know what you are shooting?

[fabsroman]

Great.

I have been trying to say for years that cars are more deadly than guns, yet we allow all types of people, even convicted felons, to use them. Heck, Maryland evens allows people to get their driver's license back after their 3rd DUI after waiting 18 months. They can get it back after their 4th DUI after waiting 24 months, some of which will probably be in jail.

[Skinny Shooter]

I'd rather be hunting quail with Dick Cheney than joyriding through Chappaquidick with Teddy Kennedy.

[rick savage]

you think he;ll look closer next time

[petey]

Analyze it all you want fabs....the man did dead wrong and it's a bad wrap for the whole hunting industry in my mind. Accidents shouldn't happen if you use your head. Believe it or not I haven't even followed the story, nor do I want to. After hearing a short clip about it on the radio on the way to work it kind of really made me mad....then I hear later they get a warning for not having the correct licenses/stamps? what's up with that?

Some people shouldn't even be allowed to hunt...which probably includes many of our "great" leaders. Just another great selling point for those anti's out there....Thanks Mr. Cheney (My true opinion as the owner of this site)

[Skyline]

At one point in my life I did a lot of bird hunting. A lot of pheasant hunting with dogs. I saw a lot of close calls with guys swinging on birds that flushed..........they get excited. That's why there are rules and proper protocal on bird shoots. There were several mistakes made here.....by the shooter and the victim.

In a few weeks, days, hell tomorrow......something else will happen and this will go away, as it should. If this wasn't one of the fearless leaders that did it, it could hardly be called news.

This was unfortunate...............but oh well....lets get over it!

[fabsroman]

Petey,

I am not trying to analyze it, because I have no idea what the facts are. However, I know accidents happen and that is why they are called accidents. They happen with guns and they happen with cars, both of which can be deadly, and that is even with all the rules in place.

Personally, I think there would be a lot less car accidents if EVERYBODY obeyed the speed limit (and I don't mean by doing 10 mph over it), stopped at stop signs, and did not try to beat amber lights by accelerating. Have you, or anybody you know, ever been at fault in an auto accident?

As far as hunting goes, accidents do happen even when all the rules are followed. I have made a couple of mistakes in my time. One time, I was dove hunting. I just got to the farm and intended on hunting a standing corn field that was about 200 yards long and 80 yards wide. I started walking down one of its lengths and my brother started walking down the other length, figuring that we would set up on each side and watch each others back. Well, a dove flushed from the edge of the field and headed over the corn, but quartering away from me. I figured there was no way my brother could be that far in front of me, so I shot the bird. Little did I know that my uncle was hunting the field also. He was further up and I ended up shooting the leaves out of the tree above him. When my brother finally got to where my uncle was, my uncle asked him who was shooting on the other side of the field. Of course, my brother told him it was me and he could not believe it was me because I am the most safety conscious person and he figured I would never shoot that close to him. Problem was that I didn't even know he was there.

On another occassion, and idiot was still hunting with a bow during firearms season and he was wearing a ghillie suit that looked really good. After being on stand for several hours, probably around 5 hours, I saw a bush moving about 100 yards away. Back then, I was too poor to afford binos, so I brought the scope up to check it out. It took me a couple of minutes to find the orange fletching on his arrows before I finally figured it out. Meantime, the only thing that prevented his death was the mechanics of the gun, but if for any reason the hammer had come down on that gun, he would have been dead. Who is to blame on that one? I didn't follow the rule of not pointing my gun at anything I do not want to kill and he didn't follow the rule of wearing orange during firearms season. On top of that, he didn't have permission to hunt the farm.

Accidents will always happen, and it is easy to condemn somebody without knowing all the facts.

Yeah, my first impression was that the antis would be all over this, but then I thought that I am glad that we have a President and Vice President that hunt. I knew that Bush liked to hunt, but I didn't know that Cheney loved to hunt. I was glad to hear that news.

As far as the warning on the upland bird stamps is concerned, the Texas DNR had been giving warnings to everybody this year about the stamp because the law was just changed 5 months ago to require the stamp. The DNR treated Cheney and the rest of the group just as they would have treated any other hunter that did not have the stamp. Cheney's camp sent in the $7 for the stamp as soon as he got back.

Accidents happen eveyday, this one just made the news because it was the Vice President of the United States.

[skeeter@ccia.com]

We all know cheney didn't shoot him because he wanted something to do....just lucky thing situation wasn't in reverse..Cheney just needs to tell the reporters is all it was..accident...so they can go home now..untill he does so..it won't go away..
We all as hunters know not everyone in the woods are hunters and even on state game lands, are people just out for a walk..unaware of orange. You as a hunter will get a fine for being there without orange if is the season but a nonhunter is not required to wear it. Signs are posted in our just opened to hunting county parks that hunters wear orange...so should you.
I have confronted spring tky hunters moving through the woods without the orange req when moving..only to be told..oh..didn't know that...bigest problem in the sport is not everyone reads the darn rules...same goes with our local sportsmens club..read the rules..
Fabs...accidents don't happen...they are caused for what ever reason.

