What’s the real issue here?
Via The Carpetbagger Report, I got turned on to a controversy developing over what must be the most emotional ad of the campaign season. It's in Missouri, and it's an ad that Michael J. Fox did on stem cell research.
CR forwards us to Balloon Juice which has the ad.
CR also has Rush Limbaugh's "pushback" to the ad, which includes the allegation that Fox was acting and off his meds.
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The interesting thing about this ad is it will no doubt spur some sort of partisan bickering -- it is the campaign season afterall. Republicans over here.... Democrats over there. But lost in that will be the one thing that people on both sides probably do agree on: Parkinson's sucks.
Normally, agreement is the foundation for action, but in politics, agreement often seems of little use. You can't beat your opponent over the head with agreement.
The debate springing from this ad will be embryonic stem cell research, I presume, and Parkinson's (disclaimer: my father in law has Parkinson's) will be linked to that issue, but no candidate, as far as I know, has called for a national initiative to wipe out Parkinson's. If the goal really is a cure for the disease, wouldn't there usually be some sort of rally around the disease, rather than the particular method of finding the cure?
No candidate this season, as near as I can tell, has called for a national initiative to cure the disease, but many have called for a position on stem cell research. Huh?
Is that the tail wagging the dog?
Is stem cell research an issue because it's an issue that breaks down along party lines? Or is the real issue mobilizing all resources and human brainpower to wipe out a disease, which does not lend itself to being politically expedient (who's against finding a cure for Parkinson's). Granted some folks think one begats the other, but without getting in the middle of that debate, there are more ways to research Parkinson's than stem cells. That's an issue that can be settled later.
Here, by the way, is some information on Parkinson's research. There actually is some going on that doesn't depend on solving the political glacier that is stem cell research.
If the issue really is about Parkinson's, how come nobody is bringing it up?
Heck of an ad, though.
But given the nature of politics in this country right now, a sure way not to find a cure for Parkinson's, is to inject it into a campaign.