As soon as the White House announced on Thursday afternoon, Aug. 9, that President George W. Bush would make a nationally televised speech that evening regarding federal funding of stem cell research, newspapers, TV, and the Internet courted the story, complete with voyeuristic views of eggs pricked with a new set of genetic instructions. Along with the latest news, we were also stuffed with the usual pontifications from preening pundits and science wonk wannabees. Nobody was sheepish about expressing opinions, no matter how "unseminal."
Bush's decision to narrowly support stem cell research also pushed a related event off page one. Gathered earlier in the week at the behest of the National Academy of Sciences in Washington, an army of physicians, researchers, and ethicists tackled the propriety and feasibility of human cloning for therapeutic and reproductive purposes.
With all the coverage, cloning and stem cells probably fertilized conversation over many a ...
