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Stem Cell Research in a Judge's Hands
deman1985 wrote to mention a San Francisco Chronicle article discussing the future of stem cell research in California. The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine has had a suit filed against it for doling out money to stem cell research groups, and the future of the organization is now in the hands of the Judge on the case. From the article: "The taxpayers groups said that at least five members of the 29-member board have conflicts because they are University of California officials and the school's various campuses have already applied for stem cell grants. Others on the board are biotechnology executives and investors whose investments could benefit from stem cell grants."
"Others on the board are biotechnology executives and investors whose investments could benefit from stem cell grants."
Meanwhile, the people who will benefit the most from stem cell research must continue to suffer disabilities while governments and special interest groups keep beating each other with their dicks!
Havn't traveled much have you. The world over is filled with pretemptious a holes. The europeans might not be as obsessed with sex and religious stuff, but trust me, that are just as bad when it comes to stuff that don't fit into their norm. Czech friend explain it this way. They are just as racist and bigited as Americans, they just don't know it, because they almost never have to deal with someone whos not like them.
As far as I can tell, the stem cell agency was created as much as a backhand to Bush for not supporting stem cell work on a federal level as it was to actually get some work done. Well, the work isn't getting done.
Personally, I'd like to see some good come of this. Unfortunately, when a public agency is born out of controversy, unified support is hard to come by.
"Eve of Destruction", it's not just for old hippies anymore...
The judge will hopefully rule in favor of stalling this. Prop 71 uses taxpayer funds and this will never go away. Even though it's s'posed to expire in 10 years, it will keep getting renewed and we CA taxpayers get to foot the bill. More CA spent on research that may go nowhere. The fact that embrionic stem cell research isn't largely funded elsewhere in the world should be a big hint that the controversy isn't just religious. The private sector doesn't want to invest in this. That should speak volumes about even the scientific community's faith (pardon the pun) in embrionic stem cell research.
As far as CA judges go, they CONSTANTLY overturn voter approved initiatives. Prop 187, passed in 1994, forbids funding for just about anything for illegal immigrants. But a judge overturned it, and this is just one of many bills passed by whopping margins that a judge has said "no way" to.
It's sad the $3 billion of tax payer funds won't go to adult stem cell research, where the results have been forthcoming. There's been
Of course, most of those studies are funded already. Maybe it's because venture capitalists don't want to throw good money at bad research. Sadly, the CA taxpayer does.
Religous people trying to stop research.
Or people with a sense of fiscal responsibility perhaps? Nice anti-religion troll.
I have no problem with Stem Cell Research. In fact, I think it should be encouraged and funded with public dollars (as long as the public funding it gets the royalties, patents, or benefits - not private corporations). However, this was a ballot measure in California to distribute billions of dollars to a new research institute with virtually no oversight. It isn't part of an existing California State Agency, it is its own ambiguous entity with required funding levels outside of any state-run controls. Already, the fiscal irresponsibility of this program has been proven by their choise for location: one of the highest rent districts in California, San Francisco. (Remember the dot-com stupidity?)
California is already running a budget that is aproximately $15,000,000,000 in deficit. This program would tack on several billion dollars more in state spending a year. It is fiscally irresponsible and was passed entirely as a "feel-good" measure and played exclusively off of general anti-Bush sentiments in the California voting public. How, and who it allocates funds to isn't clearly defined. Ownership of any technologies produced through its programs isn't clearly defined. It doesn't have clear goals other than the broad term "stem cell research". It has an enormous budget, without restrictions, and without oversight controls for abuses. It is, in short, a money pit.
It was a bad ballot measure, pure and simple.
California is problematic, in that it keeps passing mandatory expenditures through ballot proposals, therebye completely bypassing both the legislature and the governator and causing huge unforseen consequences. (For another great example of this, take a look at "Proposition 13" which locked in property taxes and has completely screwed up school and other local funding, and is now nearly impossible to fix or overturn).
I'm out of my mind right now, but feel free to leave a message.....
If scientists were allocating $3 billion in public funds for research then I doubt that embryonic stem cell research would be allocated very much. Energy research would be the highest priority. The demand for Bush bashing is far higher than the actual demand for embryonic stem cell research. The proposition was also sold on many false promises, like the promise that the research would pay for itself. If their promises were true than there would be no need for public funding. There are also constitutional problems with open meetings, conflict of interest, and the use of tax-exempt bonds for taxable assets.
We would be much better off if the funds raised to pass the initiative had been used for research instead.
There are a lot of stem cells out there. There is no actual need to use embryonic cells. The popular press and most people think of the two as the same thing, they are not, one is specific, the other is general. There is a clear cut and obvious (and quite dangerous) slippery slope using embryos, so it is better to focus research on all the other sources.