Veterans for Common Sense

September 2, 2008, St. Paul, MN – Has anyone noticed that Sarah Palin’s central claim to political fame is a fraud? She represents herself as a fiscal conservative who abhors pork-barrel projects and said no thanks to the “Bridge to Nowhere” — a $398 million span that would have linked Ketchikan, Alaska, to its airport across the Tongass Narrows. But as mayor of Wasilla (pop. 9,780), she hired a Washington lobbyist to bring home the bacon. And as a candidate for governor just two years ago, she supported both the Ketchikan bridge and the congressional earmark that would have paid most of its cost.

I know, we’re not supposed to pay attention to such inconvenient details. We’re supposed to be dazzled by how unaffected she is, how plain-spoken, how “genuine.”

Indeed, if you don’t get hung up on her actual record, Palin simply is who she is. It’s not her fault that she’s a former Miss Wasilla with a campy “Northern Exposure” vibe, doctrinaire social-conservative views and no discernible qualifications for being vice president. It’s undeniable that people in Alaska apparently like her well enough, though they seem to have been even more shocked than the rest of us when she was named to the Republican ticket. In any event, she’s not the one who created this farcical situation.

We learned last week that John McCain is not who he is — not, at least, who he claims to be. The steady, straight-talking, country-first statesman his campaign has been selling is a fictional character. The real McCain is either alarmingly cynical or dangerously reckless.

You will recall that McCain gave the same prime criterion for choosing a running mate that every presidential candidate gives: someone who is ready to step in as president if, heaven forbid, the need arises. Barack Obama echoed those words before picking Joe Biden, who is about as prepared as a vice presidential candidate could ever be.

You will also recall that McCain and his supporters have been lecturing us about the grave and urgent dangers our country faces — Islamic fundamentalism, the resurgence of Russia and other geopolitical threats. In a menacing world, McCain says, he will keep America safe.

So, at 72 and with a history of cancer, how could McCain choose a vice presidential nominee who has, let’s face it, zero experience in foreign affairs? Being the nominal commander in chief of the Alaska National Guard doesn’t count, unless you think Vladimir Putin is about to order an invasion across the Bering Strait.

At a time when the nation also confronts enormous challenges at home, Palin has, um, slightly more than zero experience in domestic affairs. The reason most people move to Alaska is that it’s different from the rest of the country. Salmon fishing and snowmobile racing are not front-page news in Ohio, Pennsylvania or Florida.

McCain’s political calculation in choosing Palin is obvious. Social conservatives, who had been unexcited by his candidacy, are ecstatic that he has picked a running mate who staunchly opposes abortion, favors the teaching of “intelligent design” in the public schools and generally embraces the agenda of the religious right.

I have my doubts about the other objective of McCain’s gambit: to win the votes of blue-collar women who supported Hillary Clinton. For one thing, these voters disagree sharply with Palin on most of the issues. For another, initial indications are that many women were insulted at the notion that they would automatically swoon over any candidate who happened to have two “X” chromosomes. Republicans tend to have a comically simplistic view of how “identity politics” works. They should recall how African Americans reacted when Clarence Thomas was named to the Supreme Court.

Whatever the political impact, so much for the John McCain we thought we knew. In choosing Palin, he cynically did the kind of thing that his party is always accusing Democrats of doing: He selected a running mate based on her potential ability to appeal to targeted segments of the electorate rather than for her honestly assessed ability to lead the nation should the occasion arise.

The other thing we learned about McCain is that he is willing to take an enormous gamble based on limited information. He only met Palin once before summoning her for a final interview. He realized he needed to shake up the presidential race, and that’s what he did. But we are reminded, if we did not realize it before, that the three things not to expect from a McCain presidency are caution, prudence and a willingness to always put the nation’s interests above his own.

August 30, 2008 – The United States Office of Special Councel has decided to pursue a federal whistleblower complaint filed in May against Prescott’s Northern Arizona Veterans Affairs Health Care System, said James Mitchell, chief of staff and director of communications for the OSC.

Registered nurse Jerri Bedell said she was fired from the Prescott VA’s Community Living Center two days after writing a lengthy letter to a supervisor outlining her concerns about abuse and neglect of veteran patients.

Bedell – who has a master’s degree in nursing with additional certification in geriatric care and more than 20 years experience nursing and teaching – worked at the center for three years.

