Ghettoputer, who is always right, has correctly assailed the media’s simple-minded affirmation of today’s “historic” order releasing the ban on embryonic stem cell research funding (thanks for the catch, Volgi!). The Czar uses quotation marks not because he is quoting, but because he is mocking. This is a manufactured non-event. Why?

The Czar is a firm supporter of science and technology. He fancies himself an ethical pragmatist, if indeed there is such a thing. So the reader might wonder “What should I as a Gormogon think about the issue—do I side with science and support the research, or side with ethics and decry it?”

The Czar has good news for you: you may do both without fear of hypocrisy! Like many controversies that divide politicians from Hollywood celebrities, intense division on embryonic stem cell research is a fabrication of the media.

Well, embryonic stem cell research is certainly real enough, but it is ultimately a ten-year-old deadend technology. Imagine if, today, a historic ban was lifted on Windows NT development. Yawn!

The fact is that embryonic stem cell research is pretty much a complete bust. Interestingly, the link in the previous sentence is itself almost 8 years old—revealing that this was actually a settled issue some time ago.

Not a single therapy, advancement, or cure has been soundly developed using embryonic stem cells. Instead, the real stem cell champion here has been, and remains, the adult stem cell.

Certainly, many will argue that this is because embryonic stem cells have been locked down, and that no real research has been possible thanks, of course, to the previous administration. Yet the reality is quite different: embryonic stem cells have been available in many countries around the world for all that time. The funding ban (to be clear again, Volgi!) was limited only to the US, which—dear liberals—is not the entire world. Even American researchers could obtain embryonic stem cells from private sources. So why didn’t they?

Actually, they did. And the results were so fruitless that most turned to adult stem cell research, which consistently proves more promising and profitable. Even a Google search on embryonic stem cell research will show little after 2004. Do a search for adult stem cell developments, and you better hang on.

Yes, while POTUS Obama celebrates with the media on this day, he does so fully aware that this feel-good-that-Bush-is-gone legislation changes nothing. The embryos in the government’s possession are too old to provide real research value (they are long past code, as it were), and very few researchers will be interested in obtaining new ones. Once again, a win-win for him.

The Czar predicts: a couple of weeks of celebrity endorsements, a few congratulatory interviews with scientists who have nothing to do with this research, some church groups will declare it an obscenity in an op-ed piece, and then the media will drop it. Meanwhile, once again, the real work is getting done without due recognition.

The Czar hopes they lift that ban on Y2K projects, too.

The Czar of Muscovy

Божію Поспѣшествующею Милостію Мы, Дима Грозный Императоръ и Самодержецъ Всероссiйскiй, цѣсарь Московскiй. The Czar was born in the steppes of Russia in 1267, and was cheated out of total control of all Russia upon the death of Boris Mikhailovich, who replaced Alexander Yaroslav Nevsky in 1263. However, in 1283, our Czar was passed over due to a clerical error and the rule of all Russia went to his second cousin Daniil (Даниил Александрович), whom Czar still resents. As a half-hearted apology, the Czar was awarded control over Muscovy, inconveniently located 5,000 miles away just outside Chicago. He now spends his time seething about this and writing about other stuff that bothers him.