On Tuesday, November 2, 2004, California voters will go to the polls to decide whether to establish, in the California Constitution, an "Institute of Regenerative Medicine," with sweeping powers to regulate scientific experimentation, medical research, medical treatment, the creation of "human egg farming," the generation of billions of dollars in profits, the possible cure of terrible diseases, and the creation of human clones and trans-human beings that could make all the taxpaying voters who financed their creation genetically, genomically, and evolutionarily obsolete.
Because of the importance of Proposition 71, the Stem Cell Initiative, which might have these, and even more bizarre and unpredictable results, California Politics Today has assembled some information that may be of interest to California voters on this subject in time, but just barely, for their consideration before Tuesday's election.
Some opinions about Proposition 71
Let's start with three op-ed/opinion pieces that make the case for rejecting Proposition 71, the Stem Cell Initiative. They are:
In "Guaranteed to Cure What Ails You--Why California's Stem Cell Proposition is a Bad Idea, California State Senator Tom McClintock, who finished third in the recall election that put Arnold Schwarzenegger and Maria Shriver in the California Governor's mansion, argues that Proposition 71 is "preying on the suffering of those many families who are watching helplessly as a loved one struggles with a disease or disorder that stem cell research might someday alleviate or cure"; that neither the public, the media, or the law will be able to control the "Institute for Regenerative Medicine" that the passage of Proposition 71 will establish; and that "Prop. 71 will add $3 billion of principal and an additional $3 billion of interest to the state's – and therefore to taxpayers’ - financial woes."
In "For stem cell research, against Proposition 71," Mitch Kapor, meditation instructor, creator of Lotus 1-2-3, and benefactor of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, explains why, even though he originally thought he would "be supporting Proposition 71 on stem cell research because I'm pro innovation and the Bush administration has blocked progress in this important area," he nevertheless is now recommending a "No on 71" vote because, among other reasons:
"Under Prop. 71, the governing body (a new "Institute for Regenerative Medicine") which would control the $3 billion of public funds will be dominated by people who are part of or close to both the institutions and companies that would benefit from the funds. This is a conflict of interest.
"The terms under which the state would benefit and the taxpayers repaid in the event of successful commercialization are murky and lack sufficient protection for the public.
and
"Because there are significant health risks to women who agree to undergo the egg retrieval necessary to conduct the embryo cloning, a much clearer and stricter regulatory framework needs to be created before proceeding."
In "Socializing the Risk while Privatizing the Health Benefits and Profits, as California's Proposition. 71 does, is Unethical," by Marc Strassman, investigative reporter for Etopia Media Medical News Network, focuses on the unfairness of making California taxpayers involuntarily invest $6 billion dollars in establishing the "Institute for Regenerative Medicine," and financing its research, and then being mostly left out of the upside benefits that may (or may not) accrue from this research, not to mention the fact that few Californians, either with or without health insurance, are likely to be able to afford the treatments that may (or may not) spring forth from their own $6 billion investment.
He concludes by saying, "Before anyone either votes for or allows his or her tax money to be used to pay for Proposition 71, he or she ought to demand and require that the Legislature and the Governor establish by law a public entitlement to the medical treatments and possibly astronomical financial benefits that they will be making possible with their votes and taxes."
Some interviews about Proposition 71
As the host of California Politics Today, Mr. Strassman has also interviewed a number of politically-involved individuals who share his belief that Proposition 71 is a bad idea. Here are links to those interviews:
Coming from all parts, and outside, of the political spectrum, these critics of Proposition repeatedly make the same points:
1. Deep in debt already, California cannot afford to take on $6 billion more.
2. Proposition 71's promises of cures for terrible diseases are no guarantee that any will be found.
3. Proposition 71 shreds existing safeguards for informed patient consent and political openness.
4. Putting venture capitalists, bio-tech companies, university bureaucrats, and research scientists in charge of distributing $3 billion dollars to themselves is an egregious conflict-of-interest.
5. Rather than reducing Californians' medical bill, Proposition 71 could raise it.
6. Women in particular are at risk from Proposition 71 due to the demands for their eggs for experimental research and possibly even more so to support the "therapeutic cloning" therapies that could arise from that research.
7. Locking the $6 billion Proposition 71 will cost taxpayers into the budget will deny many Californians medical care and educational and other services.
8. Developments and breakthroughs in "therapeutic cloning" technology being sought through Proposition 71 will greatly facilitate the advent of "reproductive cloning," and "genomic enhancement" strategies capable of producing trans-humans who may find the presence of the "sub-transhumans" who financed their creation annoying.
9. The passage of Proposition 71 will set a precedent and empower the individuals and groups who succeed in passing it to pursue additional such measures that side-step the normal democratic process by aggregating venture capital, renowned scientist/celebrities, and tens of millions of dollars of slick and manipulative television ads to channel vast sums of public money into the pockets of a few groups and investors, who can endlessly repeat the cycle until they control everything.
10. Proposition 71 will throw more money at one particular approach to curing disease than is sensible, distorting research priorities, and draining human and financial resources from other possible ways of treating and curing both existing new and emerging human illnesses.
