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Wednesday, February 15, 2006

Cheney incident provokes strong reactions

WASHINGTON, Feb. 14—The 78-year-old lawyer shot by Vice President Dick Cheney in a hunting accident over the weekend suffered a minor heart attack early Tuesday caused by birdshot lodged in his heart, hospital officials in Texas said.

The lawyer, Harry M. Whittington, was moved back into the intensive care unit at Christus Spohn Hospital in Corpus Christi, Tex., to be monitored for up to a week in case the birdshot shifted or additional pellets in his body moved into other organs, the officials said at a televised news conference. Dr. David Blanchard, the emergency room chief, estimated that Mr. Whittington had more than 5 but “probably less than 150 to 200” pellets lodged in his body.

“Less than 150 to 200 pellets,” remarked John Hinderaker of the award-winning Pajamaline blog. “I think that’s the key to this MSM frenzy right there.  If Cheney had been trout fishing and a companion had walked behind him as he started to cast, so that he inadvertently snagged his friend 150 to 200 times, resulting in a hospital visit, would we have seen this kind of frenzy? I don’t think so. I think we’re seeing, among other things, the press corps’ innate ignorance of, and hostility to, firearms coming through.”

Cheney’s friends and associates seemed to agree that the incident has been overblown by late-night comics and critics of the Bush Administration.

“Dick Cheney is one of the most skilled shots I know, and they’ll make fun of it forever,” said Alan K. Simpson, a former Wyoming senator who is a longtime friend and sometime hunting partner of the vice president.

“That’s quite true,” said a former aide to Simpson.  “You shoot just one guy in the face and send him to intensive care where he has a heart attack, and people don’t stop to average out your shooting accuracy over your lifetime.  It’s completely unfair.  Just like nobody ever forgets that one time in 1990 Senator Simpson told Saddam Hussein, ‘I believe that your problems lie with the Western media and not with the U.S. government. . . . The press is spoiled and conceited. All these journalists consider themselves brilliant political scientists. They do not want to see anything succeeding or achieving its objectives. My advice is that you allow those bastards to come here and see things for themselves.’ And no one ever remembers all the many times that Alan Simpson did not say this to Saddam Hussein.”

Some reporters have suggested that Democrats could overplay their hand by exploiting the incident for partisan gain.

“Democrats, too, have engaged in these luxury canned-hunting exercises,” said the Washington Post’s Deborah Howell. “Furthermore, Democrats have shot at animals, or asked lobbyists to direct buckshot to animals.  So we regard this as fundamentally a bipartisan scandal.”

Other commentators disagreed about the extent of Democrats’ involvement in the shooting.  “John Kerry would never have had the guts to do something like this,” said former Georgia governor Zell Miller.  “John Kerry would have fed those quail a yes no maybe bowl of mush that would only encourage animals and confuse our friends.  At least when a friend shoots you in the face, you know where he stands.”

Posted by Michael on 02/15 at 06:26 AM
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