Strange New Respect Dawning for Pro-Stem-Cell Sen. Frist?
 

     Sheryl Gay Stolberg nabs Friday's lead with "Senate's Leader Veers From Bush Over Stem Cells," on Senate Republican leader Bill Frist's surprise support for a bill to expand federal funding for stem-cell research, despite veto threats from President Bush.

     A text box reads: "The political landscape on a thorny issue is set to change."

     Stolberg sets Frist up as an expert, noting early on that he is "a heart-lung transplant surgeon" and adding: "Because Mr. Frist's colleagues look to him for advice on medical matters, his support for the bill could break the Senate logjam. It could also give undecided Republicans political license to back the legislation, which is already close to having the votes it needs to pass the Senate. The move could also have implications for Mr. Frist's political future. The senator is widely considered a potential candidate for the presidency in 2008, and supporting an expansion of the policy will put him at odds not only with the White House but also with Christian conservatives, whose support he will need in the race for the Republican nomination. But the decision could also help him win support among centrists."

     Back on March 25, reporter John Schwartz wasn't quite so respectful of Frist's medical expertise when the majority leader offered an opinion on Terri Schiavo's mental capacity that ran contrary to Times' dogma. In his article intended to debunk what the Times considered misguided concerns about Schiavo starving to death, Schwartz wrote nothing of Frist's medical expertise, calling him just another pol: "The battle over Terri Schiavo is about life and death, but it is also a war of words -- and one of the words most at issue is 'starvation.' Ms. Schiavo's parents have repeatedly used the word, as have politicians like the Senate majority leader, Bill Frist of Tennessee."

     Stolberg overreaches when she leaves this statement unchallenged: "Human embryonic stem cells are considered by scientists to be the building blocks of a new field of regenerative medicine. The cells, extracted from human embryos, have the potential to grow into any type of tissue in the body, and advocates for patients believe they hold the potential for treatments and cures for a range of diseases, from juvenile diabetes to Alzheimer's disease."

     Actually, as the Washington Post reported in June 2004, doctors think stem cell research may do little for Alzheimer's: "But the infrequently voiced reality, stem cell experts confess, is that, of all the diseases that may someday be cured by embryonic stem cell treatments, Alzheimer's is among the least likely to benefit. 'I think the chance of doing repairs to Alzheimer's brains by putting in stem cells is small,' said stem cell researcher Michael Shelanski, co-director of the Taub Institute for Research on Alzheimer's Disease and the Aging Brain at the Columbia University Medical Center in New York, echoing many other experts."

To read the rest of Stolberg, click here.

Criticism of a Left-Wing WTC Project "Sounds Un-American"
 

     A Friday editorial, "A Sense of Proportion at Ground Zero," shows none at all, attacking Debra Burlingame for leading a fundraising boycott of a left-wing cultural center at Ground Zero. The Times doesn't bother to note she's a family member of a 9-11 victim (her brother was a pilot on the plane that crashed into the Pentagon) who are generally given reverential coverage when slamming Bush.

     "Somewhere in the ill-conceived campaign to 'take back the memorial' at ground zero, false impressions have managed to triumph over facts. This week, Debra Burlingame, a board member of the World Trade Center Memorial Foundation, and others called for a boycott of fund-raising for the memorial until the International Freedom Center and the Drawing Center have been banished from ground zero. She argues that money for the memorial will be intermingled with funds for the cultural building that is supposed to house the Freedom Center and the Drawing Center. This is both misleading and harmful to the memorial itself."

     The Times leaves out the apparently not relevant fact that Burlingame's brother was a victim of 9/11 -- the pilot of the American Airlines plane terrorists crashed into the Pentagon.

     The insistence by Burlingame and some supporters that the 9-11 memorial be just that -- not a space for left-wing propaganda --  puts the Times in an uproar: "But this is not really a campaign about money or space. It is a campaign about political purity -- about how people remember 9/11 and about how we choose to read its aftermath, including the Iraq war. On their Web site, www.takebackthememorial.org, critics of the cultural plan at ground zero offer a resolution called Campaign America. It says that ground zero must contain no facilities 'that house controversial debate, dialogue, artistic impressions, or exhibits referring to extraneous historical events.' This, to us, sounds un-American."

     If a conservative had called a liberal group "un-American," the Times would no doubt be accusing the conservative of questioning their patriotism. But apparently it's just dandy for the Times to do it.

To read the rest of the editorial, click here.

Not So Lame-Duck Bush?
 

     White House reporter Richard Stevenson's lame-duck watch on President Bush continues, but he admits there are signs of life in the presidency in Friday's "Despite Problems, Bush Continues to Make Advances on His Agenda."

     "His problems remain many, and include the relentless violence in Iraq, the leak investigation that has ensnared some of his top aides and poll numbers that suggest substantial dissatisfaction with both his foreign and domestic policies. But President Bush has still had a pretty good July, showing how his own doggedness and a Republican majority in Congress have consistently allowed him to push his agenda forward even when the political winds are in his face."

     Compared to Stevenson's previous efforts, that opening paragraph is actually some of the most positive comments Stevenson has made about Bush's political prospects. Later, Stevenson admits: "The president's record over the past few weeks, combined with generally good economic news and word that the budget deficit is shrinking, suggests that Mr. Bush has hardly lapsed into the lame-duck status that Democrats had been hoping to assign him."

      Or, as Stevenson himself suggested Bush was becoming back in May and in several articles since.

     The text box even reads: "The president is not yet the lame duck Democrats hoped he would become."

For the full Stevenson, click here.