Congresswoman Diana DeGette already has earned political immortality as the answer to a trivia question: Who’s the only member of Congress to have a bill vetoed twice by this once veto-shy president?
DeGette’s bill to allow federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research earned her the dubious honor of receiving President Bush’s first veto ever in 2006.
Then earlier this year he vetoed it again, making it clear that he won’t allow federal funding for research that destroys embryos.
Somehow, the Denver Democrat has found twice to be so nice that she’s actually going for thrice. She plans to run yet another stem-cell bill next year.
Why?
Recent promising news that scientists had transformed ordinary human skin cells into what appear to be embryonic stem cells — without having to make or destroy an embryo — cheered people who care about science and curing diseases yet worry about destroying embryos to advance the cause.
The findings were heralded by some as an answer to the very real ethical questions that have dogged embryonic stem-cell research. However, DeGette waved a cautionary flag.
Discoveries come and go, she said, and while this is promising, no one knows for sure what type of cell research may one day cure today’s incurable diseases. Given that, we should press on with all research, she figures.
That makes sense, scientifically speaking.
Except, of course, Bush will just whip out his veto pen again. And unless DeGette is going for some type of world record for vetoes, it doesn’t make sense, politically speaking.
Earlier, she had hoped to attach her bill to another bill that Bush simply couldn’t veto. A spending bill, perhaps. That’s how it’s often done in Washington.
But now, her strategy has begun to shift.
And the congresswoman who has always wanted to take the politics out of the debate — researchers, not politicians, should determine how federal research dollars are spent, she likes to say — is poised to make it all about politics.
“I’ve become convinced that there’s just no way to get [Bush] to sign it,” DeGette told us last week.
Still, in the next few weeks, DeGette and Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin will meet to plot their strategy for the election year. They’ll look for ways to “move the issue” forward.
“What I really want is this to become law,” she said.
But then she hinted at what’s likely to happen, and it’s not finding some way for Bush to sign it.
Instead, it involves another veto and a Democratic presidential candidate such as, oh, Hillary Clinton using that third veto as a tool to show Americans, most of whom support the research, why they need to elect a Democrat as president. Clinton and DeGette could also use the veto to convince Americans that the Senate needs about six or seven more Democrats, too. (Right now, the Democrats don’t have the 60 votes needed to end a Republican filibuster, so the minority party is able to scuttle a lot of bills.)
Just last week, DeGette endorsed Clinton’s candidacy, and signed on to be her adviser on stem cells.
“I think it’s going to be a key issue in the election,” she said. “I’m fully committed to having a pro- stem-cell president and pro-stem- cell Congress in January 2009.”
Another veto may be the only way she’ll eventually win federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research. It’s a calculation she’ll have to make.
But at that point, it’s all about politics, not science.
Dan Haley can be reached at dhaley@denverpost.com.
Watch of DeGette’s interview with The Post’s editorial board and read a .
