Newsweek has a column by Patti Davis on stem-cells. It starts out with a story about someone who paid $10,000 for stem cell treatment but died anyway. She goes on to say:

If the Bush administration, which has blocked federal funding for stem-cell research, had any compassion or even any logic (notice I said “if”—I don’t believe this administration has either), Tom Hill’s struggle to live would serve as a wake-up call. Particularly because his is only one of many stories.

Patti is spending too much time listening to her brother, Ron. Bush did not block federal funding for stem-cell research. On the contrary, he was the first president to approve such funding. The point of contention is that the funding can only be applied to lines already existing in 2001.

The Reagan family has spent a lot of energy fighting Bush over this. In the process they have totally muddied the issue. Nancy insists that stem-cell would have saved her husband. Alzheimers is very low on the list of potential cures. Ron stood before the Democratic National Convention and claimed that stem-cells were a magic potion that could cure nearly anything. Now Patti misrepresents Bush's policy and attacks him based on this misrepresentation.

I don't know what the late president would have thought about all of this but I suspect, given his opposition to abortion, that he would have sided with Bush.