From: Dan Fabulich (daniel.fabulich@yale.edu)
Date: Wed Apr 24 2002 - 13:58:35 MDT
Interesting article in the WSJ today; I'll transcribe as fast as my
fingers can type. Expect no proofreading, and that all the technical
mistakes are my own.
HARRY AND LOUISE RETURN, OPPOSING THE BAN ON CLONING
Worrywart Couple Who Helped Scuttle Clinton Health Plan Question Bush
Policy in New Ad
by Laurie McGinley
Harry and Louise are back.
The fictional couple starred almost 10 years ago in television
commercials that helped torpedo President Clinton's health-care
overhaul plan. Now the same actors playing the same characters have
taken aim at President Bush's effort to ban all forms of human
cloning.
The new Harry-and-Louise campaign will make its debut in the
Washington area on tonight's episode of "The West Wing," on NBC-TV and
later will be shown in the home states of several key lawmakers. The
ads are sponsored by CuresNow, a nonprofit group recently founded by
entertainment-industry executives, led by some who have children with
juvenile diabetes. The Hollywood executives say cloning technology
offers their children the best chance of a cure.
--------------------------------------------------------
Side bar: THE CLONE WARS
Excerpts from Harry and Louise's dialogue in a new ad in favor of
cloning research:
LOUISE: One bill puts scientists in jail for working to cure our
niece's diabetes.
HARRY: So... cure cancer, go to jail?
LOUISE: Alzheimer's, heart disease. Take your pick.
HARRY: Is it cloning?
LOUISE: Nooo... uses an unfertilized egg and a skin cell.
HARRY: So, not making babies?
LOUISE: Just lifesaving cures.
--------------------------------------------------------
The commercials were written by Goddard Clausen Porter Novelli, the
same public-affairs company that created the original $20 million
Harry-and-Louise campaign, in the fall of 1993. In those ads,
sponsored by the Health Insurance Association of America, Harry and
Louise express vague but intense fears about government involvement in
health care. The ads proved highly controversial: Democrats blasted
them as distortions and Republications praised them as insightful.
The new ads are hitting the airwaves as a showdown vote looms in the
Senate. Sens. Sam Brownback, a Kansas Republican, and Mary Landrieu,
a Louisiana Democrat, are pushing a bill that would prohibit human
cloning either to produce a child or to conduct research and treat
disease. Similar legislation already has passed the House.
Backers of the Brownback bill include conservative organizations,
religious groups, antiabortion organizations and a few environmental
and women's groups. Opposition to the Brownback bill is being led by
the Coalition for the Advancement of Medical Research, which includes
researchers, patients' groups and the biotechnology industry.
CuresNow is a member of CAMR.
With the Senate expected to debate cloning before the Memorial Day
recess, both sides are revving up their advertising and lobbying
efforts. The National Right to Life Committee and its state
affiliates recently launched radio ads in eight states in support of
the Brownback bill. In those ads, a man and a woman chat about
cloning, then the woman exclaims: "Can't they see that it's just not
right to make human embryos and harvest them like crops?" Stop Human
Cloning, a group headed by the editor of the conservative Weekly
Standard, William Kristol, also recently ran radio and television ads
backing the Brownback bill.
Members of the entertainment industry, such as celebrities Christopher
Reeve, paralyzed in a riding accident, and Michael J. Fox, who suffers
from Parkinson's disease, have taken part in biomedical debates for
some time. But CuresNow, which stand for Citizens United for Research
in Science and Ethics Now, [DF: Isn't that CURSE Now?] represents a
ratcheting up of activity. The group was loosely organized last fall,
then renamed and relaunched in early March, with a volunteer executive
director.
The founding members are Douglas Wick, producer of "Gladiator"; his
wife, Lucy Fisher, former vice chairman of the Columbia Tri-Star
Motion Picture Group at Sony Pictures; Jerry Zucker, director of
"Ghost" and "Airplane," and his wife, Janet Zucker, producer of "Rat
Race" and "First Knight." Both couples have children with juvenile
diabetes.
This past Friday, the Zuckers held a fundraiser at their Los Angeles
home both for the anti-Brownback campaign and for general support of
medical research. More than 100 people attended, including filmmaker
Barry Levinson, Paramount Chairman Sherry Lassing, and actors Warren
Beatty, Annette Benning and Cuba Gooding Jr. Attendees heard
presentations fro four prominent scientists who support research
cloning. CuresNow has raised about $500,000 already and receive
pledges of more donations. Still in its infancy, the group aims to
keep its membership small while making use of its abundant resources
and influence
"We can't let a narrow group of people make the decision for my child
and for the entire country," Mr. Zucker says.
As the cloning battle escalates, both sides are choosing their words
to sway the undecided. The new Harry and Louise ads go to great pains
to distinguish research cloning from reproductive cloning.
In the basic cloning procedure, embryos are made by inserting a cell
from an adult into an unfertilized egg. The resulting embryo,
genetically identical to the cell donor, could yield stem cells useful
in treating disease such as juvenile diabetes, Alzheimer's and
Parkinson's scientists say. However, if the embryo were transferred
into a woman's uterus, it could develop into a cloned individual.
Wary of negative public perceptions about cloning, proponents are
struggling with the term. In one of the ads, Louise says the
technology isn't cloning at all; its simply inserting an adult skin
cell into an unfertilized egg. In fact, she is describing what is
commonly known as "therapeutic cloning," or cloning for treatments or
research.
"They don't want to say cloning and the don't want to say human
embryo," says Mary Cannon, executive director of Stop Human Cloning,
who hasn't see n the ads. "They try to obfuscate the language."
The ads also play down that it could take years for cloning-based
therapies to be developed. In a second commercial, Louise describes
and early-stage lab technique to her niece as a "cure" for her
diabetes.
Ben Goddard, who wrote the scripts and co-directed the spots with
Mr. Zucker, says the ads make clear the group backs research, not
reproductive cloning.
The stark differences of conviction on the issue suggest a legislative
stalemate is highly likely. Whatever happens in Congress, both sides
say they will raise the issue in the November elections.
-- Antonio Regalado contributed to this article.
-Dan
-unless you love someone-
-nothing else makes any sense-
e.e. cummings
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