The following letter to the editor　was emailed to Fred Snowflack, Editorial Page Editor of the Morristown Daily Record by　Dawn Parkot, a self-identified　extremely disabled woman on November 4, 2005.　 The　letter was written　in response to a November 1, 2005　editorial column by the Newspaper which was critical of Assemblyman Mike Carroll's position regarding the killing of human embryos for scientific research.　 Within minutes of receiving the email, the Daily Record's Snowflack　responded that there was not enough time to get the letter in the paper before the election.

Dear Fred Snowflack,

As a voting citizen of District 25, I have to inform you, I’m a strong supporter of Assemblyman Michael P. Carroll and his views on the embryonic stem cells research.　I happen to be an extremely disabled woman too.　Since birth, I have been living with cerebral palsy, which impairs my physical movements and my speech.　I came down with Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis in 1979, which left me with a lot of hip and back damage.　I also had a wheelchair accident in 1988.　My wheelchair hydroplaned off a cliff, which resulted in my Legal Blindness and spinal cord trauma.　Now, I live in constant pain caused by Rheumatoid Arthritis and my wheelchair accident.

I’m sure you would like to ask me, why I’m supporting Assemblyman Carroll’s views on the embryonic stem cells research? Although, I would love to have speech, or have good sight again, or be out of pain, I have no right to let a child die, in order to give my body even an excellent likelihood to get better let alone fulfill the marginal promise that open ended stem cell research offers!　What gives the entitlement to you or me to say who should live or die?　Though I don’t dispute the fact that the ability to treat or heal suffering people is noble, however I also grant that not all methods of achieving this are legally or morally acceptable.

Did your newspaper do any kind of research on this subject, before printing your opinions on November 1, 2005?　Do your writers know how to do research on one of their stories before they write his or her article?　This time wasn’t the first time that your paper got it totally wrong.　Being I have my Bachelor of Science Degree in Mathematics and my Masters Degree in Computer Science and Engineering from the University of Notre Dame.　Thus I know how to do research on a subject that I’m writing about, unlike your reporters do. For that reason, I wanted to inform your idiotic newspaper that there is no scientific proof that the exploitation of the stem cells from unborn children will produce the cures and remedies that so many advocates for this research are promising.　 There is unanimous agreement among scientists who wrote research papers to support this fact and they say that the current use of adult stem cells has produced therapeutic results for patients suffering from quite a few debilitating ailments.　The scientists also say that the research on the stem cells from the blood found in umbilical cords and the stem cells from placentas have already proven remarkably helpful in treating 58 serious medical conditions.　I think it would be more prudent to further enhance and improve the research and the studies of the medical use of stem cells from adults and umbilical cords and placentas only.

As an American who pays taxes, I have a huge issue with my tax money funding something that I’m totally against, like the act of creating a life and then killing the unborn infant to harvest his or her stem cells just for “experimentation“.　Just like Assemblyman Carroll, I have several questions regarding the potential the act of supporting this research would help to create for very real medical abuses and the exploitation of women and children. There is ultimately the potential for the creation of a new class of human beings; those designated for the purpose of “experimentation“.

Those “scientists” who want to use unborn children’s stem cells remind me of a “researcher" Josef Mengele during war world II.　Josef Mengele was a researcher at Auschwitz with the mission to plumb the depths of the human mystery, and to extract the secrets of human genetics from the living children specimens at his disposal.　While the children were spared from execution, they were delivered to a distinctly more vicious fate. Mengele reserved a special barracks for children, particularly twins.　Young children were put in isolation cages, and subjected to a variety of stimuli to see how they would react. Many children were castrated or sterilized. Countless children had limbs and organs removed in gruesome surgical procedures. Children were injected with infectious agents to find out how long it would take for them to submit to numerous diseases. Mengele’s experimentations had absolutely nothing to do with true scientific research, and were instead the result of one man’s ambitious and zealous adherence to the vision of Aryan supremacy.

Substitute the ideal of Aryan supremacy with the ideal of absolutely unfettered medical research.　Substitute the zealous ambition of Josef Mengele with the zealous ambition of some medical researchers and see the very similar picture each paints.　I submit that the ends of the compared programs may be different but the means are all too similar.

Our Founding Fathers used their morals to create our laws and our government. A heroic characteristic of American law has been its considerate protection of the lives of individuals, particularly the vulnerable.　This country’s historic protection of human life and human rights comes from an encouragement of the essential dignity of every human being.　This country’s long-established protection of human life and human rights comes from an upholding of the necessary dignity of every human being.　Similarly, the global structure of human rights law is founded on the principle that when the dignity of one human being is assaulted, all of us are endangered.

What happened to our country’s humanity and morals?　I don’t understand why in the 1970's the Democratic Party pushed the law to permit a woman to abort her vulnerable baby.　I also never will understand why in April of this year, why the Democratic Party wanted to execute a totally vulnerable and disabled woman

just because she couldn’t communicate by verbalizing her needs, wants and wishes. If the Democratic Party thinks by dying from dehydration brought Terri Schiavo any kind of dignity, they are seriously mistaken.　

Now, too many Democrats are supporting the idea of funding these “researchers,” so they could create life and then exterminate that human embryo for some useless experiment. What is happening to us as Americans?　 Why are we driving our humanity and our morals out of our justice system and our government?

Your paper was totally wrong by saying, “...we do not think that his views represent a majority of residents in the 25th District.”　 I’m an active voter in my area, so I’m aware the 25th District is voting for and it’s Assemblyman Carroll.　I believe your “so-called” polls are completely wrong.　I truly feel that the Republicans will have a lock on all Assembly seats in Morris County the next 30 years or more, because my district is made out of moral and compassionate voters!　
　
Respectfully,
Dawn Teresa Parkot
Morristown, NJ