Dick Cheney Shoots a Man

[pmac]

Dick Cheney shoots man [cnn.com] while hunting.

Rumour of a second shooter on the grassy knoll.

<mod note> As incredibly tempting as it may seem to take political shots on this one, lets try and show some restraint.</mod note>

[jimbeetle]

Appears to be a situation in which some of those NRA gun handling courses would have come in handy ;-)

[encyclo]

It's the Quayle's revenge, err, I mean quail's revenge! ;)

[garyr_h]

Geez.
I just read the linked article and couldn't help but have the 'peppered' stick out in the article. I wouldn't think that would be a word to describe being shot in the face and side...

Be it that the shooting wasn't very serious as the shotguns used for quail hunting aren't very powerful, it still couldn't have been very serious an inch or so either way.

[skunker]

Who has NOT been shot by these things? Common as hell. Shot my foot once with that. By the way, I live not far from this ranch. Part of the King Ranch, damn huge.

[anax]

This is today's "Most emailed story" in Yahoo News. The #2 story has been sent 600 times; this one has been sent *4000* times.

The cartoonists are going to have a field day. ;-)

[PhraSEOlogy]

Maybe they need to review the bag limit in Texas.

Daily bag limit: 15 quail, one Lawyer.

is this in bad taste?

[anax]

*sings Tom Lehrer's "Hunting Song"*

I always will remember,
'Twas a year ago November,
I went out to hunt some deer
On a mornin' bright and clear.
I went and shot the maximum the game laws would allow:
Two game wardens, seven hunters, and a cow.

I was in no mood to trifle,
I took down my trusty rifle
And went out to stalk my prey.
What a haul I made that day.
I tied them to my fender, and I drove them home somehow:
Two game wardens, seven hunters, and a cow.

The law was very firm, it
Took away my permit,
The worst punishment I ever endured.
It turned out there was a reason:
Cows were out of season,
And one of the hunters wasn't insured.

People ask me how I do it,
And I say, "There's nothin' to it,
You just stand there lookin' cute,
And when something moves, you shoot!"
And there's ten stuffed heads in my trophy room right now:
Two game wardens, seven hunters, and a pure-bred Guernsey cow.

[LisaWeber]

A *78 year old man* even! LOL. What are these old men thinking?

[Hawkgirl]

He used to be Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, right? The number one military guy under the President. You'd think the man would've had enough firearms training to know he needs to look before he shoots.

[Rugles]

>>>Chairman of the Joint Chiefs

No Defense Secretary.

I hope the other guy was armed, because shooting an unarmed man could be embarassing.

The Daily Show is going to be a riot tonight!

[Rugles]

Too funny... it is not the first time, its the first miss.

Vice President Aaron Burr killed Alexander Hamilton in a duel in 1804

[woop01]

Getting shot by a shotgun is very similar to getting hit by a couple dozen b-b gun pellets. Speaking from experience, if you're around 70-100 yds away it stings a bit but doesn't puncture a leather jacket.

[Rugles]

did you get shot in the face and neck?

[woop01]

Back of my neck, head, back, and legs. At that range the pellets spread into a rather large area and aren't very concentrated. We used to shoot up in the air in such a manner that the pellets would come down on each other when there weren't any birds flying.

Don't get me wrong, at close range you can blow a person's head off with a shotgun easier than you can with a rifle. (this part is NOT from experience) They just don't hold much punch once you get to about 70 yds or so.

[Hawkgirl]

> Defense Secretary

That's right. Sorry, I was lazy and didn't search first. ;)

I still think it's interesting how no one in the radio or television media that I've heard will say "he shot the guy" ... it's all "peppered" and "sprayed" and other innocuous-sounding terms.

[Quinn]

Ha - I was thinking the same thing Hawkgirl. When I first saw it on TV last night the anchor said something to the effect of, "Now it's important to remember that this was an accidental shooting and that these aren't fatal."

What? When was the last time the press played down ANY kind of shooting.

"VP shot Man in Face".

[woop01]

"Shot" in the traditional sense of the term isn't what would have happened with a shotgun. The term shot brings to mind images of a big entry wound when pellets don't do that. "Peppered" or "sprayed" are actually a lot more accurate terms for what would happen with a shotgun.

I wouldn't say it's been played down, it's been the lead story on every news broadcast I've seen and they broke into live coverage to mention it when the news came out.

