Stem cell research is flying under the radar in this year's election. Both candidates support it but do not explain their positions at great length. The stand of Democrat candidate Barack Obama is clear: he supports human embryonic stem cell research to the hilt, as does his running mate Senator Joe Biden.

For instance, Biden recently told a rally in Missouri, "I hear all this talk about how the Republicans are going to work in dealing with parents" who face "the joy and the difficulty of raising a child who has a developmental disability, who were born with a birth defect... Well, guess what folks? If you care about it, why don't you support stem-cell research?"

The position of Republican hopeful John McCain is more amorphous. On the one hand, he is running radio advertisements in which he promises to support stem cell research to "unlock the mystery of cancer, diabetes, heart disease". But he fails to mention that this research might use human embryos -- which his anti-abortion supporters would reject. His running mate, Sarah Palin, is amongst these.

Furthermore, the official Republican platform, though clumsily worded, seems to condemn all research on human embryos: "We call for a ban on human cloning and a ban on the creation of or experimentation on human embryos for research purposes." This seems to be inconsistent with Senator McCain's track record in the US Senate, where he supported embryo research. He even signed a letter to President Bush with almost 60 Senators who urged the President to modify his restrictive policy. So there are two competing sides to his policy – and only time will tell which will eventually triumph should he be in the White House next year. ~ Boston Globe, Sept 15; New York Times, Sept 9; AP, Sept 18