After the Democratic convention became an infomercial for embryo-killing research--with Ron Reagan touting the possibility that human cloning would allow for personal "biological repair kits"--the Bush administration decided to start defending its policy.

* After the Democratic convention became an infomercial for embryo-killing research--with Ron Reagan touting the possibility that human cloning would allow for personal "biological repair kits"--the Bush administration decided to start defending its policy. Laura Bush has taken the first step: clearing up the Democrats' deliberate attempt to mislead people into thinking that Bush has a "ban" on stem-cell research, when all he has done is to limit federal funding for the type of stem-cell research that kills human embryos. Mrs. Bush also criticized the exaggerated claims being made for the research, which she rightly said cruelly manipulate the hopes of sick people and their families. Research should be encouraged, she said, but in a spirit of sobriety and with due regard for the moral norm of not taking nascent human lives. John Edwards, meanwhile, said that federally funded research would have to be cleared by ethics committees when Kerry and he are in charge. But ethics committees are a poor substitute for having sound moral principles oneself. The president does not have to worry about losing the public on this issue during the debates to come: He can easily defend his policies as reasonable, and make an issue of Kerry's support for cloning. The political question to which we do not have an answer is how many sick people Kerry and Edwards can delude into thinking that cures are just a federal subsidy away.