Mitchell said the OSC assigned an investigator in its San Francisco office to the case on Aug. 25. The OSC investigates cases only that it believes it has adequate evidence of proving, Mitchell explained.

“It’s possible our investigator would go to Prescott in the course of the inquiry,” Mitchell added.

He said the investigation – which is concerned only with whether Bedell was fired in retaliation for complaining about abuse and neglect of veterans at the Prescott VA – could take months to complete, depending on the total case load of the individual investigator and the complexity of the allegations.

Meanwhile, Mitchell said, a second case involving disclosures of neglect and abuse that Bedell made in her whistleblower retaliation case is still developing.

“It may be referred to the Secretary of the Department of Veterans’ Affairs for investigation,” Mitchell said.

“Our first task is to see if we can make a substantial likelihood finding, which means we believe there is a better than even chance that the whistleblower’s disclosures are true,” Mitchell explained.

Because of the information contained in Bedell’s retaliation complaint, the OSC asked her to file a “disclosure” complaint in early June.

Prescott VA’s director, Susan Angell, has declined to speak directly to The Daily Courier. But when a staff member to Sen. John McCain asked Angell about some of Bedell’s charges, Angell – in a letter that The Daily Courier obtained – said that the Prescott VA fully investigated Bedell’s allegations.

“Most of the allegations were unsubstantiated,” Angell wrote. “Several allegations were found to be essentially a difference of opinion … Other allegations were found to be substantiated in part and corrective action was taken.”

Bedell denies that her complaints were fully investigated.

The Daily Courier has been looking into Bedell’s charges of abuse and neglect at the Prescott VA since June, after learning of Bedell’s firing.

During the past three months, The Daily Courier has spoken with four nurses with knowledge of the center’s caregiving practices.

The Daily Courier also spoke to more than two dozen patients, family members and other Prescott VA staff.

In addition, The Daily Courier has examined nearly 100 pages of documents, letters and e-mails, including Bedell’s federal whistleblower prohibited personnel practice complaint as well as the federal whistleblower “disclosure” document that federal officials asked Bedell to file.

Nurses, veteran patients and relatives of veteran patients at the Prescott VA say some of the nursing staff there – mainly at the center – abuse, neglect and overmedicate patients – actions the nurses say have sometimes lead to injury and in some cases may even have hastened death.

Prescott VA officials say the employees making the complaints are “disgruntled” and that family members are misinterpreting what they see.

The officials say every patient at the Prescott VA gets the same high-quality care and they flatly deny any abuse or retaliation is taking place.

VA CONFIRMS SOME PATIENT CARE PROBLEMS

However, during a recent interview with The Daily Courier, the same officials – Associate Director for Patient Care Services Marianne Locke and the center’s medical director, Dr. Jyoti Walavalkar, with Prescott VA spokesman Frank Cimorelli present – confirmed at least some of the accusations.

For example, Bedell in her whistleblower complaint says that a nursing staff member shoved a wheelchair-bound patient’s injured foot into a wall so hard that doctors had to reset the pins in the patient’s foot.

The term “nursing staff” at the Prescott VA refers to registered nurses, licensed practical nurses and certified nursing assistants.

Two other employees that The Daily Courier interviewed backed up Bedell’s charge.

Locke confirmed that the incident took place but said the employee responsible for the incident no longer works there. When told that nurses say the man is still there, Locke said she would find out the man’s status and get back to The Daily Courier. But VA officials later declined to comment further about that specific incident.

Officials did say that the Prescott VA takes situations like these “very seriously” and reviews them to assess and fix any personnel and training issues involving patient safety.

Bedell and the other nurses also said three veterans were overmedicated so badly for constipation that they were found laying in liquid pools of their own excrement from their armpits to their knees. Their explosive diarrhea continued until the medicine wore off.

Locke and Walavalker also confirmed that these incidents took place. They said a pharmacist and several nurses were retrained as a result. They also said that nurses should use their own judgment in determining how much medication to give.

The nurses who spoke with The Daily Courier also said some nursing staff members refuse to help patients.

“We’ve had issues with (some of the nursing staff) and we’ve addressed that appropriately,” Locke said.

NURSES SAY NEGLECT CONTINUES

But the nurses The Daily Courier has spoken with say problems with patient care continue. They said a few of the nursing staff deliberately treat patients badly while low staffing levels and poor communication among staff members lead to the kind of benign neglect from other staff members that endangers patients.