[pmac]

Well, I for one am stunned at how the media have handled this story. From up here it looks like it got knocked off the front pages by a snow storm.

If one of our senior politicians pinged someone with an elastic band [bbc.co.uk] it would dominate news for days........ I can't imagine the furor if they actually shot someone.

[skibum]

The guy should have taken cover under a bush.

[skipfactor]

Chenneyquiddick: 24 hours before officially announcing that the VP had shot another human being?!

No, not "peppered" nor "sprayed"! If the VP had been shot, "sprayed" would never have been spun.

>> "Shot" in the traditional sense of the term isn't what would have happened with a shotgun.

US law makes no such distinction: bullet = buckshot.

[jecasc]

What I think is funny though is how the blame is put on the guy Cheney "peppered". Not he had the obligation to look if its ok to fire. But the guy approaching from behind without warning is at fault.

Because thats what you do when hunting. Running around screeming "WATCH OUT, HERE I COME".

[woop01]

US law makes no such distinction: bullet = buckshot.

Like people on hunting forums have been yelling every time the media uses the word "buckshot", you don't hunt quail with buckshot. If he had been using buckshot it would have been a much worse wound. Buckshot pellets are more like marbles than the BBs you would have in a bird shot. Buckshot doesn't spray or pepper, it's concentrated in such a manner that it's more like a rifle than a shotgun. Hence the word "buck" as in deer. It's also not what you would use to hunt any type of bird with.

Regarding the law, you don't get thrown in jail for hunting accidents. I personally know a person who killed somebody during a hog hunt and didn't so much as get sued.

[edited by: woop01 at 1:41 pm (utc) on Feb. 14, 2006]

[woop01]

But the guy approaching from behind without warning is at fault.
Because thats what you do when hunting. Running around screeming "WATCH OUT, HERE I COME".

Actually, yes, you do in that type of a hunting setup. They were hunting in a line to flush out quail. When quail hunting, you don't aim, you point your gun and lead the birds. Any time you back off of the line or ESPECIALLY if you walk out in front of the line to pick up a bird, you are supposed to clearly announce it to the hunters around you otherwise stuff like this happens.

Cheney was as at fault for shooting the guy but the reports you are hearing are not coming out of left field. That's something you are supposed to do in that type of a hunting strategy.

[Rugles]

>>Regarding the law, you don't get thrown in jail for hunting accidents.

What about criminal negligence <lawman, where are you?> because you were drinking. I am sure somebody, at sometime has been charged with negligence after shooting a friend while hunting.

[trillianjedi]

I am sure somebody, at sometime has been charged with negligence after shooting a friend while hunting.

Sure, if negligence can be proven. Under the influence of drink or drugs, or plain stupidity in a persons actions can add up to that.

But this one sounds more like an accident to me - if anyone was negligent it was the guy that got shot.

TJ

[woop01]

Yes, if you take my comment out of context, there have been criminally negligent situations where somebody was charged. There's no evidence of that in this situation, everything that has come out has pointed to a plain old hunting accident. I'm saying that you don't get charged for that regardless of whether you are the VP or some 22 year old who works at the local feed store.

[GaryK]

A quick search of the CourtTV website revealed plenty of people who have been charged with crimes for shooting someone while hunting. Criminal negligence was most often cited as the charge. In one case a man killed a woman because he mistook her scarf for the tail of a deer. I couldn't find any cases where someone was charged in a situation similar to what Cheney did.

[edited by: GaryK at 2:11 pm (utc) on Feb. 14, 2006]

[Freedom]

<snip>

[edited by: lawman at 5:39 pm (utc) on Feb. 14, 2006]
[edit reason] OT No Politics [/edit]

[woop01]

I'm not sure where this conversation is going but I'm not on any witch hunt or political slant. I live within 100 miles of where it happened (which is actually pretty close considering the area) and can cite you two cases in the past ten years where people killed other members of their own hunting party and nothing ever went to court, either civil or criminal. Also, I know of three other situations where people have been shot while hunting and went to the hospital without the shooter getting charged with anything at all. I'm not talking about Court TV cases we don't know the details about, I'm talking about the same area and the same kinds of situations.

On the other hand there are also situations where people shoot somebody they are not with and that tends to become extremely messy in terms of lawsuits.

This was a case of two people in the same hunting party having an accident without criminal negligence. You don't go to jail for that.