Posted on 02/21/2006 4:07:48 PM PST by Luis Gonzalez
"I thought the vice president handled the issue just fine." — George W. Bush, Feb. 16, 2006
"Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job." — George W. Bush, Sept. 2, 2005
Some of us have always thought of Dick Cheney, vice president of the United States, former secretary of defense, industrial magnate and general mover-and-shaker, as The Brains of the Outfit.
We still do, but intelligence isn't everything in a leader. Or even the most important thing — like judgment or honesty or prudence or modesty or, well, name your own favorite character trait. Lest we forget, the smartest people can do the stupidest things. (Cf. The Hon. William Jefferson Clinton.)
It's become almost a Washington mantra since Watergate: What really gets a politician into trouble isn't the mistake, even a serious mistake, but how it's addressed afterward — promptly or tardily, candidly or evasively, well or badly enough to amount to a far more serious mistake, as in cover-up.
Dick Cheney now has stepped forward (finally) and taken responsibility, full responsibility, for firing first and looking afterward on that quail hunt, or maybe looking simultaneously, which can be just as dangerous. That's good.
But he's still sticking with his story about its being perfectly proper to wait till the next morning to let the country know that a vice president of the United States has shot a friend in a hunting accident. Even though presidential counselor Dan Bartlett and the president's press secretary, Scott McClellan, both advised him to get the story out — widely — as soon as he could. But the best advice is of no use if one doesn't take it, and the vice president didn't. .
(Excerpt) Read more at jewishworldreview.com ...
I still don't see the big deal.
Great. Let's see the Barrett report in it's entirety then!
He couldn't have said it any clearer.
Cheney shoots buddy, waits overnight to tell anyone... It's old news, especially after Mr. Whittington spoke to the press when he was released from the hospital. That pretty much should have put this whole ordeal to rest.
"Any discrepancy between these accounts wouldn't matter so much if the Veep had been answering questions all along — in the faith that people would understand, sooner or later. But he doesn't seem to have had that kind of faith in We the People, or just in the truth. That's another quality important in a leader, or just in anyone: faith. Faith in other people's fairness. Faith that telling the truth as best one can all along, rather than trying to manage the news, is the best policy."
If you're going to post graphics, why don't you learn how to do it right?
I think he was devastated after shooting his friend and didn't want to appear in public right away.
And the next day seems fine to me.
I don't see where Cheney hid anything, mislead anyone or did anything to make this a big deal. Contrast it with Chappaquidick.
This would be closer to being a big deal is Cheney was trying to position himself to run for President.
He did not have to appear in public, he should have had his press people handle the issue expeditiously.
That was wrong, and this was wrong.
"If you're going to post graphics, why don't you learn how to do it right?:"
the picture came up for me...
I must admit that I don't get it....
Control the size of the picture in respect to the size of the screen.
LOL!
"Hmm. Let's see. On the one hand, the guy leaves the gal at the bottom of the river struggling for breath pressed up against the window in some small air pocket while he pulls himself out of the briny, staggers home, sleeps it off and saunters in to inform the cops the following day that, oh yeah, there was some broad down there. And, on the other hand, the guy calls 911, has the other fellow taken to the hospital, lets the sheriff know promptly but neglects to fax David Gregory's make-up girl!"
LOL. Is he brilliant or what...
What on earth has gotten into JWR? Seems like everything I've seen from them posted here recently is wrong headed. I never would have expected it.
If this had been 1998 instead of 2005, if the shooter had been Al Gore instead of Dick Cheney, and if everything else about this story remained exactly the same...what would the majority of the people in this forum, you and I included, be saying?
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