Examples of their concerns over the past few years – which are also alleged in Bedell’s whistleblower complaints – include:

• Patients left sitting in urine and feces for so long that they are found with their private areas sore and reddened or with crusted urine in their pelvic area.

• Nursing staff who sometimes handle patients roughly and openly mock them.

• Nursing staff who falsify medication and treatment records to show that treatments have been applied to patients or medicine given to them when it hasn’t been. This includes charting – verifying that a staff member has completed a patient care task – as long as two days ahead of time.

A Sept. 5, 2007, memo from supervisor Karen Martin to Bedell, which is included in Bedell’s whistleblower complaint, asked Bedell to document her witnessing of “staff pre-pouring meds and doing other work-arounds.”

“We want this documented so that we may start corrective measures,” Martin wrote.

• Patients found with pills scattered in their bed sheets or left laying on their nightstands.

• Missing medications.

• Staff overmedicating patients, sometimes without their knowledge, for the convenience of the staff – a practice known in the medical community as “chemical restraint.” In one case such overmedication resulted in a patient’s inability to eat or drink because of excessive sedation, Bedell said.

• Too frequent use of foley catheters in patients who don’t need or want them, leading to bloody, overflowing catheters that cause infection, pain and needless use of patient restraints. A foley catheter is a thin tube inserted into the bladder to drain urine.

• A nurse who accidentally left a cap on a foley catheter when she inserted it so no urine drained for several hours until the next shift discovered the problem.

• Two nurses who accidentally gave forced air instead of oxygen to a patient who had just returned from surgery.

• A patient who slept on a blanket because his sheets were dirty from not being changed.

• Nursing staff who put patients to bed after dinner without taking their clothes off, who hang up on patients when they put their call lights on and who take excessive time to answer call lights because they are chatting or surfing the Internet.

• A nurse who initially ignored a patient with a painful herpes chest wound saying, “What does it matter. He’s dying anyway.”

• An Aug. 19, 2007, memo – which also is part of Bedell’s whistleblower complaint – to housekeeping supervisor Steven Peterson, complaining about filthy rooms: “I just can’t tell you how disgusting some of the patients’ rooms are when I come in to work … especially the floors, sinks, bathrooms, toilets. We find things under the beds that have been there for days. Some of the sinks and mirrors look (like) they haven’t been washed in days. The floors are sticky around the patients’ beds. Bedside tables are never cleaned except by nursing staff.”

Peterson replied in a memo to Bedell the next day that “this will be checked into immediately.”

VA officials, in responding to questions about patient care at the center, declined to answer specific questions about employees or patients.

However, Cimorelli explained that when anyone reports an incident, the Prescott VA investigates it thoroughly.

He also said the center’s nursing staff “maintains appropriate standards of care.”

Locke also said the Prescott VA is not abusing or neglecting patients.

“These things are not happening here,” Locke said. “We have people who would like to see us in a bad light.”

Cimorelli said that when “adverse” events do happen at the center, staff reviews them carefully so they can learn from them.

He also said all medication errors, including medications not being given to patients, are “tracked and trended” and spot observations of staff passing medications also are conducted.

“Identified concerns are addressed immediately,” Cimorelli said, and staff always looks for opportunities for improvement. He said the Prescott VA’s medication error rate for the second quarter of fiscal year 2008 was “very low.”

DIFFERING VIEWS ON TERMINATION

Bedell’s termination notice, signed by Angell and obtained by The Daily Courier, said Bedell was fired “because on several occasions you have removed foley catheters from patients without orders to do so.”

However, Locke – an RN herself – and Dr. Walavalker emphatically stated in a July 3 interview with The Daily Courier that a nurse should immediately remove a bloody, overflowing catheter from a patient and does not need “orders” to do so.

“We have told the nurses to use their judgment,” Walavalker said.

One of the two patients that Bedell removed bloody catheters from wrote a letter to Bedell thanking her for her actions, which the patient says were done at his insistence. The patient’s letter is part of Bedell’s whistleblower complaint.

But Locke said, “That situation was investigated and found not to be as the nurse described it.” Locke declined to elaborate.

Bedell said she carefully monitored both patients after removing their catheters.

