Truth in advertising? Not for the Missouri Coalition for Lifesaving Cures...

Unfortunately, and regrettably, this group continues to spread its poisonous message across the airwaves of television, buying 30 minute spots for it's cleverly deceptive ads which encourage the destruction of human life for a false and illusory goal - a promise of cures. In reality, and if we are to believe others who are involved, this is primarily about money - money which can be generated from patenting the technology of as yet unknown and elusive cures, should they ever come to pass. And as we have seen recently, those who want to experiment with and destroy innocent human life are not content with using their own money for "research" - they wish to force taxpayers to shell out tax dollars to support their macabre endeavors.

The Missouri Coalition for Lifesaving Cures, the group behind the proposed Nov. 7 vote to amend Missouri’s Constitution to exempt embryonic stem-cell research from state regulation, has begun airing a nine-minute advertisement for the initiative.

It mixes clinical-sounding testimony from doctors and emotional pleas from mothers asking voters to pass the amendment, which would give unprecedented legal protection to a practice the Church considers immoral.

Producers of the advertisement — being shown three straight times in half-hour slots the coalition has bought on commercial television — have not criticized the Church for its opposition. Rather, the voice on the ad blames "politicians in Jefferson City" who it says want to limit Missourians’ access to potential lifesaving cures.

And, the ad’s producers do credit use of adult stem cells — which the Church wholeheartedly endorses — for successful cures. But not enough of them. The ad mentions only bone marrow treatments for leukemia but not the other nearly 70 successful adaptions of adult stem cells in fighting disease.

The ad also fails to mention that embryonic stem-cell research, which it dubs "early stem-cell" research, has yet to produce any cures. All the language encouraging people to vote for the measure is laced with the conditional words "could," "possibly," "potential" and "if."

As has been pointed out in these pages before, the only reason a Catholic needs to vote against the Nov. 7 ballot initiative on embryonic stem cells is that it is immoral for its destruction of human embryos after needed cells are harvested. Nevertheless, Catholics need to continue to inform themselves of the legal pitfalls in giving an unchecked go-ahead to such research.

The ad concludes with emotional pleas from two mothers that would lead people to believe that opposition to the ballot initiative is opposition to scientific progress that could help their children. From the Church’s view, nothing could be further from the truth. The Church has always, and always will, support cures done through moral means, such as through the use of adult stem cells.

Editorial comment from the St Louis Review (Link)