The news has just come across that Christopher Reeve died of a heart attack this morning, following complications from an infection.  Reeve will be remembered for many things, but I will point out two.

He had an indomitable positive spirit. He always stated that he believed he would recover from his paralysis, and that scientists were working to enable him to walk again.  He was a hopeful man, and adamantly refused to play the victim role.  And he defied some leftwing critics by making a highly publicized visit to Israel to show his support for some of the world's leading researchers into spinal cord injuries.

Israel is on the cutting edge of science and technology. After the United States, Israel has seeded more Nasdaq companies than any other country.  Israeli scientists have won three Nobel prizes in chemistry and physics in the past two weeks.  Reeve celebrated Israel's real science achievements while Palestinians put their technology efforts into new suicide bomb technology.

It would not surprise me if John Kerry, slipping behind in some of the polls again, tried in the last debate to take advantage of Reeve's death by trying to tie it in some way to President Bush's decisions on stem cell research. The reality of course is that government—funded stem cell research is occurring under this President for the first time. Private research continues, as entrepreneurs and companies see opportunities to invest. Californians, will in a few weeks, consider taking on an additional $3 billion in debt to finance state research into stem cell projects. 

As pointed out on this site a few weeks back, to date, the promise of embryonic stem cells is much more than hype than reality, while real progress is being made with adult stem cells.

Richard Baehr   10 11 04