Embryonic stem cell research: the blood trail of progress

By Paul A. Ibbetson

With a recent federal appeals court decision temporarily lifting the ban on embryonic stem cell research, the question of destroying a life to save a life is again thrust back into the realm of public debate. As reported by medical AP writer Lauran Neergaard, the National Institutes of Health will rapidly resume embryonic stem cell research as well as remove holds on grants and contracts allowing the use of embryonic stem cells.

The stance from the White House on this debate has been predictable. Former President George W. Bush's position against federal funding for embryonic stem cell research was a part of his pro-life stance and heavily based on his religious belief in the sanctity of life. Barack Obama, the president who said in 2008 at a rally in Pennsylvania that if his daughters ever made the mistake of getting pregnant he would not want them "punished with a baby," has predictably taken the modern liberal stance on this issue in support of federal funding for embryonic stem cell research.

Those that advocate the federal funding of embryonic stem cell research attempt to wrap their argument within the notion of helping society. Who doesn't want to do that? In fact, if we believe the rhetoric from our recent past, like the bold words of John Edwards, who alluded to the fact that if embryonic stem cells could not make us supermen, they could at least make "Superman" actor Christopher Reeve rise up and walk after being paralyzed, it would almost be cruel to refuse such miracles so close at hand. Of course, if embryonic stem cell cures did not happen, it would not be because the science was not there, or would never be there, but because narrow-minded individuals like George W. Bush lacked the understanding to allow the careful and restrained usage of stem cells in limited situations like embryos discarded by patients of in vitro fertilization clinics. So much was to be gained if we had the will to bring this brave new world to fruition.

Of course those that accept this premise have not only bought into the John Edwards lies of instant embryonic cell miracles but also the much darker lie that comes from prioritizing one life over another. To get a sobering look at the deadly progression that comes from degrading life for societal improvement, two names come to the forefront in modern times: Margaret Sanger and Adolf Hitler. Margaret Sanger wrote the book "The Pivot of Civilization," which is so full of eugenic madness that even the organization she founded, Planned Parenthood, has to distance itself from its very pages. It is a frightening book to say the least. Sanger wished for society to be free of the feebleminded and their tendencies toward poor economic status and societal violation. Her answer: society would never suffer from the ills of the mentally defective if those individuals never existed. Instead of embryonic stem cell miracles, selective breeding would bring about societal improvement if we were enlightened enough to grasp it. What was the natural progression of these eugenic beliefs? Not just Planned Parenthood, an organization that specializes in death, but a government that forces its citizens to pay for its operation.

Margaret Sanger's book preceded Adolf Hitler's racial eugenics piece in "Mein Kampf," but they are solidly compatible with their focus on eradicating what they believed were out-of-control, undesirable elements in society. We all know from history that the progression of purifying Germany came in the form of the "Final Solution," which just happens to be not too far from the mentality of Sanger's modern day Planned Parenthood which teaches, "eradicate what is not desired."

Sanger and Hitler were truly sister and brother to a common set of eugenic values. Both treated those they designated as defective as less than human, inconsequential and tainted. One focused on intelligence and the other on race, but when it came to the cold calculations, from Sanger's desire for quarantines and forced sterilizations to Hitler's usage of intern camps, both embraced their blood trail of progress. This eugenics mentality lives and its natural progression is seen today in the modern abortionists who help female teens fit better into their prom dresses or avoid missing spring break. It is seen in the zero-growth environmentalists who calculate the value of babies as having no more worth than any other natural resource. It is a deadly progression of cruelty in which the most brutal actions are depicted as societal improvements. Sanger's morons beget Hitler's troublesome Jews which beget Obama's idea of punishment, which ultimately beget the embryonic stem cell industry waiting to go full bore.

What common factor has been missing throughout this entire observation? What critical void exists in this debate that allows those that advocate degrees of value for human existence to entertain credibility? The missing piece, the all-important component that has allowed, and continues to allow, such abominations that encapsulate the embryonic stem cell debate is the self-imposed absence of God. When God becomes part of the debate, life becomes sacred and murder becomes sin, not a matter of choice or the restructuring of society. If the current debate on embryonic stem cell usage remains an issue dictated by science alone, its progression may find an ending point worse than past atrocities.

© Paul A. Ibbetson