JOHN KERRY has a well-deserved reputation for waffling and attempting to get on every side of every issue. Now, he’s done it again by signing up as a co-sponsor (along with Senators Orin Hatch and Dianne Feinstein) of what could be called the Human Cloning Legalization and Legitimization Act of 2003 (S. 303).

The legislation isn’t really called that. Such a title would be too honest, too candid. It’s given name is the “Human Cloning Ban and Stem Cell Research Protection Act of 2003,” the stated purpose of which, supposedly, is to “prohibit human cloning and to protect important areas of medical research, including stem cell research.”