to VOTE NO!!
Hurray to Connecticut for awarding $20 million in grants to fund 21 research projects at universities in the state. The grants went exclusively to embryonic stem cell research projects!!!
This kind of commitment to embryonic stem cell research is really commendable, and sharply contrasts with what may be happening in New York, and what has already happened in New Jersey. Embryonic Stem Cell Research advocates should be leery about politicians and/or researchers who work to fund embryonic stem cell research in name only.
An important lesson to take from the opponents of embryonic stem cell research is that, though they are very much in the minority ( only 30% of the american population), they wield enormous power. Why is that?
Well, we all know the answer lies with the well-organized religious right.
In dealing with legislators as Don Reed says in today's message at Stem Cell Battles: "The opposition, is enthusiastic, and they flood their friends with support, and barrage their opponents."
The 70% of americans who support embryonic stem cell research will have to do the same and become more vocal.
That includes the bio-medical industry as well as the grassroots advocates: "we need to voice our support for ESCR friends in the House and the Senate, and barrage our opponents in both Houses!!"
For the first time in six years, the issue of ESCR ( embryonic stem cell research) got no mention in the president's State of the Union address, even though there had been considerable focus in the press about Michael J. Fox being invited by Rep. Langevin.
I still remember how the cameras panned to Dana Reeve during the State of the Union address in 2005. She was there to draw attention to the ESCR issue and the untimely death of her husband, Christopher Reeve. Then in 2006, Dana herself lost her battle with cancer, and we sadly lost another high profile activist on behalf of ESCR.
So why did Bush avoid mention of ESCR in his State of the Union address this time?
