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Topic: Cheney's Got A Gun... (Read 172 times) |
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Carl_D
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WASHINGTON, Feb. 12 Vice President Dick Cheney accidentally shot a prominent Austin lawyer while the two men were on a quail  Hunting expedition in South Texas on Saturday, firing shotgun pellets at the man while trying to aim for a bird His spokeswoman confirmed today.
Mr. Cheney, a practiced hunter, sprayed the lawyer, Harry Whittington, with shotgun pellets on an outing on the Armstrong ranch in South Texas. Mr. Whittington, 78, was flown by helicopter to Corpus Christi Memorial Hospital, where he was listed in stable  condition today, according to Michele Trevino, a hospital spokeswoman.
White House officials did not release details of the incident. But local news accounts in Texas suggested that Mr. Cheney fired his shotgun  without realizing that Mr. Whittington had approached him from behind, spraying his fellow hunter on his right side, on his cheek, neck and chest.
"Nobody wants this to happen, but it does," Katharine Armstrong, the owner of the ranch, told The Corpus Christi Caller-Times according to an article on the newspaper's Web site. The Caller-Times, which first reported the shooting incident, said that Mr. Whittington was a friend of the Armstrong family and was a frequent visitor to their ranch, one of the largest private properties in Texas.
Mr. Whittington is a former member of the Texas Board of Corrections, which runs the state's prison and he was once chairman of the Texas Public Finance Authority Board. In 1999, Gov. George W. Bush appointed him to the Texas Funeral Service Commission. In August 2002, he was reappointed to the commission for a term set to expire in February 2007.
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Carl_D
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Re: Cheney's Got A Gun...
« Reply #1 on: Feb 15th, 2006, 9:09am » |
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White House officials, who did not make public the shooting incident for 24 hours, did not say how Mr. Whittington and Mr. Cheney were acquainted, although both have longstanding ties to the Armstrongs, a prominent Texas family. The White House also declined to say who was on the hunting trip with the two men
Local news accounts said that Secret Service agents attended to Mr. Whittington until the medics arrived.
The Armstrong ranch is a familiar hunting venue for Republican politicians, including Mr. Cheney, who sometimes hunts there several times a year.
Mr. Cheney often goes on hunting outings with other political figures. Two years ago he went duck hunting  with Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia in Louisiana, a trip that drew criticism because the Supreme Court had just agreed to hear a case involving Mr. Cheney's energy task force.
Anne Armstrong, the family matriarch, is a Republican Party stalwart who served in the Nixon and Ford administrations and also as ambassador to Britain. When her husband, Tobin Armstrong, died last October, Mr. Cheney and James A. Baker III, the former secretary of state, spoke at the funeral.
The 50,000-acre ranch, which features Spanish-style cottages on the property and usually has a full working staff, including a chef,  was settled in 1882 by a Texas Ranger named John Armstrong III, who passed the land on to the family. It sits near the King Ranch, the legendary property settled by the Kleberg family, also in South Texas.
Katharine Armstrong was in the hunting party on Saturday. The Associated Press reported that Mrs. Armstrong was watching from a car as the vice president, Mr. Whittington and another unidentified hunter got out of the vehicle to close in on a covey of quail. She said Mr. Whittington shot a bird and went to look for it in the tall grass, as his hunting companions walked to another spot where they found a second covey of quail.
Mr. Whittington "came up from behind the vice president and the other hunter and didn't signal them or indicate to them or announce himself," Mrs. Armstrong told the A.P. "The vice president didn't see him. The covey flushed and the vice president picked out a bird  and was following it and shot. And by God, Harry was in the line of fire and got peppered pretty good." Campaign finance records show that Mr. Whittington contributed $2,000 the maximum personal amount allowed to the Bush-Cheney re-election campaign.
Mr. Whittington has been involved in a long-running dispute with the city of Austin, which is trying to condemn a block his family owns to build a parking garage. He has won several legal victories in the case, most recently last month in the Texas Supreme Court.
Mr. Cheney visited Mr. Whittington in the hospital on Sunday, said the vice president's spokeswoman, Lea Ann McBride. After spending the weekend in Texas, Mr. Cheney was scheduled to return to Washington this evening.(NY Times)
For another report on this accident go here:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/huffpost/20060213/cm_huffpost/015538;_ylt=A86.I1 26_u9DYWMBehP9wxIF;_ylu=X3oDMTBjMHVqMTQ4BHNlYwN5bnN1YmNhdA--
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| « Last Edit: Feb 15th, 2006, 9:10am by Carl_D » |
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TomM
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Re: Cheney's Got A Gun...
« Reply #2 on: Feb 15th, 2006, 9:33am » |
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Ohhh Myyyy Efffffing GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This too funny, Carl! Too funny.
TomM
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sandie99
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Re: Cheney's Got A Gun...
« Reply #3 on: Feb 15th, 2006, 9:36am » |
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What Cheney did was horrible, but I must admit: Carl, that was just hilarious! Thanks!
Sanna
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Opus
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Re: Cheney's Got A Gun...
« Reply #4 on: Feb 15th, 2006, 9:54am » |
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Well done Carl!!!!!
Opus/Paul
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PollyPocket
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Re: Cheney's Got A Gun...
« Reply #5 on: Feb 15th, 2006, 9:54am » |
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I thought the title of this thread ALONE was hilarious!!!
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“Life is all about timing... the unreachable becomes reachable, the unavailable become available, the unattainable... attainable. Have the patience, wait it out It's all about timing.” - Stacey Charter
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