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A Love For Life

Floor Speech

Date: June 7, 2007
Location: Washington, DC
Issues: Stem Cell Research


A LOVE FOR LIFE -- (House of Representatives - June 07, 2007)

(Mrs. BLACKBURN asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 minute.)

Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, sales and marketing is my career field, and I know a little bit about the branding of products and the value that is there, and sometimes the name of the product or the idea can make or break the success of the product. Marketing is not always about the product. Sometimes it is about selling a slogan.

Yesterday we debated the Human Cloning Prohibition Act, which sounds good, right? No one wants human cloning. But what this bill does is just a very clever marketing ploy that sounds good, but leaves open Pandora's box to a world of dangerous interpretation.

Let's make it clear: All this ban does is to prohibit a clone from living inside a mother's womb. It doesn't ban destroying clones from experimentation, just for human life. So that is good.

But how would this House leadership react when a woman breaks a law and decides to have a cloned embryo inserted into her womb? Would they force her to abort the clone inside of her?

Columnist Charles Krauthammer, a prominent supporter of embryonic stem cell research, says, ``This practice sanctions the most ghoulish and dangerous enterprise in modern scientific history, the creation of cloned human life for the sole purpose of destroying them in the name of science.''

Mr. Speaker, life is a gift, not a science experiment. Let us have the decency in this Chamber to treat it as such. I strongly opposed the bill and urge all those that believe in the beauty of life to do the same.

* [Begin Insert]

Today, we debate embryonic stem cell research. Republicans are often categorized as opposing stem cell research. The truth is that Federal funding for stem cell research has increased by 60 percent since 2004 and was nonexistent before 2001. I support ethical scientific research when it does not depend on the destruction of life and I urge my colleagues to do the same.

* [End Insert]


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