Actually, you can ethically get embryonic stem cells from amniotic fluid and placentas. Sadly, the fetal tissue harvesting billion dollar plus industry is already driving abortion in many abortuaries. See the below FR thread for more and much more extensive information on the industry.
In any event, we'll have to carefully craft the laws banning them, in order to get aound the intentional misuse of terms like "adult" in this specific case.
Stem cells from amniotic fluid and placentas are not considered embryonic stem cells. They are actually "adult" stem cells, although more versatile than most.
The embryonic stem cells scientists keep hoping they'll find some use for are those that come from very early, very little differentiated embryos.
Mrs VS