The American Spectator

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Special Report

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To their credit, many in the media along with other ESC boosters have admitted ACT and Nature took them for a ride. These include Senators Arlen Specter, R-Pa., and Tom Harkin, D-Iowa., authors of a bill President Bush vetoed this year that would have expanded ESC research funding. Specter, chairman of the Senate subcommittee that holds the health and medical research purse strings, told officials of the company it had not accomplished "what you told the world." He added, "We have representation which created a lot of hopes...and now they appear to be dashed."

But ACT propagandist, er, uh, ethicist Ronald Green leapt to the company's defense. "The approach does not harm embryos; the experiment did," Green insisted. (Right. And "I didn't kill the victim;" the shooter said, "the bullets did!") An utterly unrepentant Lanza tossed off the backlash criticism as merely indicative of how politicized stem cell research has become. Now there's something he knows about.

Lanza has always been more salesman than scientist, constantly inveighing against the federal funding restrictions that restrict the growth of his bank account. Yet the media treat him as an impartial source on all things stem cell. Welcome to the world of ESC "science" -- about 10% research and 90% hype.

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