In an otherwise useful fact-checking article on claims made during the stem cell debate in Congress, Wired News endorses the misleading "ban" rhetoric of John Kerry and other supporters of embryonic stem cell research:
"There is no ban at the present time on research in this country on embryonic stem cells." -- Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Oklahoma)
Misleading. While it's technically true that no law bans embryonic stem-cell research, current administration policies have had much the same effect as a ban. Under an executive order, no federal funding can be used for research on embryonic stem-cell lines that were created after 9 p.m. on Aug. 9, 2001. That has had the practical result of stymieing U.S. embryonic stem-cell research, and is one of the main reasons HR810 was drafted in the first place.
This is awful fact-checking. A citizen who hears the claim that there is a ban on stem cell research will infer that it is legally prohibited (as in the definition of ban: "to prohibit especially by legal means"). That is simply not accurate. Whether Bush's policy makes private research difficult or not, it is more than "technically true" to say that no ban exists. The correct statement is that federally funded research is limited to certain embryonic stem cell lines. People who summarize this as a "ban" without clarifying their meaning are being misleading.
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