Yes, I’m a gun owner and in fact, have participated in several “canned hunts” similar in nature, if not in scope—the hunts I’ve been on have all been for ringneck pheasant and we’ve released less than 30 birds for 4 or 5 hunters. I have also, in fact, been on point and almost shot once; I’m convinced had I not thrown myself to the ground when the second and third pheasant were flushed, it is very likely I’d have been sporting a few pellets in the back of my head. These type of hunts, where there are several shooters in close quarters, are undeniably the most dangerous of all hunting. How they work, is typically, one or two of the group depending on how many dogs you’ve got, are “on point.” (On point means in the center and in front of the designated shooters. Your purpose is to flush the birds after the dog points on them.) The shooters are supposed to be on the wings and never point their guns below head height. They’re supposed to also give a large lead in front of the point man.
There’s no doubt that Cheney fucked up here and violated the safety rules - no doubt at all It’s unfortunate that a guy got shot, but thankfully, not seriously so. That does infrequently happen. The safety rules are designed to work in most cases - and they do so quite well most of the time. But the rules are also designed so that the chances of injury are minimized when safety rules are violated. In my opinion, there are probably actually three persons among whom the blame for this should be equally shared: Cheney, obviously for taking an unsafe shot; Whittington, not quite so obviously for waking into an unsafe zone; and the shoot captain, which isn’t apparent at all from the reporting on the incident, for not controlling the shooters - he should have been yelling at both Cheney and Whittington for acting stupidly and unsafely. The shoot captain, and I’ve never shot in a group of any size in which someone wasn’t in overall command, is generally the guide who owns and calls the dogs. He should be the rearmost person of the group so he can see everything that’s happening out in front.
Really? You have a public statement from someone associated with the VP refusing to admit this happened? I’ve seen reports which say that nothing was given to the press through an official spokesman until after the story broke elsewhere. But you seem to be saying that a Cheney spokesperson actually went farther and denied that it happened. Can I get a clarification on your statement, please?
I see. You’d prefer the word of someone who wasn’t at the scene? Why is Armstrong a “dubious” witness? I can’t see that she has anything to gain by being obfuscatory.
They do that in Mexico, too, when bullfighters kill a bull. The meat goes to the homeless and the poor. Guess what? It still doesn’t make the practice of bullfighting any less barbaric. Just like shooting 400 birds that have been put there specifically for you to shoot and then giving them to charity doesn’t make you a hunter, much less a sportsman.
I heard it on a local news affiliate last night. They didn’t say that Cheney’s people denied it, but that they refused to confirm it or comment on it at first. I’m not sure what part of the timeline they were talking about but it is true that the WH hid the story for almost a full day before it broke.
Her statement just seems very canned and scripted to me…not to mention delayed. I don’t see how she could know what Whittington said or didn’t say if she was sitting in a car when it happened, and it just seems suspicious that she has this rehearsed little story 18 hours later.
Call me paranoid and suspicipus but this administration has never given me any reason not to be. If they told me the sky was blue, I’d go get my eyes checked.
I’m assuming and nothing more that it was one of those cars with windows.
Personally, whenever we hunt quail we position ourselves in a line perpendicular to the direction we’re sweeping so we’ll all be in each other’s peripheral vision. Furthemore, you pre-ascertain the degree of safe angle you can point your gun. For those in the middle, it’s somewhat limited. For those on the ends, it’s a great deal wider. My guess is that Cheney though he could safely pursue a quail over a certain angle but was unaware that a portion of that space had been invaded by a third hunter. His degree of safe angle would have been much less than he’d previously considered. Another thing; the nature of a quail’s flight is that it’ll delay flight until the last instant and then EXPLODE from the brush in a sudden burst. It doesn’t fly high but gains speed low and then coasts low back to resettle in more cover. Much of it’s flight takes place less that 8 or 9 feet off the ground, making it particularly dangerous when other hunters are present.
One more thing, if Cheney is right-handed (and an earlier link does suggest that) he would have had his left eye closed when targeting and shooting and apparently hit did hit the lawyer from a position to the lawyer’s right. It’s not an excuse, just another probable requisite for an experienced hunter to make such a mistake. For the record, I don’t think Cheney is guilt free here. I give 'em both 50% blame.
Uh, the great big bullseye permanently tattoed on his forehead to any and all partisan observers? Again, I don’t see him denying anything, nor do I blame him for not beeing too conceeding in his public stance.
If she, however indirectly and politely, accuses Cheney, a star customer, one who draws other customers to her business even when he isn’t there, of reckless fuckuppery, there are consequences. He won’t come back, his rich friends probably won’t, the star power he brings is gone, she gets a rep (unfair but real) as just another Bush hater in a part of the country where that is most seriously bad for business. That, btw, is without getting into what Cheney is known to be willing to do directly to somebody who crosses him.
Oh, get out the way of Ol’ Dick Cheney
His trigger’s quick, he’s got bad aim-y
Get too near the line to flush them quail
Cheney’ll put birdshot in your tail!
