Tête-à-Tête-Tête

The stem cell veto came down the pipe as expected, and will not be overridden because the House lacks the cajones. It’s a pretty big event, politically, scientifically, morally - and the President, and a thin band of ultra-right wingers found themselves on the wrong side of it. So, I have this morbid curiosity about how the supposedly moderate and high-minded bloggers from the Conservative side would take the story. So I checked RedState.com first. Then I went out and bought a new keyboard, because what they said made me spew my beverage involuntarily with laughter.

Are you ready for this?

Sitting down?

If you have a beverage, swallow, and put it away.
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It’s a “pork” bill. Good thing he vetoed it, huh?

There are many valid reasons to oppose the pork in question, and the easiest and most politically expedient of those inevitably point to the fact that the bill in question is pork, does not change the legality or illegality of anything [...], and that while embryo-destruction may or may not be an overall good thing, that is no reason that the government should have to pay for it. All of that is well and good, and should justify the President’s veto to the satisfaction of most fiscal conservatives.

Not only that, he goes on to say, but people who oppose this type of research because it “destroys life” shouldn’t be required to pay for it! God forbid anyone other than those who support it should pay for an activity that destroys life! That’s why the Iraq war is entirely privately funded, you see! Or would be if that wasn’t an entirely different situation!

Ok… so just in case Leon or the Directors make it by here, checking on the rehabilitation prospects of their past banned commentors, and just in case they are ignorant by accident rather than choice, and would like to learn what it actually is that they, as conservatives, railed about from about 1980 until 2000, I thought I’d post a definition.

n. Slang.

A government project or appropriation that yields jobs or other benefits to a specific locale and patronage opportunities to its political representative.
[...]
Government funding of something that benefits a particular district, whose legislator thereby wins favor with local voters. [...]
(from answers.com)

And, though it does grant the power to appropriate money from the NIH budget under 42 U.S.C. 284 for purpose of this research, it does not actually increase the NIH budget. It provides no new allocations. Here’s the text of the version passed by the Senate. The bill lifts the restriction on use of federal funds for stem cell research, and encourages the development of new stem cell lines. Period.

Question - can the Red State Conservatives possibly believe that a bill which does not increase spending and which every representative’s constituents equally, is PORK. My answer is no - at least not without willful ignorance playing a big part.