The National Journal Highlighted today Rep. Kenny Hulshof’s most recent television ad called “moral clarity.” The Congressman talks about his experience as a a former prosecutor and how it taught him to have “unshakable moral clarity.” This ad has interesting timing, especially in light of the recent confusion surrounding the Congressman’s stance on stem cell research. As you’ll remember, it was revealed that Mr. Hushof, while publicly against research, was accepting money from stem cell research financier Jim Stowers. It was later revealed that Mr. Hulshof was also investing in life science research mutual funds run by Mr. Stower’s investment company. Observers are asking is this why Mr. Hulshof is not a co-sponsor of Rep. Dave Weldon’s (R-FL) bill HR 2564, the “Human Cloning Prohibition Act,” the House version of the “Brownback Bill” the prohibits SCNT. Congressmen Akin, Blunt, and Graves all co-sponsored the legislation in 2005 when it was a much hotter issue in Missouri because of the run-up to Amendment two.

Since Mr. Hulshof is not well known outside of his congressional district, political observers speculate the moral clarity ad is an attempt to quell the mini controversy and shore up the conservative base; a base that may be associating Mr. Hulshof’s name with his somewhat confusing stance on stem cell research. We’re also hearing from the tipline, that the weekend endorsement by Sen. Kit Bond, has raised more questions on where Mr. Hulshof stands on stem cell research. Kit (and a couple other Republicans) joined with all of the Senate’s Democrats back in October to kill the Vitter Amendment which seeks to prohibit federal funding for family planning by abortion facilities. By law, federal dollars cannot go towards abortion services but money is given by the federal government to organizations that perform abortions for “non-abortion family planning programs.” Critics say this equates to federal subsidization of abortion, since the federal dollars free up other money to be used for abortion. See excerpt below from Lifenews.com below.

Vitter added that federal funds subsidize abortion by supporting organizations that provide them, even if the groups do not use federal funding to perform abortions. “The way it works now, we send federal dollars to abortion providers … and it supports their overhead and it supports their organizations,” he said.

But pro-abortion Sen. Barbara Boxer, a California Democrat, led the fight against the Vitter amendment and claimed it would have done “nothing to reduce abortions.”Had the Vitter amendment been adopted, it would have brought an end to the current practice of co-locating abortion clinics and federally funded “Title X” family planning clinics. Republicans were unified in support of the amendment with even pro-life Democrats Ben Nelson of Nebraska and Bob Casey of Pennsylvania voting against it.

Republican Sens. Kit Bond, Sue Collins, Dick Lugar, Lisa Murkowski, Olympia Snowe, Arlen Specter, and Ted Stevens joined Democrats in voting against the Vitter amendment.

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