The new Senate bill, under the section titled "prohibition on human cloning," offers this stunning definition: "the term `human cloning' means implanting or attempting to implant the product of nuclear transplantation into a uterus or the functional equivalent of a uterus."
In fact, "the product of nuclear transplantation" is a cloned human embryo. It can be implanted, or experimented on and destroyed. This is the familiar distinction between "reproductive cloning" and "research cloning" (or "therapeutic cloning"). Both are forms of cloning, and the "product" that is implanted or destroyed is a clone. Senator Specter and his colleagues are trying to define away the choice before us by, for the first time in history, defining "human cloning" as the act of implanting a human clone.
This Orwellian double talk won't work. The new bill permits the creation of cloned human embryos and requires their destruction for medical experiments. The Brownback-Landrieu bill, supported by the House of Representatives, President Bush, and the American people, does not. Let's have an honest debate between the two alternatives - not a dishonest attempt to define the choice away.
