Big Biotech Gorges at the Larder
The following blog was written by Wesley Smith on the January 13 edition of First Things.
Investor's Business Daily opines that Proposition 71 has been a failure. From its editorial:
"California's Proposition 71 was intended to create a $3 billion West Coast counterpart to the National Institutes of Health, empowered to go where the NIH could not — either because of federal policy or funding restraints on biomedical research centered on human embryonic stem cells…Five years later, embryonic stem cell research has failed to deliver and backers of Prop 71 are admitting failure. The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, the state agency created to, as some have put it, restore science to its rightful place, is diverting funds from embryonic stem cell research to research that has produced actual therapies and treatments: adult stem cell research. It not only has treated real people with real results; it also does not come with the moral baggage embryonic stem cell research does.
"To us, this is a classic bait-and-switch, an attempt to snatch success from the jaws of failure and take credit for discoveries and advances achieved by research Prop. 71 supporters once cavalierly dismissed. We have noted how over the years that when funding was needed, the phrase "embryonic stem cells" was used. When actual progress was discussed, the word "embryonic" was dropped because embryonic stem cell research never got out of the lab."
The Investor's Business Daily speaks truth about how the science is turning out, although I think it is certainly way premature to say that embryonic stem cell research will not eventually advance toward the clinic.
But if the Investor's Business Daily is right in the narrow sense, it misses the big picture. The sad fact is that Proposition 71 was a smashing success that splendidly served the broader purpose for which it was brought forth. Using outrageous hype–little children getting out of their wheelchairs, etc.–its designers saw it both as a political hammer with which to concuss President Bush (only bruising him) and, more importantly, as a way by which to grab a permanent seat at the table of power for the Science Establishment.
And it worked. Big Biotech and "The Scientists" are now big league political players gorging at the larder filled with the people's money.
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