[Skinny Shooter]

My questions are why did it take so long for information to come out?
Why wasn't the president immediately notified that the Veep was the trigger puller in a hunting accident?
Why did it take an hour for any news of this incident to reach the President.

Here's a timeline from MSNBC:

2/11/06:
4 p.m.: Vice President Cheney begins an afternoon quail hunt with four other hunters on the private Armstrong Ranch in south Texas. They had been hunting earlier in the day, but took a break for lunch.
6:30 p.m.: Cheney accidentally shoots fellow hunter Harry Whittington while aiming for a bird. Secret Service agents and medical personnel with Cheney tend to wounds on Whittington’s face, neck and chest.

7:20 p.m.: An ambulance takes Whittington to Christus Spohn Hospital Kleburg.

7:30 p.m.: White House chief of staff Andrew Card tells President Bush there was an accident, but Card is unaware Cheney was involved.

7:50 p.m.: The head of the Secret Service office in McAllen, Texas, calls the Kenedy County sheriff to report the accident. The sheriff asks to speak to Cheney, and they schedule an interview for 9 a.m. Sunday. At the White House, presidential aide Karl Rove tells Bush that Cheney was the shooter, after talking to ranch owner Katharine Armstrong.

Almost an hour and a half later the sheriff is called??? What?
If this injured hunter was transported by EMS to the hospital, why wasn't LE sent to the scene because guns were involved? Why didn't the hospital notify LE that a patient came in with gunshot wounds. that's all pretty standard around these parts.

Saturday Evening:
Cheney and the rest of the hunting party sit down for dinner at the ranch. At some point, sheriff’s deputies who heard reports of the ambulance responding to an accident at the ranch stop at the front gate to see if anyone needs help, but are told no one needs assistance. The Secret Service earlier had said the deputies were seeking to interview Cheney, but on Tuesday they said that was not the case. Armstrong says no one at the dinner discussed announcing the accident to the public because they were all focused on Whittington’s well being.

What? The VP can't multi-task enough to think this needs to be reported??? If you're calm enough to sit down to dinner and enjoy a meal, you'd think he would have been on the horn to his boss.
How many "Aides" go with Cheney when he is on a trip?
Not one of them thought to make a statement? Why didn't the President's Office make a statement?

2/12/06
6 a.m.: White House press secretary Scott McClellan is awakened by a phone call from the White House situation room, informing him Cheney was the shooter. McClellan contacts the vice president’s office and urges that the information be made public quickly.
9 a.m.: Kenedy County sheriff’s deputies interview Cheney. Armstrong begins calling a reporter at the Corpus Christi Caller-Times and leaving messages. Armstrong says she told Cheney she wanted to tell the local paper what happened, and he agreed.

Noon: The reporter returns Armstrong’s call.

2:48 p.m.: The Corpus Christi Caller-Times posts a short report about the accident on its Web site after confirming the account with the vice president’s office.

3:34 p.m.: The Associated Press, following up on the local story, moves a news alert about the shooting.

Early Sunday evening: Cheney visits Whittington in the hospital before flying back to Washington.

2/13/06
6:20 p.m.: The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department issues its hunting accident report, which says the main contributing factor was a “hunter’s judgment factor” when Cheney sprayed his fellow hunter while aiming at flying birds. The report says both Cheney and Whittington were violating state game law because they did not have required $7 upland game bird stamps. Both are issued warning citations.

7:20 p.m.: The vice president’s office issues a statement saying it was not aware that Cheney needed the $7 stamp and that he has sent a check for that amount to the state.

Cheney's office staff allegedly took care of all permits and licenses needed for this hunt somehow that new stamp was overlooked by the state.

I have a strong dis-like for the white house press corps and media in general but I can't blame them for jumping all over Scott McClellan for not having better answers during his press conference. His repeated statements that you'll have to talk to the vice-presidents staff for more info just made me even more mad.
The handling of this incident has been a goof-up for the Bush Admin. If I shot another hunter and waited to notify LE or the PGC I'd be in serious trouble. How bad would GW have looked if a reporter would have blind-sided him on this before he had the full story?

[fabsroman]

Skinny,

It is very easy to say "this should have been done and that should have been done". In essence, it is very easy to be a Monday morning quarterback, or for those of us that watch Monday night football, a Tuesday morning quarterback.

Do you think Cheney might have been in shock, denial, etc. During a crisis, there are seven stages that people go through, I cannot remember them all, and the length of time it takes to get through all of them depends on the individual person.

When you are on the outside of the entire situation, it is easy to see what should have been done. However, when you are on the inside, it isn't as easy.

Like I say, we all like to think we will do the right thing when the crap hits the fan, but until the time comes to make that decision, you cannot tell me for sure that you would do the right thing.


Skeeter,

Accidents do happen, and they are just that, accidents. An accident is something that is unintentional. Albeit, it might be the result of somebody not following the rules, etc.

For instance, how about the single car "accident" because of black ice? Is the driver truly at fault for that. How about when a tree falls in the middle of the road and causes an "accident," or should I just call that a crash?

