I found this interesting column raising issues about embryonic stem cell research. I think the point made is a good one.

Pro-embryonic stem-cell research proponents, like the snake-oil hucksters of old, have done a masterful job of rolling their wagon into the town square and selling the quick and easy.

Embryonic stem cells, they argue, hold the cures for everything from Alzheimer's to diabetes - if only embryonic stem cell research wasn't banned by the dark emperor, George W. Bush.

In truth, however, embryonic stem cell research hasn't been banned. Private labs have spent millions trying to see if healing potions could be unlocked using embryonic stem cells. But as the private sector money dried up, a push for federal funding ensued. Bush has said no to that.

Yet why does the private-money river mirror the Rio Grande trickling through the bosque? If this research truly promises cures for cancer, multiple sclerosis and Parkinson's, for example, private companies' stockholders should be counting their money, right?

Could it be that after years of such research, there is no honest indication that embryonic stem cells hold the keys to anything

Where is the private money for this research? Why the push for government funding? Is the problem that there has been a lack of results to justify private funding? If so, why the demand to throw money down what private industry has determined to be an unprofitible rat-hole?

This question isn't just an academic one for me. My wife suffers from a cluster of conditions that could benefit from stem cell research -- whether based upon adult stem cells, cord blood, or embryonic cells. I want to see good research done. What I don't want to see is money or opportunity wasted on bad research. That's why I'm suspicious of the push for embryonic stem cell research which seems to have yielded very little when adult stem cell research and cord blood research seems more promising.

The British are going to engage in terrorist profiling in an attempt to safeguard its people.

People from certain ethnic groups are more likely to be stopped and searched on London transport in the wake of the bombings, British Transport Police say.

A force spokesman said communities were not being singled out, but police have to "target the people we think may be involved" in bomb attacks.

The policy has been supported by Home Office minister Hazel Blears.

***

She told BBC News: "That's absolutely the right thing for the police to do.

"What it means is if your intelligence in a particular area tells you that you're looking for somebody of a particular description, perhaps with particular clothing on, then clearly you're going to exercise that power in that way."

She said it was important people were kept informed and those who were stopped were given an explanation.

"I think most ordinary decent people will entirely accept that in terms of their own safety and security," she added.

Consider the common sense nature of that concept. We know the profile of the folks we are fighting. We know that they are among us, ready to kill innocents. it makes sense to give scrutiny to those meeting the profile -- not mass detentions or lock-ups, simply heightened scritiny.

Most ordinary decent people would accept that.

And we know that the usual suspects object -- the ACLU, Muslim groups, liberals in general -- quite loudly to any procedure that doesn't make black grandmothers, Japanese tourists, Congressional Medal of honor winners and babies in diapers subject to the same level of scrutiny as Muhammad Atta's identical twin brother. Scratch that -- they object to any procedure that scrutinizes Atta's twin at all.

After all -- who on earth did Albert Eisele think he was, treateing her like she was subject to the same rules as everybody else. Why -- she didn't mean for THAT COMMENT to make it into print.

But Thomas said yesterday at the White House that her comments to Eisele were for his ears only. "I'll never talk to a reporter again!" Thomas was overheard saying.

"We were just talking -- I was ranting -- and he wrote about it. That isn't right. We all say stuff we don't want printed," Thomas said.

But Eisele said that when he called Thomas, "I assume she knew that we were on the record."

"She's obviously very upset about it, but it was a small item -- until Drudge picked it up and broadcast it across the universe," Eisele said.

Still, he noted that reporters aren't that happy when the tables are turned. "Nobody has thinner skin than reporters," Eisele said with a laugh.

Additional comments from Instapundit and The Violence Worker.

Remember the terrible act of hatred experienced by the pregnant widow of Pfc. Tim Hines and his family last week? You know, the one in which someone uprooted American flags from their yard and set them ablaze underneath one of the family car on the night of his funeral.

Well, police have arrested two teens, age 15 and 13, and charged them with this crime.

Be prepared to be outraged by the bogus comments of the cops.

Two teenage boys were charged Thursday with burning 20 small American flags set up in honor of a soldier who died from injuries suffered in the Iraq war.

Police said the boys apparently did not know the significance of the flags they took from the yard and set afire under a car belonging to the soldier's sister-in-law. The vehicle was destroyed.

Excuse me -- what the hell do you mean that they didn't know the significance of the flags? Where the f*ck are they from that they don't know that an American flag signifies this country and our love for it -- not to mention the many men and women who have fought beneath it and laid down their lives for the nation it symbolizes?

It appears that the little miscreants were involved in other vandalism that morning. Here's hoping that the judge in this case is sure to include public service time at a rehabilitation facility for veterans. These boys need to know why those flags were there, and why what they did was horrendously wrong.

ADDITIONAL COMMENTARY from The Violence Worker, Instapundit, and NeoBabble.

And there is no room for argument -- this IS Lauren Bacall, after all.

"When you talk about a great actor, you're not talking about Tom Cruise," Bacall says.

"His whole behavior is so shocking. It's inappropriate and vulgar and absolutely unacceptable to use your private life to sell anything commercially, but I think it's kind of a sickness."

That pretty much says all that needs saying on the matter.

And as for you, Ms. Bacall, you are still one of the most beautiful women in the world today.