Dick goes hunting

February 12, 2006

In the highly unlikely event you haven’t heard…

Vice President Dick Cheney accidentally shot and wounded a companion during a weekend quail hunting trip in Texas, spraying the fellow hunter in the face and chest with shotgun pellets.

Harry Whittington, a millionaire attorney from Austin, was “alert and doing fine” in a Corpus Christi hospital Sunday after he was shot by Cheney on a ranch in south Texas, said Katharine Armstrong, the property’s owner.

He was in stable condition Sunday, said Yvonne Wheeler, spokeswoman for the Christus Spohn Health System in Corpus Christi.

Armstrong in an interview with The Associated Press said Whittington, 78, was mostly injured on his right side, with the pellets hitting his cheek, neck and chest during the incident which occurred late afternoon on Saturday.

So, what’s the best approach to this incident? There’s the humor angle:

* If Cheney wanted to shoot someone, he shouldn’t have taken five deferments. (rim shot)

There’s the suspicious timing angle:

* “The shooting was first reported by the Corpus Christi Caller-Times. The vice president’s office did not disclose the accident until nearly 24 hours after it happened.”

And conspiracy fodder angle:

* “It’s been a tumultuous week for the Texas Funeral Service Commission. On Monday, Travis County District Court Judge John Dietz ruled that Gov. George W. Bush won’t have to testify in Eliza May’s whistle-blower lawsuit against the agency. On Tuesday, the old TFSC board was dismissed. On Wednesday, the new board, headed by Austin lawyer Harry Whittington, took over the struggling agency.” (From September 1999)

And the “era of responsibility” angle:

* “The property owner, Katharine Armstrong, gave a highly exculpatory recounting of what transpired. Basically, she said the victim, Harry Whittington, snuck up on Cheney, didn’t give the appropriate warning. And in any case getting sprayed with shot in the face and half your body isn’t that big a deal anyway.”

One thing’s for sure — when the Vice President shoots a guy, it gets people’s attention.

I heard that the VP has invited Brownie for a bit of deer hunting next week. nudge nudge wink wink

  • Unbelievable…Cheney shoots somebody (admittedly, with bird shot) and it takes a day for the news to come out…only the Bushies (and, perhaps the Soviets) enjoy(ed) this kind of luxury…

    I’m thinking that the delay in releasing a statement might have been due, in part, to difficulties stabilizing a 78 year old victim…just speculating here…

    Other bloggers are suggesting that they needed a day to get the hunting parties’ stories straight..i.e. on the same page.

    Or to give Cheney time to get his blood alcohol down to an acceptable level if he had been drinking…

  • Following up:
    Can you imagine what it was like at the scene of the shooting???
    -If the victim was unconscious they must have been preparing for the worst…
    -Cheney must have been cr*pping in his pants…or grabbing his heart with his blood pressure going through the roof…I could well imagine docs administering to both Cheney and the victim…crazy.

  • There may be a fair argument that the more hunting companions the Vice-President shoots, the better off the country will be. It will have one of two effects, either it will thin the heard or the VP will have fewer people to pal around with.

  • I was taught that it is always the shooters responsibility to make sure of what is in front of the gun before pulling the trigger. This is just one more indication of how little the administration thinks of everyone besides themselves.

  • 1. Just because Cheney unloads at inappropriate times is no crime.

    2. If anyone says Cheney deserves to be charged for shooting someone, they are objectively pro-terrorist.

    Let’s all pray for Cheney’s gun and its loads.

  • Don, you are correct. Gun safety – one more thing Cheney has obviously no clue about. I wouldnt hunt with this psycho if you paid me.

  • Shoot first, ask questions later. Where o where have I seen that pattern before? Ira, Irq, no thats
    not it. Maybe the name will come to me later………

  • One can only wonder what would have happened if the unfortunate victim had returned fire….. 😉

  • Mr. Whittington must be one tall sucker. Quail don’t feed on putting greens, and who would take a shot at one less than eight feet off the ground? Well, I guess if you were really good. But if you were really good, you could tell the difference between a bird and your companion.

    Of course, if you were really, really good, you wouldn’t be part of the Bush administration.

  • I prefer the ever pragmatic TBogg approach, who wrote, “A word to the wise – if you’re going to shoot a lawyer (as Cheney did), shoot to kill. They pretty mean when wounded.”

    —
    HRlaughed

  • Is anyone surprised? Of all the people in the White House, Dick Cheney would be the one I’d pick to shoot someone.

    The CNN.com story has Cheney and his cohorts committing, essentially, drive-by shootings at quail. I’m no hunter. But I always thought part of the challenge was using bird dogs and tromping on foot to find the birds. But I guess cruising the fields in a climate controlled, leather interior could be considered sportsmanlike. Somehow.

  • Shock and Awe for Harry Whittington

    This is just a sample of what more and more friends of the crazy incompetent Bush Administration will soon be experiencing.

  • This was funny (assuming the victim recovers speedily), but it caused PZ Myers to post what to me is the shocking aspect: what Dick Cheney does when a day’s “hunting” isn’t interruped by accidents.
    Apparently, he shoots dozens and possibly hundreds of pen-raised birds per day, as the birds are sent past his position. Sounds less like hunting and more like a video game, but more exclusive (and expensive) and with a lot of bloody broken bird corpses strewn across the landscape.
    P.S. The best joke I’ve seen so far was Tom Tomorrow’s “The gang that couldn’t shoot straight”.

  • I would never watch tawdry reality TV like “The Simple Life”, but I might actually pay to watch “Life With Dick”. Just imagine all the dramatic and hilarious episodes!

    • Comments are closed.