I heard that broadcast too. The first thing that came to my mind was this:
[anecdotal]The father of my ex-brother in law and a friend argued about whose shotgun “shot the hardest.” They were dressed in heavy winter jackets. So one of them, I don’t know which, went down the road about 60 yards, pulled up the jacket collar and ducked his head while the other one shot him with each of the 12 gauge shotguns. As I understood it, the shot didn’t penetrate the jackets.[/anecdote]
As I recall one of them had a Damascus, twist steel-barrel gun while the other had a gun with a solid tube barrel. That was the reason for the argument because the twist steel barrel guns couldn’t use standard 12 gauge shells because of possible damage.
My WAG would be that with a 28 gauge and 7½ shot you need to be pretty close to get pentration of the clothing, skin, etc., etc. As the news was reported, it was a chilly day and they were wearing jackets.
Does anyone else suspect that the reason for the delay before Cheney spoke with the press was so that his staff could get a study group together and determine what a normal human reaction would be to such an event?
“Mr Vice President, we’ve determined that you should go with an initial mix of 75% shock and 25% concern and then fade into a later mix of 45% regret and 45% concern with a residual 10% shock to cover any gaps in your stated memories of the event. You’ll want to avoid any guilt for legal reasons although we may later have you go with contrition if the lawyers clear it. You should hold off on anger or denial until the first news cycle is complete and we’ve had a chance to read the numbers.”
This is the one thing I am willing to give Cheney a pass on. Seeing as how he’s veep and all, the Secret Service would have wanted to secure not just whatever waiting room he was in at the hospital, but probably a fair amount of surrounding space as well.
That would’ve made it harder for the hospital to operate normally, and it would’ve kept the friends and relatives of other patients from being able to use the waiting room. Best that he should stay at the ranch, which is what he did.
Of course, I’m surprised he felt like sitting down to dinner. I sure wouldn’t.
I think you are spot on with this. But I also see DICK either stating that he must stay on message and stand resolute or else be perceived as weak OR him actually asking someone how to show concern and remorse.
I can’t make up my mind which. Either is disgusting.
There is a small slice of the heart that is on the right side, so perhaps the shot lodged there. Frankly, having cared for elderly men for 20 years–it’s not all that uncommon for one to have atrial fibrillation as a their baseline heart rhythym. I have not heard the docs say that this Afib is new.
The pellet is embedded in the muscle of the heart, and couldn’t have migrated there from the blood stream. There is a fluid filled sac named the pericardium that surrounds the heart, and from what I’ve seen the pellet was in there. Scar tissue will eventually surround foreign objects in the body, but before that happened the pellet was traveling around freeley.
I think there is some misunderstanding when folks are saying that Whittington was shot on the right side of his body are taking that to mean that he was standing with right side of his body to the shot. What I take it to mean is that he was facing Cheney, and that the grouping of pellets struck Whittington on the right side of his body.
That also begs the question, how could a pellet grouping from a 28 gauge 7½ shot shell remain that tight at 30 yards? Is this some sort of special shell that cleans, guts, and makes hamburger out of the quail? 30 feet is more like it.
So now the story is that Salinas was willing to forgo interviewing the shooter while any alcohol or drugs in his system might still show up, simply on the word of his old buddy who now works for the Veep’s rich friends.
These are honest people, yeah. Like Katharine Armstrong, who claimed to be an eyewitness, although she saw so little of what was happening that she initially assumed Cheney’d had a heart attack. And Cheney said yesterday that she was the most trustworthy of the people there.
Well, I’ll be. I’m an honest person and I wouldnt’ tell a lie, but I sure hope that if I am shot in Texas that the sheriff moseys over to check, things out in a more timely fashion, say, after his sun tea is done brewing and all.
Morons. Utter morons.
Honestly RT, I’m a bit dumbfounded by everyone’s insistence that there’s some huge coverup going on despite consistent reports to the contrary from those that would be most affected were that to be true. So now we’ve got the sheriff, his deputies, an ex-sheriff, the Secret Service, Cheney, the ambassador to Switzerland, eyewitnesses to the accident, dedgum Whittington himself, his family and his doctors ALL CONSPIRING TO HIDE EXACTLY WHAT???
Cheney said he did it. It was an accident. He didn’t benefit one bit from it being reported the next day or from it coming from the CC paper instead of the NY Times.
Man, I totally understand not liking Cheney but people are blowing this all out of proportion in their zeal to do his reputation and standing harm.
Look, Yankee, you got no cause to be talking about how things work in Texas. Now you best apoogize before I’m forced to fill you full of lead and skin your ass for flag number seven!
Skin my ass for flag number seven? <backs away from thread>
WTH does that mean, officer?
I think I’ll leave Texas (Austin can come with)–buh bye!
lieu –
I am not thinking in terms of cover-up. I am thinking in terms of arrogance, entitlement, good ole boys (who so aren’t in every way), and the chilly disregard for proper feelings/appropriate actions and remorse. But if you want to bash away at conspiracies, have at it.
I rather doubt that a man with Cheney’s health history and the medications that he might be on should or does get really plastered. He probably had a couple beers and didn’t want that fact to get out, hence the coverup.
Not a Texan, but as a WAG, I’ll note that Six Flags over Texas is not only the name of an amusement park, but a reference to the fact that the state has officially flown six flags throughout its history.
Please do not take the following as an attempt to compare Dick Cheney with Al Capone.
Al Capone did not go to Alcatraz for bootlegging, weapons violations, racketeering, murder-for-hire, or bribery of government officials; he went to Alcatraz for income tax evasion.
The world will be a better place when Dick Cheney suffers the consequences of having harm done to his reputation and his standing. As long as it is not done fraudulently, I’m not in the mood to be exceptionally picky about how this outcome is achieved.
Thanks. Considering how Texans just won’t STFU about the Six Flags (at least in my experience) I sometimes forget that some people don’t actually know the relevance…