Embryonic stem cell research as configured under Proposition 71 is not the only game in town
In the last few decades, the "war on cancer," interferon, and "gene therapy" all promised long-sought cures to terrible diseases. None has yet succeeded, but all involved the expenditure of vast amounts of public money. There is no guarantee that "embryonic stem cell research," more heavily and shamelessly hyped by those who stand to directly profit from it, will be any more fruitful than these earlier panaceas proved to be.
It's also very possible that Proposition 71 will do to embryonic stem cell research what George W. Bush's war in Iraq is doing for the concept of "spreading liberty," give it a bad name that will take it decades from which to recover.
Senator Kerry has promised to lift federal obstacles to embryonic cell research and fund it at $100 million per year, four times the current rate. Almost everyone, including reputable bio-scientists, except the people salivating over the $300 million a year just for Californians that Proposition 71 will provide, think that this amount will very adequately enable embryonic stem cell research to move ahead in an optimal manner.
On top of that, there is not now, and nor will there be after November 2, 2004, however the vote goes on Proposition 71, and absent further restrictions to be applied against this type of research at the federal level, any legal impediments in the way of venture capitalists who think embryonic stem cell research is a promising area for investment, or a good way to help humanity, from investing their own money in the field.
That would be a fair way of proceeding, but to trick millions of Californians into paying for a project that has little chance of actually helping them, in the name of helping them, is an act of arrogant manipulation that even the transhumans that are the possible result of all this might find distasteful.
What if Proposition 71 passes?
All that having been said, it's very likely that the $25 million dollars being invested by Proposition 71's backers for a possible $3 billion pay-out will turn out to be, from their point of view, a good bet.
As indicated by the results of a Field Poll released on October 10, 2004, which found "the measure leading by a narrow 46% to 39% margin, up marginally from a three point lead found in August," even before the incredibly tacky, manipulative and shoddily-produced television ads touting Proposition 71 hit the airwaves (and cables), it's very likely that Proposition 71 will be passed.
What is to be done, by those who think that Proposition 71 will, if left to itself, prove to be an enormous disaster in a variety of ways?
The aftermath of passing Proposition 71
It goes without saying that the certification of Proposition 71's passage, the issuing of its bonds, the populating of its various boards and committees, and the establishment of the procedures by which it will attempt to distribute its largesse will all be attended by the kind of political litigation at which Californians excel.
This will no doubt delay the first "somatic cell nuclear transfer" paid for with Proposition 71 bond money until well after a re-elected President Bush puts the kibosh on all embryonic stem cell research, however financed, at least within the US and all the countries it's successfully invaded, or well after a newly-elected President Kerry has lifting the existing restrictions and asked Congress to increase the national research allotment for its eager pursuit on a reasonable budget.
Either of these eventualities will, no doubt, throw the plans of Proposition 71 supporters/board members of the "Institute for Regenerative Medicine" into some consternation, even possibly to the point of arguing about whether the $300 million allotments planned for Year 1 and Year 2 can legally be spent all together in Year 3, if the litigation has reached closure by then.
What with new advances in other areas of bio-science, the possibly even-more -precarious state of the California economy and the state budget, advances in computing technology, the world situation, and the mood of the people in a few years, the well-laid plans of the Prop. 71istas may be set to gang aglay with a vengeance by, say, 2007.
Nevertheless, according to the new provisions written into the California Constitution by Proposition 71, all that money will have to spent, and twice that money will have to be paid by taxpayers, regardless of anything else.
The architects of Proposition 71 are smart, high-powered, successful men. They've used the best legal talent their money could buy to create what they hope will be an iron-clad agreement between them and the citizens/taxpayers of California to deliver their not-very-hard-won $3 billion dollars to them and their chosen scientists on-time and without fail.
The "Institute for Monitoring the 'Institute for Regenerative Medicine' " or IMIRM
Given all this, it might not hurt to pro-actively put together a non-profit, NGO-type public interest organization to monitor the behavior of the "Institute for Regenerative Medicine" and to fight against its inevitable abuses.
As a clearinghouse for information about the inevitable conflicts-of-interest and self-dealings that will arise within and in relation to the "Institute of Regenerative Medicine"; as a way of organizing the medical malpractice and class action lawsuits on behalf of the "egg farm" women the "Institute" will need to stoke its cloning furnaces; as a way of trying to protect the innocent experimental guinea pigs lured into the maw of the "Big I" by promises of cash and a low number in the therapeutic lottery for themselves and their family members; as a platform that fans of democracy can use to try to wedge their way into the closed meetings of the "Institute" where decisions too "complicated" and too "proprietary" for the likes of the common people to know about, let alone participate in, will be taken by the self-selected; as a means of trying to put some independent citizens on the "Independent Citizens Review Board" designed to rubber stamp the "Big I"'s actions; and to keep alive the illusion that something other than a dark and self-absorbed cabal is now running California, it might be nice to set up such an "Institute to Monitor the 'Institute for Regenerative Medicine'."
Should we allow transhumans to join, or even to attend our meetings?