This will be a drive-by contribution to this thread. I doubt I’ll change anyone’s mind with this, but as a hunter of sorts I’m compelled to stamp out some ignorance here.
(1) This is not like fishing from a stocked pond. The ranch is managed for quail. Whether they release coveys the day of the hunt or have “wild” coveys on site, the birds are little, fly very fast, and are hard to shoot. That said, hunting at a managed ranch is a rich man’s “sport” and out of the reach of most of us. Personally, I don’t like the idea of hunting released birds, but not everybody is so picky.
(2) According to every report I’ve read, the shootee is responsible for his peppering, even if the media is choosing not to report it that way in the headlines. While some may think it callous to “blame the victim”, and while it may seem counter-intuitive to blame the person who got shot, here’s why: he apparently approached a group of active hunters from behind without announcing his presence.
When a group of folks is engaged in upland bird hunting, one of the primary safety rules is to be aware of the location of everyone in your hunting party AND to make sure that everyone in your hunting party is aware of where you are. This is normally a fairly simple thing to do as you’re usually walking together in line abreast of each other and are in the peripheral vision of everyone in your group. Yes, you also have to watch for the dogs, too.
The guy who got peppered wan’t part of the VP’s group, as such nobody in the group was on the lookout for him. He wasn’t in anybody’s peripheral vision. He had been hunting in another area, then he decided to join Cheney’s group. When he decided to join those hunters, he should have first called out to them to stop hunting until he could catch up.
Accidents, by their very nature, are accidents. Sometimes they’re unavoidable. Sometimes they can be traced to someone doing something stupid. It’s stupid to walk up behind a group of people who have shotguns and who are hunting something without alerting them to your presence.
That seems fair and an adequate piece of support for your claim. I agree with you; it seems kinda weasly on the part of Cheney to not speak up immediately.
Well, admissions of fuckups are always kinda canned. There’s only so many ways one can admit to a fuckup. On the other hand, I don’t know of Armstrong’s comments came immediately following the incident, or later as you suggest. Simply because they’re included in the Whitehouse release, doesn’t mean they weren’t in the earliest breaking stories. You may be right though; the Corpus Christi newspaper which was supposedly the first with this story doesn’t seem to have published anything until 18 hours after the incident. Armstrong’s statement, which appears actually to be a small portion of a larger interview, is in that story. So, it remains to be seen exactly what the delay was between the incident and her statements.
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A stance I try to advocate with anything politic. However, one has to make judgments on what he believes the best information available - judgments subject to revision if new & better data is presented. In this case, the best information available right now doesn’t seem to reveal anything sinister. More than a little callous and evasive, but not outright sinister.
And what I should have caught on preview: I agree with most of what Uncle Beer has said here. I would give Cheney 25% of the blame, Whittington 25%, and the ranch owner/hunt leader 50%.
Whittington is 40 yards away with his back turned, unless Cheney is firing at the car. How does the presence of a window in the car enable Armstrong to affirmatively state that he did not announce himself? Could she read his lips in the reflection of Cheney’s glasses?
[QUOTE=lieu]
I’m assuming and nothing more that it was one of those cars with windows.
Personally, whenever we hunt quail we position ourselves in a line perpendicular to the direction we’re sweeping so we’ll all be in each other’s peripheral vision. Furthemore, you pre-ascertain the degree of safe angle you can point your gun. For those in the middle, it’s somewhat limited. For those on the ends, it’s a great deal wider. My guess is that Cheney though he could safely pursue a quail over a certain angle but was unaware that a portion of that space had been invaded by a third hunter. His degree of safe angle would have been much less than he’d previously considered. Another thing; the nature of a quail’s flight is that it’ll delay flight until the last instant and then EXPLODE from the brush in a sudden burst. It doesn’t fly high but gains speed low and then coasts low back to resettle in more cover. Much of it’s flight takes place less that 8 or 9 feet off the ground, making it particularly dangerous when other hunters are present.
[quote=lieuOne more thing, if Cheney is right-handed (and an earlier link does suggest that) he would have had his left eye closed when targeting and shooting and apparently hit did hit the lawyer from a position to the lawyer’s right.[/quote]
Not necessarily, lieu, although I’m reticent to contradict you. I almost always have both eyes open when shotgunning. Gives be a better gauge of distance to target, and thus, lead. I know several guys who do this. Of course, I also know many guys who do indeed close their non-master eye.
Do any of those reports have anything other than Armstrong’s statement as a source? If not “every report I’ve read” is pretty much just one report from someone who as far as we know was in no position to hear what Whittington did or did not say, and almost ceretainly has no way of knowing that he absolutely said nothing.
To expand on that a bit. If Armstrong was indeed leading the hunt, then she should be shouldering more blame. There’s no way in hell she can effectively direct a hunt from inside a vehicle.
I’ve been a hunter for about 25 years. A relatively minor “shooting” where birdshot is involved is just about always called a peppering. Just the way it is. Evis as this White House can be, this isn’t their term for it.