{"id":12422,"date":"2009-03-09T19:33:26","date_gmt":"2009-03-10T00:33:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/?p=12422"},"modified":"2009-03-09T20:38:12","modified_gmt":"2009-03-10T01:38:12","slug":"obama-approves-stem-cell-research","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/daily-astrology\/obama-approves-stem-cell-research\/","title":{"rendered":"Science Returns to Science: Obama Approves Stem-Cell Research"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Today,\u0412\u00a0in a coincidence interesting enough\u0412\u00a0to make me suspect\u0412\u00a0someone in the\u0412\u00a0White House reads Planet Waves,\u0412\u00a0President Obama has signed an executive order overturning the Bush Administration&#8217;s policy on <a href=\"http:\/\/voices.washingtonpost.com\/44\/2009\/03\/06\/obama_to_lift_ban_on_embryonic.html\">stem-cell research.<\/a> The president signs\u0412\u00a0the order while\u0412\u00a0the Full Moon\u0412\u00a0overhead is conjunct Saturn in\u0412\u00a0the sign of Virgo\u0412\u00a0and Uranus conjuncts the Sun in Pisces. Pluto in Capricorn, the sign of big government witnesses the signing.<\/p>\n<div class=\"mceTemp\">\n<dl id=\"attachment_11953\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"width: 260px;\">\n<dt class=\"wp-caption-dt\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11953\" title=\"fe-logo-13-feb-09-250-px1\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/02\/fe-logo-13-feb-09-250-px1.jpg?resize=250%2C133&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"       \" width=\"250\" height=\"133\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" \/><\/dt>\n<dd class=\"wp-caption-dd\"><\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n<\/div>\n<p>If ever there was a day for government to right the wrongs committed against the sciences governing human health and healing of life on the planet, this is it. By signing this bill, the President has spared the country from another year of the manipulation of science for political gain &#8212; also known as the politicization of science which is\u0412\u00a0second only to the global war on terror\u0412\u00a0as the most damaging in repercussions to life on the planet as we know it.\u0412\u00a0 Today, in signing the executive order on stem-cell research, the Obama Administration will also issue a statement insulating science from <a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/wp-dyn\/content\/article\/2009\/03\/08\/AR2009030801476.html?nav=rss_email\/components\">political influence.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>From pharmaceuticals to climate change, science policies over the last eight years under the Bush Administration was at times so unbelievable we had to suppress our incredulity to cope. It was quite literally a war waged on knowledge. Here are some of the highlights:<!--more--><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Scientists were asked for non-scientific reasons to inappropriately exclude or alter technical conclusions in Food and Drug Administration (FDA) documents.<\/li>\n<li>Scientists were pressured into approving or rejecting new drugs despite concerns\u0412\u00a0from their scientific findings;<\/li>\n<li>Interior Department officials manipulated scientific findings on public land use to favor Bush policy goals and assist land developers.<\/li>\n<li>An\u0412\u00a0Interior Department official was forced to resign for illegally providing non-public documents to oil industry and property rights groups.<\/li>\n<li>In a 2006 <em>Science<\/em> journal,\u0412\u00a0the United States ranked second to last in a group of thirty-four developed countries surveyed in the number of adults who accept the theory of evolution.<\/li>\n<li>According to a 2005 article from the <em>UK Guardian<\/em>, there exist State Department papers showing that the Bush Administration thanked Exxon executives for the company&#8217;s active involvement in helping to determine climate change policy, including the US\u0412\u00a0stance on the Kyoto protocol.<\/li>\n<li>In 2007, the <em>Christian Science Monitor<\/em> reported that since 2003 and particularly after Hurricane Katrina, the Bush Administration broadly attempted to control which scientists could speak with reporters, as well as edited scientists&#8217; testimony on climate science and key legal opinions.<\/li>\n<li>Information about comprehensive sex education was removed from the Center for Disease Control&#8217;s (CDC) website.<\/li>\n<li>Performance measures for abstinence-based sex education programs were altered to make them appear more effective.<\/li>\n<li>The National Cancer Institute&#8217;s website was changed to reflect the Bush Administration view that there\u0412\u00a0 may be risk of breast cancer associated with abortions.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>This list is what is now\u0412\u00a0public. There&#8217;s probably more that will need to be dug out, exposed to light and allowed to die like mildew in the sunshine.<\/p>\n<p>We know\u0412\u00a0what is accomplished with a pen and a policy can save lives or end them. We will hear lots of neighing\u0412\u00a0over stem-cell research the next few days with arguments about the sanctity of life from <em>Torquemadas<\/em> of religious extremism.\u0412\u00a0It&#8217;s hard to believe those arguments in the face of people getting sick and dying because of the incessant lies, denial of science\u0412\u00a0and the refusal to\u0412\u00a0allow fact to govern debate. But today, Uranus has arm wrestled Saturn to the floor. What was done today under the clinical eye of the waxing full exacting Virgo moon and the compassionate and barrier-dissolving\u0412\u00a0Pisces sun will save lives.\u0412\u00a0 We make way for the new, and we will\u0412\u00a0open our minds\u0412\u00a0to fact. Hopefully, we&#8217;ll be slapped back to common sense.<\/p>\n<p>In celebration of turning away from eight years of ignorance and allowing the sciences back into science to do\u0412\u00a0the\u0412\u00a0work needed in life-saving research, I return to one of my most favorite movie endings in the world: the end of<em> Kill Bill Volume 2<\/em>. After\u0412\u00a0the\u0412\u00a0heroine disposes the last of the bad men and she&#8217;s re-united with her child,\u0412\u00a0it suddenly dawns on her that what she&#8217;s been fighting against\u0412\u00a0has finally been defeated.\u0412\u00a0 She collapses on her bathroom floor, hugging herself, simultaneously giggling and sobbing in joy and disbelief.<\/p>\n<p>Believe this. Today, for our health, the health of our children and the world we live in, we&#8217;ve won.<\/p>\n<p>Yours &amp; truly,<\/p>\n<p><strong>Fe Bongolan<\/strong><br \/>\n<em>San Francisco<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Today,\u0412\u00a0in a coincidence interesting enough\u0412\u00a0to make me suspect\u0412\u00a0someone in the\u0412\u00a0White House reads Planet Waves,\u0412\u00a0President Obama has signed an executive order overturning the Bush Administration&#8217;s policy on stem-cell research. The president signs\u0412\u00a0the order while\u0412\u00a0the Full Moon\u0412\u00a0overhead is conjunct Saturn in\u0412\u00a0the sign of Virgo\u0412\u00a0and Uranus conjuncts the Sun in Pisces. Pluto in Capricorn, the sign of big &#8230; <a title=\"Science Returns to Science: Obama Approves Stem-Cell Research\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/daily-astrology\/obama-approves-stem-cell-research\/\" aria-label=\"More on Science Returns to Science: Obama Approves Stem-Cell Research\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"generate_page_header":""},"categories":[1,583,762],"tags":[29,1788,1795,52,1034,1214,909,1215,1216,466],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12422"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12422"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12422\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12422"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12422"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12422"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}