Nothing To See Here Little Doggies, Move Along Please
During the height of the frenzy over Cheney's wayward marksmanship, I was more fascinated by the collective attempted spin than the reality. I saw one reassuring headline from a wire service about Whittington getting nicked by "a pellet gun." Early in the week, a hospital spokesman apparently felt that the standard terms for a patient's condition were insufficient, so he invented a new one: "very stable condition."
But Josh Marshall notes the most egregious and unintentionally hilarious spin here.
Incredible times, eh?
But Josh Marshall notes the most egregious and unintentionally hilarious spin here.
Incredible times, eh?
posted by The Cunning Realist at Friday, February 17, 2006
18 Comments:
fair and balanced.
I hear Cheney got a standing ovation in Montana today. I guess that's the price you pay for shooting a man in the face!
I give up. I don't know what else to say when a man an old man gets shot in the face by another (drunk) old man and the victim apologizes to the shooter. What will we tell the children?
mjs-
Tell the children to make every effort to be white, male, rich, and powerful and the world will be their oyster.
and we think North Korea is in the grip of a personality cult
Yes, if only Charles Manson's victims were alive to apologize to him.
"Tell the children to make every effort to be white, male, rich, and powerful and the world will be their oyster."
I think white people are in their last throes. I also think they know it, fear it, and thus the amount of backlash, blowback, and fear mongering they have undertaken against everyone else.
I always tell my white Republican friends that today's immigrants are this century's pilgrims and we are the American Indians. That typically scares the bejesus out of them.
It was an unfortunate hunting accident. Where there are guns, things like that are likely to happen because individuals react hastily, get mad, can't see or hear too well, have a mental condition, use drugs or alcohol, or the guns get into the hands of children. Only individuals with an utmost sense of responsibility should be allowed to use guns.
It does show enormous misjudgment on Cheney's part. That's what scares me. If he can't use good judgment on an innocent hunting trip among friends, should he be Vice President of the United States?
It is obvious that there was an initial effort to cover up the whole affair. The local police was not allowed anywhere close for a day or so. Is a Vice President immune to local police investigation when someone gets shot? Why did they keep the police away? Was the local police intimidated because it was the Vice President?
As a lover of Agatha Christie stories, this one leaves too many questions unanswered.
http://www.infowars.com/articles/us/cheney_shooting_scientific_proof.htm
I dunno if this site is trustworthy but it's probably as good as CNN or Fox.
"VP Accident Tale Filled With Discrepancies
By CALVIN WOODWARD and NANCY BENAC
02.18.2006, 03:52 AM
Vice President Dick Cheney said he didn't immediately disclose his hunting accident because he wanted the confusing details to come out right. Instead, authorized accounts came out slowly - and often still wrong.
The result: a week of shifting blame, belatedly acknowledged beer consumption (not "zero" drinking after all) and evolving discrepancies in how the shooting happened, its aftermath and the way it was told to the nation. [...]
BLAME
In the first days after the vice president wounded attorney Harry Whittington while shooting at quail last Saturday in Texas, blame was placed on the victim for not announcing his presence to fellow hunter Cheney.
"The vice president did everything right," Katharine Armstrong, the ranch owner approved by Cheney to disclose the accident, said Monday. [...]
The about-face came Wednesday when Cheney made his first public comment on the accident.
"It was not Harry's fault," he said. "You can't blame anybody else. I'm the guy who pulled the trigger and shot my friend."
DRINKING
Although there is no evidence that beer impaired Cheney's judgment, initial denials that he had consumed alcohol were wrong.
"No one was drinking," Armstrong said at the outset. "No, zero, zippo." [...]
Authorities did not investigate the accident until the next day. The Texas Parks and Wildlife accident report, dated two days after the shooting, checked "No" on the question of whether Cheney appeared under the influence of intoxicants. [...]
Cheney acknowledged Wednesday, "I had a beer at lunch" several hours before the group's afternoon hunt, asserting "nobody was under the influence."
VICTIM'S CONDITION
In the rush to assure everyone Whittington was "just fine," some important details were left out.
Initial reports had him treated at the scene, then taken by ambulance to the hospital, where in no time he was cracking jokes with the nurses. It turned out that after being taken to the emergency room of a local, small hospital, he was flown by helicopter to the intensive care unit of the larger hospital in Corpus Christi. [...]
LICENSE
Cheney did not have all his hunting papers in order, as suggested by the White House and initially stated by Texas authorities.
On Sunday, a spokesman for the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department said Cheney was legally hunting with a license he bought in November. While that was true, the department's accident report the next day stated that he was in violation of a law requiring him to have an upland game bird stamp.
DISCLOSURE
The accident raised questions about the flow of information into and out of the White House communications apparatus.
Asked why no one released news of the shooting on Saturday night, McClellan said "the vice president's office was working to make sure information got out" but that details were slow to reach Washington that evening. [...]
TELLING WASHINGTON
McClellan said President Bush was told shortly before 8 p.m. EST Saturday that Cheney had shot Whittington, less than half an hour after Bush first heard there had a been an accident of some sort involving Cheney's hunting party. [...]
However, McClellan said he didn't personally know Cheney was the shooter until the next morning, about 6 a.m. EST Sunday, when he was awakened with the news. [...]"
Just another SNAFU, time to 'move on'...
The amount of spin was remarkable. I suppose we'll never know what really happened. Can you imagine the cronism that has transpired on that ranch though.
What caught my ear:
-blaming Whittington
-it was just a "minor heart attack"
-Fox played the feeling card
Bottom-line, Cheney shooting a man in the face and chest, the spin, secrecy, was a metaphor for this administration. I was kind of shocked he got a standing ovation. It is scary; the only thing I can think of is to survive you join whoever is in power.
Who do you think is really running the country?
Here's an interesting piece on Cheney, and it confirms what was written in this Time article in March of 2003.
While Powell was off at the UN, Cheney and Rumsfeld, were backstabbing Powell. It is a great article and well worth a read. On the one hand they were telling us one thing, but they were already planning for war. "Diplomacy was suspiciously absent."
I think Cheney is incapable of being honest with the American public. He is arrogant and secretive; very self-centered selfish man. Vietnam deferments, Iran Contra, appointed himself to head the transition team into the WH, Halliburton CEO and continual contacts... He just seems to be a very odd man to be in public service in a Democracy, since his attitude to us seems to be F-U. 60 Minutes did a piece on Halliburton & subsidiaries doing illegal business with Iran and other countries we had sanctions on; to this day Halliburton is still doing business in Iran.
MJS-
What we can tell the children?
We can tell them their leaders are keeping them safe from the evils of on-line gambling . . .
. . . on the same weekend that the Powerball Lottery was *the* biggest news story in the land.
Most peculiar, mama.
I couldn't give a rat's ass if those guys all get out and shoot each other. It bothers me a lot more that they were shooting quails. And from the car yet - there's a plaque over the mantelpiece I'd like to see! Right between the liberal and the puppy.
If only our media took as much interest in nailing down the real story behind all his secret meetings.
If the folks that cheered Cheney in Wyoming are for him, does that mean they are also for this (i.e., leaking cia operative, shady Halliburton deals, block campaign financial reform, manipulation of intelligence, etc.). If that doesn't work click here and select video.
It is kind of sad about Wyoming, when you think of historically the integrity and progressiveness of the state.
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