W, who has never vetoed anything in his years in the White House, has threatened to do so if federal restrictions on stem cell research are loosened. Clearly, he is motivated by the Republican ideal of fiscal responsibility, which must weigh heavily on his mind, since the War on Terror has now cost $270 billion and is projected to run to $600 billion. This is a slight inflation of the Administration's earlier estimates "for both short-term and long-termmilitary campaigns against Iraq".

In other veto news, the governor of Maryland has vetoed legislation that might have led to "the erosion of the sanctity of traditional marriage" by allowing both hetero- and homosexual unmarried couples to "make medical decisions for their partners and to add a partner to a deed of property without paying the state transfer tax." One can well imagine the cataclysmic effect it would have on marriage, if married people had to suffer the sight of hospital visits between unmarried couples.