As America struggles with such weighty issues as the war in Iraq, the foundering economy and the run-up to a historic presidential election, it may be difficult to recall that seven years ago this month the most wrenching issue facing the nation was human embryonic stem cell research.

Scientists and patient advocates were clamoring for studies on the cells, whose vast therapeutic potential was just coming to light, while others were decrying the research as immoral because it necessitated the destruction of days-old human embryos.

On Aug. 9, 2001, President Bush devoted his first nationally televised address solely to this subject. After months of introspection and deep discussions with experts in bioethics, he said, he had decided on a policy that would allow scientists "to explore the promise and potential of stem cell research without crossing a fundamental moral line."

That policy, still in effect, would allow federal funding of research on embryonic stem cells already created as of the date of his address, but not on cells derived thereafter.

Bush's approach stood in contrast to that of his predecessor, Bill Clinton, whose plan was never implemented because it was completed in the administration's final months. Under Clinton's proposal, the decision of which cell colonies were eligible for study with federal funds was based on whether the cells had been ethically derived - whether the women who donated their discarded embryos for research did so with a full understanding of what was to be done with their cells, for example, and whether coercion or an expectation of better medical care had influenced their decision.

Recent revelations that many of the Bush-approved stem cell colonies were obtained in clear violation of widely recognized ethics rules have now laid bare the moral hollowness of Bush's approach.

At least five of the 21 cell colonies approved for federal funding by virtue of their having been derived before Bush's 2001 address came from embryos that were "donated" by women who were either not told anything about what they were agreeing to or were expressly told that their cells would not be preserved as regenerating cell cultures.

Other colonies were obtained with lesser but still troubling ethics lapses. Having learned of those failures of informed consent, at least six of the nation's leading academic stem cell centers - four of them in California - are now reconsidering whether to allow those cells in their research protocols. An expert committee at Stanford University recently recommended banning these cells.

New rules being considered by the Proposition 71-created California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, while useful in some ways, could paper over the problem by allowing research on cells that otherwise do not pass ethics muster.

The question of how we got into this mess is worthy of a congressional probe. Insiders at the National Institutes of Health have said they were under intense pressure from the White House to ignore the ethics problems surrounding many of the Bush-approved cell lines. The fear, apparently, was that if the number of cell lines available for study with taxpayer dollars were to prove too small, then scientists and patients would revolt against the policy.

In fact, it is a marvel that science and health experts have not already revolted. Though Bush said in his 2001 address that there were "more than 60" cell colonies that would be eligible for study with federal funds under his plan, only 21 have turned out to be available. Under the terms of the Stanford ethics review, that number shrinks to 16.

Meanwhile, hundreds of new lines of embryonic stem cells have been derived since 2001, using superior methods that enhance the cells' biomedical potential - in compliance with strict ethics guidelines crafted by the national academies.

It is time to move beyond the Bush era of stem cell research, with its faux moral high ground and simplistic reliance on a TV broadcast date. There is nothing moral about telling women that cells from their microscopic embryos, left over from fertility treatments and already set to be discarded, cannot be donated to researchers for the purpose of understanding diseases and developing cures.

And there is nothing moral about forcing U.S. scientists to struggle with old and degenerating cell lines while competitors overseas busily file patents on potential therapies that take advantage of the latest and best cells available.

Both presidential candidates have voted for legislation that would loosen Bush's research restrictions while locking in, for the first time, strong ethics rules for how embryonic stem cell research should be done - legislation that Bush vetoed twice.

Now, given the ethical cracks in the Bush policy, the candidates need to stand behind that legislation. Whoever is elected should order that ethically derived embryonic stem cells be made available for study by America's publicly funded researchers, who for too long have been hobbled in their desire to understand disease and reduce human suffering.

Rick Weiss and Jonathan Moreno are senior fellows at the Center for American Progress, a Washington think tank. E-mail us at insight@sfchronicle.com