Last year, Congress passed legislation with broad bipartisan support to expand funding for embryonic stem cell research beyond the 2001 limits set by President Bush. In response, Bush issued the first veto of his presidency. When Congress returns from recess, it will again revive debate on funding for new embryonic stem cell research. Bush has already vowed another veto.

Even Bush’s own scientists disagree with his position on stem cell research. Last month, Dr. Elias Zerhouni, Bush’s appointee as director of the National Institutes of Health, said that “American science will be better served — and the nation will be better served — if we let our scientists have access to more cell lines that they can study with the different methods that have emerged since 2001.”

Furthermore, polling done this year shows that the Bush is at odds with the public, as “now a solid and consistent majority says that it wants to move forward with research”:

“It’s interesting to note that even Republicans in the CBS News poll said they approve of embryonic stem cell research by 54-36. On the stem cell research issue, Bush isn’t even representing his own partisans, much less the rest of the public,” states American Progress fellow Ruy Teixeira.

Former Sen. Mike Gravel (D-AK) served two terms in the Senate through the 1970s, a period marked by the U.S.’s struggle to end the Vietnam War. In 1971, when military analyst Daniel Ellsberg famously leaked the Pentagon Papers — which documented the “policymaking process that led to our deepening involvement in Vietnam” — Gravel, a war critic, audaciously read the documents into the Congressional Record to ensure that the public would have access to them.

Also in 1971, Gravel, “against the advice of Democratic leaders in the Senate, launched a one-man filibuster to end the peacetime military draft, forcing the administration to cut a deal that allowed the draft to expire in 1973.”

Now, he’s running for President. He told us last weekend that he thought the Iraq redeployment provision attached to the House and Senate supplemental bills is “ridiculous legislation.” “We need to get out now,” Gravel said, adding that he had his “suspicions” that whoever is elected president in 2008 is “not going to get out of Iraq.”

“We are fighting over the ownership of the Titanic. That’s really what’s going on,” he said. “Keep in mind when Nixon got elected — he said I got a plan to end the war. Yeah, it took him four years. And we doubled the number of casualties under his tenure.” Gravel warned, “I suspect we’re going in the same direction.” Watch it:

Gravel also advocated a carbon tax. He said Americans should “keep in mind” that every time they fill up their gas tank, “you’re spending another $4.00 per gallon indirectly by maintaining American troops in 140 countries to stabilize the price of oil.”

Transcript: Read more

“For well over a month now, liberal and/or anti-Bush bloggers have hit famed columnist David Broder for a column he wrote on February for The Washington Post (syndicated nationally) in which he suggested that President Bush, perpetually down in the polls, might be ‘poised for a political comeback.’ Today he was asked about this in an online chat at www.washingtonpost.com:

Seattle: Remember your column about President Bush being on the verge of regaining his political footing? Isn’t it about time you revisited that tidbit of political prognostication? (Bush Regains His Footing, Post, Feb. 16)

David S. Broder: I remember that column well. It is time to revisit and revise. Stay tuned.

says it has a policy of not renting rooms to gay couples. You can contact Affordable Suites HERE.