Anne Kornblut’s New York Times account of Dick Cheney’s Excellent Misadventure contains a fascinating passage. The interviewee is Katharine Armstrong, a member of the family that owns the Texas ranch where Cheney was hunting on Saturday. Whittington, of course, is Harry Whittington, who’s in intensive care after being shot by the vice president.
“This all happened pretty quickly,” Ms. Armstrong said in a telephone interview from her ranch. Mr. Whittington, she said, “did not announce — which would be protocol — ‘Hey, it’s me, I’m coming up,’ ” she said.
“He didn’t do what he was supposed to do,” she added, referring to Mr. Whittington. “So when a bird flushed and the vice president swung in to shoot it, Harry was where the bird was.”
Mr. Whittington was “sprayed — peppered, is what we call it — on his right side, on part of his face, neck, shoulder and rib cage,” she said, noting that she, too, had been sprayed on her leg in a hunting accident.
Apparently the lesson here is that Cheney did do what he was supposed to do by blasting Whittington in the face.
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mike_b1
Let that be a lesson to Kerry, Sheehan and all those who dare cross the mighty VP.You mess with the VP, you get the gun!Long live the 2d amendment!
Lex
What utter crap. Apparently the vice president’s spin machine believes that none of us have ever hunted and therefore we have no idea when they’re lying through their teeth.Quail, even the ones boxed up for the specific purpose of being blown to kingdom come by so-called “hunters” too inept or lazy to go find real quail in the wild, are very, very skittish. If a hunter is approaching some to try to shoot, the LAST thing you want to do is announce that you’re coming up behind the hunter preparing to shoot — the sound of your voice might well flush the birds before the would-be shooter is prepared.
Rick
What’s the “over/under” on how long it will take Garry Trudeau to replace Cheney’s icon in “Doonesbury” with a blunderbuss-toting Elmer Fudd? “Kill the wabbit, kill the wabbit….” Copyright issues?
John Galt
No self-respecting cartoon character would stand for being portrayed as feckless Cheney.
Anonymous
At least he’s a real hunter and not a gold-plated phony like John Forbes Kerry on the campaign trail (can I get me a hunting license here?) That 12 point buck on the Cape is proving to be as elusive as those weapons of mass destruction. But it’s a good thing Cheney got all those deferments; friendly fire, you know…
Steve
Anon 5:06 – How do you think it would have played in the media if it were KERRY and not Cheney who caused this accident?
Anonymous
I keep hearing that Wittington was shot because he came up from behind Cheney unannounced. If he came from behind, how was he shot in the face and chest? It should have hit the back of his head and his back.I’m suspicious of *everything* the administration tells me, I automatically assume they’re lying and trying to manipulate the news.And I can’t wait to see what Letterman, Leno, and Jon Stewart do with this.
Anonymous
Yeah, lucky Cheney didn’t do something like driving off a bridge and leaving behind a young lady to drown…. then he’d *really* be in trouble… right? Right? *chirp-chirp*
Anonymous
Quit trying to change the subject. The so-called incident at Chappaquidik never happened. It’s been debunked a million times over.
Dan Kennedy
Just a reminder, folks … Media Nation is not related to Ted Kennedy. So if that’s what’s motivating these non sequiturs about Chappaquiddick, you’re driving off the wrong bridge.
o-fish-l
Let me get this straight. Vice President Cheney, while hunting using the equivalent of a pellet gun, accidentally causes cuts to a long-time supporter. The daughter of the “victim” says it looks like he has chicken pox. Then we have a knock down, drag out press conference because the media felt it wasn’t notified in a timely manner. Gimme a break. This type of response by reporters to a non-incident is what makes people wary of the media.
Anonymous
Dan,your relationship (or lack thereof) to Ted is the real non sequitur. He is sui generis, unreproducible outside of MA or LA.(Mary Jo Kopechne had no comment).
Anonymous
To hear the press tell it, the greatest sin was not the incident itself (no more significant, really, than President Carter’s killer rabbit) but that the all-powerful, omniscient Washington Press Corps was scooped by some redneck rag in Corpus Christi. Is it any wonder journalism has such a pitiful reputation these days? There’s a war on, you know…
Specks
Amazing how the disingenuous wriggle out of the sludge on cue.
Al
o-fish-l: “Let me get this straight. Vice President Cheney, while hunting using the equivalent of a pellet gun, accidentally causes cuts to a long-time supporter. The daughter of the “victim” says it looks like he has chicken pox.”Hey, if you think it’s no big deal, then stand still and let me shoot you in the face with a 28-gauge from 12 to 15 feet away — which, given the relatively narrow spread of the pellets, is how close Whittington had to have been. (30 feet, my butt.)If Cheney had been using a 20- or 12-gauge, as many less experienced bird hunters do, Whittington would be dead. As it is, you don’t get AIRLIFTED from a Level IV to a Level III trauma center, as Whittington was, for a case of chicken pox.So this was hardly a non-incident. The last vice president to shoot a man, by the way, was Aaron Burr, and we don’t treat that as a nonincident, either.”Then we have a knock down, drag out press conference because the media felt it wasn’t notified in a timely manner.” No, because the president wasn’t informed in a timely manner. Please keep up.