Michael J. Fox Blasted for Misleading Missouri Stem Cell Research Ad 
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by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
October 23, 2006
St. Louis, MO (LifeNews.com) — Residents of St. Louis are understandably excited as their hometown baseball team is in the World Series. However, Missourians are being shown more than they bargained for when tuning into the television broadcasts as they’re also having to watch a stem cell research ad that is getting national attention for its misleading nature.
The commercial ran on Sunday evening and features actor Michael J. Fox, who has previously upset pro-life advocates with his embryonic stem cell research advocacy.
The ad features Fox, who is clearly increasingly suffering from the effects of Parkinson’s disease, but who makes inaccurate generalizations about stem cell research.
“In Missouri, you can elect Claire McCaskill, who shares my hope for cures,” Fox tells viewers urging them to support the pro-abortion, pro-cloning candidate.
"Unfortunately Senator Jim Talent opposes expanding stem cell research," Fox claims. "Senator Talent even wanted to criminalize the science that gives us a chance for hope."
Though the ad makes it appear Talent opposes all kinds of stem cell research, he has voted in favor of spending millions in federal funds for adult stem cell research, the only kind of research that has ever cured a single patient.
What Talent has opposed is forcing taxpayers to pay for studies using embryonic stem cells, which can only be obtained by destroying human life. A new study by Steven Goldman and colleagues at the University of Rochester Medical Center finds embryonic stem cells cause tumors when inserted into rats that have Parkinson’s.
As a result, patients like Fox would likely be killed or face severe problems if treated with embryonic stem cells.
Kathryn Jean Lopez, the editor of National Review, criticized Fox’s new ad.
"In the commercial, which ran during game two of the World Series in St. Louis Sunday night, a clearly suffering Michael J. Fox — the beloved actor, who has Parkinson’s disease, is shaking as he speaks — pulls on voters’ heartstrings and serves up an unfair and disingenuous message," she explained.
"In a commercial drowning in false hope and overhype, Michael J. Fox, Claire McCaskill, and their funders don’t mention that stem-cell research — including embryo-destroying research — is already legal and happening not just in Missouri but across the U.S," Lopez adds.
"The commercial also doesn’t mention that there are some real potential drawbacks to jumping into embryonic-stem-cell research for Parkinson’s patients," Lopez writes. "Embryonic-stem-cell research is not the panacea its advocates would have you believe."
Lopez also bashed McCaskill for "running as just another snake-oil salesman" by approving the false ad.
