I take his point to be substantive: if Americans continue to tolerate the religious right's war on science, we will continue to fall behind the rest of the world.

We're getting off track. America does a tremendous amount of the medical (and otherwise) science that helps progress modern medicine, and here we have a documented use of stem cells with an incredible outcome that is not encumbered at all with controversy. This is a win, no matter how calous you want to be about America. (New flash, religion affects the political climate all over the word.)

It is not a 'war on science' to oppose killing embryos for their cells any more than it is a war on science to oppose killing prisoners for their organs. Science can only answer the question of what will happen if one does one thing or another; religion/morality/philosophy must answer the question of what should happen, which implies what one ought to do.

Save for psychopaths, everyone applies some sort of moral calculus to his actions.

The religious right does comprise the largest portion of those who recognise the scientific fact that an embryo is a living human being and apply the moral principle that killing innocent human beings should be avoided (much as the religious right comprised the largest portion of those who recognised the scientific fact that blacks are human beings, and applied the moral principle that human beings ought not be enslaved, 150 years ago). It's not a war on science; it's applying moral principles to scientific facts.

This comment will be interesting to look back on in ten years if Trump wins.