The American Spectator

p>I feel for Vice President Cheney. I know he hurts from the mistake he made. I only wish the MSM cared about this rather than making mockery of him. br> — Beverly Gunn , East Texas Rancher /p> p> …Truly, this incident is a non-event, except to the people involved. There was no cover-up. No one is currently vacationing in some remote exotic location, locked into a mental hospital or otherwise being kept from the press. The media simply became complacent and missed a breaking story. But the responsibility for the news media’s failure to learn of this in a timely manner does not reside with the White House. This is a wake-up call for journalists. It should be taken as such. Before a truly significant story slips by. br> — Michael Tobias /p>

While pretty much in agreement with Lawrence Henry’s piece on the Cheney quail shoot flap, I find he omits one critical part of bird hunting gun safety dogma that applies: chiefly the responsibility of all in the group to know each other’s location at all times during the shoot. As a kid, if I heard that dictum repeated once in the field, I heard it a thousand times. “If you don’t know where your partners are, don’t ever fire until you do.”

Yes, the Veep was in error to shoot while his partner was off the group’s plane of advance. His partner, however, was equally, if not more at fault, for failing to make his location and line of approach known to the others. This was, in my humble opinion, a group fubar* in which there was sufficient error and judgment lapses to go ‘round.

That said, the self-important jihadi reaction of the WH press corps over this matter Monday was both excessive and indicative of why the people hold these blokes in such dim esteem. They are not, in spite of their inflated view of their own importance, a “priest-class” whose presence must be worshipped at all possible times.

p>*fubar � fouled up beyond all recognition. br> — Frank Stevenson