Down a slippery stem-cell path

President Obama on Monday cleared the way for a significant increase in federal dollars for embryonic stem-cell research and promised no scientific data will be "distorted or concealed to serve a political agenda." While the group in the East Room of the White House may have been celebrating, conservatives found this decision abhorrent and grieved for the lost children. What I find especially pathetic is that the black men and women of this nation are not screaming for the impeachment of this president. I'm sure many liberals are saying that this is just more Christian conservative rhetoric. When you look at this situation from a historical perspective, you begin to see how pathetic and ironic this action is.

On Jan. 1, 1863, as the nation approached its third year of bloody civil war. President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. The proclamation declared "that all persons held as slaves" within the rebellious states "are, and henceforward shall be free." On March 9 Obama, the first black president, signed an executive order legalizing the use of and destruction of human embryos for medical research. Once you destroy the embryo, it's dead. So how long will it be for "liberty and the pursuit of happiness" and the Constitution?

DON PRESSON, Cape Girardeau