Frist Train Wreck

My congressman's take on the Bill Frist speech on embryonic stem cell research:

RSC CHAIRMAN RESPONDS TO FRIST STATEMENT ON EMBRYONIC STEM CELL RESEARCH

Washington, D.C.- Congressman Mike Pence (R-Ind.), Chairman of the House Republican Study Committee (RSC), spoke today at a press conference held in response to Senator Bill Frist's statement on embryonic stem cell research.

Pence's statement follows:

"House conservatives are profoundly disappointed that we have lost Senator Bill Frist to this cause, but this cause will prevail.

"It was Ronald Reagan who said, 'We cannot diminish the value of one category of human life - the unborn - without diminishing the value of all human life.'

"Ronald Reagan was right and Bill Frist is wrong.

"I believe that life begins at conception and that a human embryo is human life. I believe it is morally wrong to create human life to destroy it for research. And I believe it is morally wrong to take the tax dollars of millions of pro-life Americans, who believe that human life is sacred, and use them to fund the destruction of human embryos for research."

Mike Pence would make a great President. He is a strong conservative, something we seem to be lacking these days on the Hill.

Reading the transcript of Frist's remarks, what strikes me are the contradictions. One one hand he claims to be unabashedly pro-life, then goes off on a tangent about how right it is to kill embryos with public money. Or as Ramesh Ponnuru puts it:

The speech in full is a logical train wreck. He says that he still believes what he believed in 2001: that the research should be federally funded with certain restrictions. Then he says that the main funding bill doesn't meet his conditions. Then he says he'll support it anyways. Then he says that he's pro-life and supports alternative courses of research that don't kill human embryos. Then he reiterates his support for embryo-destructive research. It's as though (at least) two different people were giving two different speeches.

Yep.