Talk:Stem cell/Archive 2

message: It seems idiotic to me to mention what a losing presidential candidate promised.  I thought wikipedia is supposed to maintain a NPV?  Do we mention what Bob Dole promised in 1996 or Mondale in 1984 or Goldwater, etc.???  Just take out the Kerry stuff or put it on his page.  The fact that he lost means his opinion is useless here (unless he leads some senate fight, etc. regarding stem cells).
: I'd argue that what is important is: John Kerry and the Democratic party's opposing Republican policy during the most recent US presedential election brought the debate back to lead status in the nightly news, after a few years of relative quiet.  Key45 01:12, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: In general, I completely disagree with your opinion that the platform of a losing candidate is not relevant. I think they often are. My personal opinion about John Kerry is, however, not relevant. In fact, I think Bob Dole's platform in 1996 and Walter Mondale's in 1984 on certain issues are relevant too. Debates over issues do not happen in a vaccuum of history. A story about the flat tax without a mention of Jerry Brown's position in 1992 and Steve Forbes's position in 1996 would hardly do the subject justice (note: our article did not mention either of these men and their highly visible positions: I have since added a paragraph on it). A history of the gold standard would be quite remiss if it did [not] mention that William Jennings Bryan (who lost the presidential race three times) made the removal of the gold standard in the U.S. as one of his core issues, giving one of the most famous speeches in U.S. history on the subject (the "Cross of gold speech"). Bryan was defeated, but he was later vindicated in spades many years later by Richard Nixon, who completely removed the gold backing of U.S. currency. Issues don't go away. It's important for history to record who advocated what, even if it did [not] become policy immediately. Defeated candidates and their ideas sometimes ring loudly through history and emerge victorious in the long run. Even when they don't (as the flat tax advocates so far have not), it is very much worth mentioning. Stem cell research, and its complications, will certainly not go away soon. It is, in my opinion, very much worth mentioning that Kerry made certain changes in policy about it part of his platform. -- Decumanus 02:34, 2004 Nov 9 (UTC)
Added some missing negatives in []. Please check. Mr. Jones 17:45, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Why Mention John Kerry? 

message: The several references to a "ban" are misleading.
Clinton banned all federal funding for embryonic stem cell research in 1996.  In 2001, the Bush administration reversed the earlier ban with respect to existing embryonic stem cell lines.
:See my response to this topic at #Presidential_and_Congressional_Background_to_Stem_Cell_Research
:The ban was from the congressional Dickey Amendment.  The funding process for embryonic stem cell research was started under Clinton when we he published his guidelines.  Some critics believe his guidelines exploited a loophole in the Dickey amendment, and there was substantial congressional opposition to the method the guidelines used to get around the Dickey amendement.
:Bush implemented Clinton's guidelines, with the alteration that ESC lines created after Aug. 2001 were prohibited from the federal funding.--Nectarflowed 03:48, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Talk of a ban is misleading 

message: ::::Funding of ESC research that was allowed (but not yet put into practice) under the Clinton Administration’s (Aug. 23, 2000) guidelines was restricted by Bush’s funding decision. Bush’s decision was a step down in the funding situation from what the situation was under Clinton (though not put into practice before he left office).
::::Clinton, in the publishing of his guidelines, was the first to approve of and initiate the process of federal funding of ESC research, not Bush; the process of NIH obtaining funding for ESC research under Clinton's guidelines was kept from completion only by the postponement on April 25, 2001 of the scheduled review of pending grant applications in order to provide the Bush Administration with the opportunity to review the issue.  Bush changed the guidelines and the funding process began during Clinton's administration completed (under Bush's altered guidelines), with funding beginning in 2002:  "NIH initiated the applications process but ultimately funding was not granted to the applications. The prior administration's process was then overtaken by events and the new policy was set."
::::To read a passage from the Congressional Research Service detailing this topic, go here: Talk:Stem_cell/Presidential and Congressional Background to Stem Cell Research
See also my response at:
#Talk_of_a_ban_is_misleading
--Nectarflowed 11:17, 30 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Presidential and Congressional Background to Stem Cell Research

message: In all due respect, I believe that MrJones's reorganizations have made this discussion page a complete and total unmitigated mess.  I don't know where argument start and where they end.  Some of the thing that have attributed to me supposedly writing are not my work at all.  It seemed like we were quickly coming to an agreement and and a concensus on most of this issues before MrJones's work.  I'm sure that he meant well, but it just doesn't work.
:I think Mrjones' reorganization was a good idea and may encourage other users to participate in the present discussion, but I also felt the end result was hard to follow, due to that in order to extract the points under discussion, some discussions and even some entries were split up.  Following Mrjones' reorganization I reverted to the last version before his edits and tried to implement a more conservative reorganization that was mostly making section names more accurate and less controversial, and making the section #Is_the_US_still_the_leader_in_stem_cell_research into a subsection of #Coverage_of_the_US.2C_US_states.2C_and_countries_beyond_the_US.--Nectarflowed 05:52, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Ok, I've now archived the present discussion text and tried to keep a summary of the issues that I think we are still concerned about.  I've also kept much of the section on the California's institute, corrected where it needed to be, because it does contain a lot of information about international funding and about why I think the California institute is important.--Nectarflowed 05:52, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)
replies: text:  I did not think my first attempt was perfect. The point was to remove needless invective and separate the (far from needless :-) ) political assertions from other types as these were not actually about stem cells. I hope it has provided a useful basis for reorganization. Keetoowah, I feel that you are too ready to use invective. It's really not necessary. Mr. Jones 09:05, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Reorganization started by MrJones