She says the last time she removed a catheter was on Jan. 28 and the issue never came up again until she was fired in April – two days after writing a lengthy email to Locke alleging patient mistreatment and that staff often falsifies records.

Prescott VA officials deny that they retaliate against anyone.

One VA employee, who asked that her name not be used, said Angell recently held a staff meeting during which she told employees that if they didn’t like the conditions at the Prescott VA, they should leave.

Cimorelli said Angell often meets with groups of employees.

“One of the areas she discusses is the privilege of serving veterans,” Cimorelli wrote in an email. “This privilege requires a high degree of commitment and compassion by employees. If this level of expectation is not comfortable for an employee, she asks them to think about making choices that fit their own individual needs.”

STAFFING SHORTAGE

Many of the center’s problems stem from an overworked and exhausted staff pushed to the limit by too many patients with increasingly serious health issues, the nurses told The Daily Courier.

They say morale at the center has plummeted, turnover has risen, and a tense climate of fear has taken hold.

Locke agrees that the center is struggling with a serious nursing staff shortage. An internal VA management memo that The Daily Courier obtained called the shortage a “crisis.”

Locke said that between the center and the acute care facility, which is in a different building, 10 nursing staff positions are unfilled.

She says they are working to fill the shortage by hiring temporary nurses and by asking staff to work overtime as well as by not operating at full capacity. The center has a total of 85 beds, Locke said, but fills only 60 to 65 beds.

Locke said the center typically has one nurse – either a registered nurse or a licensed practical nurse – and one to two certified nursing assistants on each of five wings. But, Locke said, sometimes supervisors have to send even those nurses and CNAs elsewhere to help out.

A memo, entitled “Staffing Issues and Patient Safety” that Locke sent to staff this past spring said officials had decided to divert admissions to the center as much as possible and to share staffing between units.

“But this is not reliable, as all units are experiencing staffing issues…,” Locke wrote.

NOT OUR FIRST RODEO

Cimorelli, the Prescott VA’s spokesman, said the Prescott VA would weather any investigation that any reports of abuse may prompt.

“This isn’t our first rodeo,” Cimorelli said. “We know what it is to deal with Congressionals,” he continued, referring to members of Congress.

Prescott VA director Angell does, too.

She was the associate director at Bay Pines VA Medical Center in Florida in 2004 when several Congressional committees and the VA Inspector General’s office conducted investigations there.

That round of investigations turned up mismanagement by senior staff at Bay Pines and lead to an upper management shake-up there.

Before the VA Inspector General’s investigation of Bay Pines concluded, Angell volunteered for a temporary assignment in Afghanistan.

According to the Aug. 11, 2004, final report on Bay Pines by the Office of Inspector General, “In many areas of (the facility), a culture of safety and accountability was not evident. Communication that was important for patient safety was not discussed out of fear of adverse consequences.”

The report also said that, “Senior leadership needed to better manage and administer facility operations … Factors such as … employee mistrust in leadership’s ability to manage and treat them fairly, morale challenges, and a growing workload demand generated by a rapidly expanding veteran community contributed to lapses in providing timely care and ensuring administrative accountability.”

The report about Bay Pines, where Angell was second in command, stressed that, “One important tenet of a culture of safety is the ability for an employee at any level to feel empowered to express a view against the authority gradient without fear of adverse consequences.” The Bay Pines report did not specifically name Angell although it did refer to an interview officials had with the associate director.

The Prescott VA employees who The Daily Courier spoke with say the same mismanagement that investigators found at Bay Pines is happening in Prescott.

Mary Garrison, president of the American Federation of Government Employees Local 2401 at the Prescott VA, says management there wouldn’t have so many problems if it would accept responsibility for its poor supervisors.

“They don’t even want (people to file) reports,” Garrison said. “And they badger the employees that (do) file the complaints.”

She says most employees with complaints simply give up after awhile.

Many of the people The Daily Courier spoke with for this article said the Prescott VA has plenty of good employees. But there are problems, they say, and the VA needs to fix them.

“There are good staff there and basically the care is good,” Bedell told The Daily Courier. “The staff that are bad are few in number; the staff that are overworked and stressed are many and (they are) making mistakes.”

VA spokesman Cimorelli said the Prescott VA would deal with any problems it has.

“If there’s problems here, then we are going to address it,” Cimorelli said. “If there’s sensitivity issues, then we’re going to address that, too.”

