Sen. John F. Kerry spoke at a town hall meeting in Hampton, N.H. Here is a transcript of his appearence.
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KERRY: President Bush just doesn't get it. Faced with the facts, he turns away. Time and again he's proven that he's stubborn, he's out of touch, he's unwilling to change, he's unwilling to change course.
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And it's not, obviously, a stubbornness limited to this field, because we see it in the conduct of our foreign affairs, we see it in the decisions and choices made about Iraq, we see it in the unwillingness to be realistic about bringing countries to our side.
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And we can talk about that when we open it up and have, sort of, the open part of this.
But, you know, this isn't about politics. This is really about fundamental American values. It's about how we save lives. It's about how we actually respect life itself.
And the fact is that leaders from both political parties -- Michael mentioned John McCain; Orrin Hatch, the leader on the Health and Human Services Committee, and others -- we got about 58 senators who are cosponsors of this. But you can't get the president to look, stop and change his mind.
Forty-eight Nobel prize-winning scientists are supporting my campaign for the presidency of the United States, citing stem cell research as one of the primary reasons.
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The fact is that the majority of the American people support stem cell research and it's high time we had a president of the United States who does, too.
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But instead of listening to the American people, you know what they say?
We're going to get there. Did you want to ask a question? Can I...
QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE) and I know that there won't be any cure in time for me. I'm voting for you and everything you stand for.
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KERRY: Thank you so much. Thank you. God bless you.
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QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE) wonderful speech.
KERRY: Oh, no, I love you. My gosh, come on.
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Do you need some assistance? Do you need any help? Are you OK? Are you all right? OK.
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All right. God bless. God bless you. Thank you. Thank you so much.
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Thank you.
I've got to tell you, folks, when you hear somebody stand up and say to you, "I support you, but it's too late for me," that's pretty tough.
KERRY: And it really tells you something about what this means to people who do lie awake at night, who are in tears, who worry about the possibilities, and who know that there's a way to do this with ethical guidelines, with standards; that we could be leading the world in the effort, as we ought to.
What disturbs me so much about it is that, you know what this administration says? It says that, instead of listening to the facts, that supporting stem cell research is giving people false hope.
Now, I want you to think about that for a minute. Imagine if we'd told researchers researching polio, "You're giving people false hope." Imagine if we'd told those who were working to eradicate smallpox, "Oh, false hope." It's unthinkable.
But that is exactly what the administration is saying to scientists, to people whose lives are dedicated to trying to make these judgments about facts, and who want to study Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, juvenile diabetes, spinal cord injury, osteoporosis -- so many different possibilities.
And that's just an honest difference between President Bush and me. I believe that when it comes to promising research, there's no such thing as false hope.
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I believe that it's part of the American spirit that when we put our minds to things, when we go out and pull and push and get the best minds at our colleges and laboratories and universities and venture capitalists and scientists all working toward a goal -- who knows whether you'll reach that goal, but guess what has always happened in America: We find something new and different and promising and helpful that raises the quality of life.
KERRY: Just today two Americans, Richard Axel and Linda Buck, won the Nobel Prize in medicine for their pioneering research. It's an example of what we can do when we start...
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But when you have a president who refuses to listen to the facts, who wants to play to the cheap seats, who wants to go down to the politics of division and the politics of ideology, dismisses scientists and turns his back on science, then we wind up saying no to discovery and no to innovation and no to the people who desperately need cures.
You know, it's not any accident, I think, that Nancy Reagan -- a woman of great courage, compassion and grace -- put it best when she said, quote, "I just don't see how we can turn our backs on this. We've lost so much time already. I really can't bear to lose any more." Well, neither can I.
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