US Lead in Science Ends... right.... now.

The White House on Friday condemned research in South Korea for producing human embryros through cloning and said President Bush would veto any legislation that loosens federal restrictions in the United States on embryonic stem cell research.

Just in case you think I'm exagerrating:

The results, published online on Thursday by the journal Science, illustrate the way Asian countries - China and Singapore as well as South Korea - have established a world lead in some areas of human stem cell science. In an interview, Prof Hwang said this is partly because of supportive political and social attitudes in Asia in contrast to the US and many European countries, where embryo research and therapeutic cloning are either banned or mired in controversy.

Oh, but big deal, right? It's only one little advance in the black arts, right?

SAN FRANCISCO -- Just a few years ago, Michigan State University scientist Jose Cibelli was considered the leading expert on cloning human embryos to treat and study disease. Now, there's no debate that the cloning king is Hwang Woo-suk of Seoul National University.

On Thursday, Hwang announced yet again that he had successfully cloned human embryos, this time extracting stem cells from embryos created using the DNA of sick and injured patients. It was the second time in a little more than a year that Hwang had successfully cloned. He remains the only acknowledged scientist to have done so. Hwang is succeeding where the United States is failing because generous South Korean government support helped him create an efficient cloning factory.

Alright, I know some people are a bit oogy on the whole issue of cloning. But there is a world of good that cloning and stem-cell therapy can do - and yes, my father's diabetic - and I'm not at all suggesting we should ignore the ethical questions. But Bush's approach, unsurprisingly, lacks any nuance or sophistication. Via Brad Delong, Carl Zimmer has probably the best comment on the state of reason in the US today:

Reading about this advance, I felt a grim sense of irony. As I wrote in my original post, President Bush stopped federal funding for research on stem cells using new lines... despite the fact that most of the already existing lines were contaminated by this lost sugar. American scientists have been making some progress with stem cells with private money and state initiatives, but guess where scientists finally figured out how to solve this evolutionary problem with cell sugars? South Korea....

Case in point: try to imagine a stem cell therapy company deciding where to set up shop. I doubt they'd be excited about a state that doesn't make sure their high school students understood mutations, natural selection, the origin of species, the fossil record, and all the other elements of evolutionary biology--that thinks it's fine just to claim that the broken sugar gene in our genome was just stuck there for reasons unknown by some mysterious designer...

UPDATE: Oh, it's even better! Bush's principled reason for opposing Stem Cells:

I made very clear to Congress that the use of federal money, taxpayer’s money, to promote science which destroys life in order to save life – I’m against that... Therefore, if the bill does that, I would veto it.

I expect that all military research will end within hours. Similarly, the US invasion of Iraq - which was, after all, destruction to save life - will also end quickly. (new quote via Suburban Guerilla.)