In the, most accidents are caused because somebody is careless/negligent and/or not obeying the rules. However, sometimes accidents happen even though all the rules are followed and everybody was being extremely careful.

[Skinny Shooter]

Originally posted by fabsroman
Skinny,
It is very easy to say "this should have been done and that should have been done". In essence, it is very easy to be a Monday morning quarterback, or for those of us that watch Monday night football, a Tuesday morning quarterback.

Do you think Cheney might have been in shock, denial, etc. During a crisis, there are seven stages that people go through, I cannot remember them all, and the length of time it takes to get through all of them depends on the individual person.

When you are on the outside of the entire situation, it is easy to see what should have been done. However, when you are on the inside, it isn't as easy.

Fabs, you're dead on if it was you or I in this situation. I would have been in shock if it happened to me. But the last I heard the VP doesn't travel alone.
He had the SS as bodyguards. His "Handlers" and/or Aides control his schedule, etc. I don't believe for one minute that Professionals like the SS couldn't react quicker to notify their command center in DC or that the Aides didn't have their act together enough to call the Boss.
Not sure how to make that more clear so we may have to agree to disagree.

[fabsroman]

I'll agree with you that there were some level heads there at the time. However, I think you will agree that sometimes a little investigation needs to be done to make sure that the facts are conveyed to the public correctly. Look at the response time we got with the West Virginia miners, and look how that turned out. Sometimes, speed isn't all it is cracked up to be when it turns out that things are inaccurate.

Sure, I could crank out a tax return in an hour without ever talking to the client about grey areas, but you can bet there would be mistakes in it.

At the end of the day, it is easy for people to criticize when they aren't in the other person's shoes. We can criticize this administration on 9/11, the war in Afghanistan, the war in Irag, the response to Katrina, and now the Cheney's shooting. Seems as though this administration has a lot on its mind and it has had to deal with a bunch of stuff the previous administration did not. I don't blame them for holding the information.

Let me ask this question, would it be such a big deal if it was anybody other than the Vice President that shot somebody. This is a big deal, and we are making a "federal case" of it because it was the Vice President. Why should we be entitled to know this stuff immediately. Does it have any effect on the nation as a whole. Is it required that this type of information be divulged to the American public? Somehow, I don't think this has anything to do with National Security.

At the end of the day, we can be mad at Cheney for making our fight to keep firearms harder. We can be mad at him and the administration for not disclosing this info to us immediately. However, in the end, I think we would be better off trying to support the guy.

I too was mad when I first heard about this, but I put myself in Cheney's shoes and started to feel bad for him. Can you imagine shooting your friend by accident and then having to deal with all this? I am surprised the man is still sane. On top of all that, we have a man lying in a hospital bed, yet the nation's comedians can find humor in all this. Utterly insane.

At the end of the day, I will agree to disagree about this whole thing, but I think my position is pretty clear. I am going to support Cheney until I find out that he shot the guy on purpose.

[huntingvet]

Fabrosman, I have to admit that I agree with you 100%. Here's my take on the situation.

Facts - Cheney shoots a guy that is still in a hospital with a potentially serious complication.

Pretty darn close to fact though I can't prove it - Cheney feels terrible and is embarassed. If given the opportunity to repeat that one second in time, Cheney would have let that bird go. All of us have been close to being in similar situations whether we admit it or not. For most of us the difference lays in whether we pulled the trigger or not, which may not have involved a conscious decision. Our hunting heritage is better served by an administration that also likes to hunt.

Debatable - The situation was TOTALLY preventable. As Fabrosman stated, we weren't there. I would like to believe that I would have had better judgement than to swing on a fellow hunter while pulling the trigger, but I wasn't there. Hopefully, I'll never be in that situation.

What I think we call all agree on - Cheney wounding a friend while on a hunting trip has absolutely nothing to do with his ability to lead our country. More importantly, do I really have to know that Cheney pulled the trigger on a shotgun that propelled bird shot toward another individual named "Whittington" striking him in the face, neck and possibly body unintentially on a Saturday afternoon in Texas? If so, would I then need to know the number of shot used, high brass vs low brass, type and make of shotgun (maybe Winchester or Browning is to blame?), etc?

Unfortunately the poor guy suffered from a lack of judgement, may have seriously harmed his fellow hunter and yes may be bringing light to our hunting heritage. However, why does it matter to so many so much?

[fabsroman]

The more I listen to this stuff on the news, the more it drives me crazy. Now, it appears that the media is upset that Cheney did not apologize for telling them right away about the incident. Did I miss something? Was the media upset at Clinton when he didn't tell them right away about Monica? What happened between Monica and Clinton was actually a crime. Last I checked, unless Cheney was completely reckless, what he did was an accident and not even a crime.

Cheney apologized on national TV to his friend about shooting him, but did not apologize to the White House press corp for not informing them immediately.

Do you guys think he should apologize to the media for not informing them right away? Mind you, from what I get of the chronology, he did inform them within 24 hours.

[Skyline]

The media should get stuffed!

[huntingvet]

Amen!