September 2, 2008 – A Navy SEAL from Lexington was killed in Afghanistan on Saturday, the Navy said yesterday.

Petty Officer Josh Harris, 36, drowned after he was swept away during a nighttime river-crossing, according to a Navy news release and Harris’ brother.

“My brother was defending our country the best way he knew how,” the brother, Ranchor Harris III, said in an interview.

Harris said that his brother loved being a SEAL and accepted the risk involved.

“When you fight for freedom, that’s the end of the deal,” he said. “Every day there’s a person like my brother out there who’s keeping this country safe.”

The Navy did not provide further details about the incident.

Family members told WGHP/FOX8 that Harris’ safety harness came undone. His body was later found downstream.

SEALs take their name from being trained for missions involving sea, air and land.

Harris had worked his way through various SEAL assignments to the Naval Special Warfare Tactical Development and Evaluation Squadron Two, an elite team within the SEALs based near Virginia Beach, Va.

Harris graduated in 1990 from Lexington Senior High School, where he was a standout football player. His family said he went to Davidson College, graduating in 1994 with a degree in studio art. He then went to UNC Charlotte to study for a master’s in architecture.

Ranchor Harris said that his brother decided to try to serve as a SEAL in 2000, a few months before he turned 29, which is the Navy’s cutoff for acceptance into the SEALs.

Harris had been deployed to Iraq several times and earned several awards, including the Bronze Star medal.

He never talked about any of his awards, Harris said.

“He was an understated, reserved and very humble individual,” Harris said. “He would say, ‘It was the team.'”

Harris is survived by his parents, Sam and Evelyn Harris, twin sister, Kiki Harris, his brother, and aunts and uncles.

Funeral arrangements were incomplete.

August 27, 2008 – A standoff between Iraq war veterans and police ended after representatives of Barack Obama’s campaign finally emerged from the Pepsi Center to hear the group’s grievances.

The veterans were arrayed in formation and in uniform, marching slowly toward a line of police, who had warned them they could be pepper sprayed and arrested. They were being watched by a crowd estimated by police at more than 5,000, many of whom had marched with the veterans from the Denver Coliseum.

As the vets got within a few yards of the police, the cavalry arrived in the form of two white-shirted Obama staffers who asked a representative of the veterans to be escorted inside the security zone.

After a brief conversation, a veteran’s representative said they had been promised a meeting with Obama’s liason for veteran’s affairs. A cheer went up, the veterans did an about face, and the Democrats appear to have avoided providing John McCain with some very unflattering video footage of veteran’s being pepper-sprayed hogtied and handcuffed outside their convention.

The veterans first approached the southwest entrance of the Pepsi Center and tried to ask the Democrats to allow a representative to read an open letter to nominee Barack Obama from the podium. But no one from the party or the Obama campaign emerged from the arena to speak to the group.

Jeff Key, who served in Iraq as a Marine master sergeant, said he wants to go into the convention, play taps for the fallen on his bugle and read the letter from Iraq Veterans Against the War.

“I’m not leaving until I get to read that letter,” he said, as protesters gathered behind him in a fenced zone outside the Pepsi Center. “I intend to read that letter from the podium. If they say no we’re going to tell the world they turned away the veterans.”

As Key spoke, delegates inside the arena were watching a performance by Melissa Etheridge. A spokeswoman for the DNC said she was unaware of the veterans demands or even that they were outside.

“The veterans have fought too hard to come back here and be ignored as we have for the past seven years by the administration,” said Liam Madden, a Marine sergeant.

A representative of the Barack Obama campaign did not immediately return a call seeking comment.

Moments later, and after police warned the veterans that they could be pepper sprayed and arrested, they turned and began walking back toward Speer, but stopped at the Pepsi Center entrance on that side, near Market. Dozens of police in riot gear were waiting, but did not immediately intervene.

“We want to thank you for your service,” one of the veterans shouted to police over a bullhorn at 7:15 p.m. “We are non-violent. We don’t want to hurt you. We don’t want you to hurt us.”

The veterans were aligned in formation, marching, two steps at a time toward police.

The march of as many as 3,500 people from the Denver Coliseum to the Pepsi Center by Iraq Veterans Against the War reached the fenced protest zone on the grounds of the Democratic convention hall about 5:30. But while they were next to the zone, they refused to enter.

