Of stem cells and other myths

Yesterday 44 appeared in a ceremony to sign an order rescinding the ban on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research, in place since 43 stopped government money in 2001. It was the lead story on the CBS Evening News and on many local news shows as well.
As would be predictable from the emotional fervor that holds both sides of the debate, the proponents of funding embryonic stem cell research pulled out all the stops in cheer leading the move. In a non-scientific poll carried out in this blogger's household, the impression created by the coverage of the event was that 43 had, by executive order, blocked stem cell research from taking place in the United States.
The facts are these: embryonic stem cell research has never been banned in the United States. Research using pre-existing cell lines derived from embryonic stem cells has continued to receive federal funding. Nothing has prevented embryonic stem cell research from taking place in other countries or in privately funded labs in the United States. Federal funding using stem cells derived from other sources, like umbilical cord blood, has continued unchanged since 2001.
Why the hoopla? Why the rolling out of the proverbial kid in a wheelchair to herald the change? In part it seems to be a continuation of the desire of many of the previous administration's enemies to dance on its grave. It is also part of an odious tradition carried out by researches to tie their requests for basic science research to feelings of pity for those afflicted with diseases like Alzheimer's, diabetes, cystic fibrosis. The reality is that no clinically significant treatments have arisen from stem cell research, so to show a videotape of the actor Michael J. Fox writhing in distress with his Parkinsonian symptoms and imply that a cure was just around the corner had not 43 "banned" research, is disingenuous at best and cynically manipulative to boot.