The march, led by the members of the band Rage Against the Machine and the veterans, and followed by an array of protesters including anti-war groups, supporters of medical marijuana and some anarchists with gas masks, started at close to 4 p.m.

As the head of the march reached the 16th Street Mall about 5 p.m., they stopped, and one of the veterans read the letter intended for Democratic nominee Barack Obama, who arrived this afternoon at the nearby Westin Hotel.

“Sen. Obama, millions of people are looking to you to restore our reputation around the world,” the letter read. “…In this ominous time, you symbolize the hope for a better America .”

The group read out its three aims: Removing U.S. troops from Iraq immediately, providing full health care benefits to returning veterans, and paying reparations to Iraqis for the damage done during the war.

Marchers expressed disappointment that Obama had not responded to their letter by 3 p.m. today after they had delivered it to his campaign earlier.

“We are here to hold the Democrats accountable,” said an IVAW spokesman shouting into a bullhorn. “We as Americans voted them into office in 2006, and they have not done their job.”

The protesters, who had divided themselves into groups based on who was willing to be arrested, were led on the march by a police SUV with a flashing sign saying, “Welcome to Denver, Follow Us.”

Police estimated that 3,000 to 3,500 people were taking part, making it by far the largest march of the convention week.

Organizers have been talking with officers along the route, and, while there is a heavy police presence around the marchers, there have been no confrontations. Some of the protesters have a phone number written on their arms for legal assistance in case of arrest.

The march followed an energetic, and at times emotional Rage Against the Machine concert at the Coliseum.

The concert opened with a stirring speech from Vietnam veteran Ron Kovic.

“I have been in this wheelchair for 40 years because of war, and I have been arrested in this wheelchair 12 times protesting this war,” said Kovic, whose story was told in the film “Born on the Fourth of July.”

“This is our country. They are not going to shut us up or shut us down,” he said. “We are going to end this war and bring the troops home.”

September 2, 2008, Los Angeles, CA – Dr. Philip Butler on McCain: “I think I can say with authority that the Prisoner Of War experience is not a good prerequisite for President.  John McCain is not somebody I would like to see with his finger near the red button.  Dr. Philip Butler, a highly decorated combat veteran who was imprisoned alongside John McCain at the infamous ‘Hanoi Hilton’ prison in Vietnam, has gone on record with his opinion of the GOP presidential candidate in a short video interview with Brave New PAC.

Click here to watch the video of Philip Butler.

Dr. Butler was shot down over North Vietnam in April, 1965 and was brought to the Hanoi Hilton prison, two and a half years prior to McCain’s arrival. He spent eight years in captivity. Butler is critical of McCain’s habitual use of his P.O.W. story to advance his presidential campaign. “John has allowed I think the media to make him out to be the P.O.W., the hero, and in fact there were over 600 just like him who performed just as well.” Echoing a similar assertion from General Wesley Clark two months ago, Butler continues, “I think I can say with authority that the Prisoner Of War experience is not a good prerequisite for President of the United States.”

Having lived across the hall from John McCain at the U.S. Naval Academy prior to combat, Butler was a close witness to McCain’s famously volatile temperament. “He was very sensitive and touchy and just easy to anger,” says Dr. Butler. “John McCain is not somebody I would like to see with his finger near the red button.” Butler continues, “John McCain’s temperament makes it clear that he is not cut out to be President of the United States.”

Butler points to the health risks faced by former Prisoners Of War as another cause for concern about a McCain presidency – a concern publicly heightened in recent days by McCain’s selection of a political novice as a running mate. “The data show that the Prisoner Of War group are dying at an earlier age and that we suffer lots of residual things that non-P.O.W. group really doesn’t have to deal with. And it’s imperative that we have someone who is healthy and can stand the rigors of that job.”

Other military veterans agree with Butler’s criticism of McCain’s exploitation of his P.O.W. story. Writes Brandon Friedman, a veteran of both Iraq and Afghanistan and author of ‘The War I Always Wanted’: “To see McCain resort to playing the POW card when answering legitimate questions, in my mind, cheapens that experience. And by cheapening his own experience in war, he degrades all of our experiences in war. He turns the horrific incidents we’ve all seen, touched, smelled, and felt into a lame excuse to earn political points. And it dishonors us all.”