Reply #42: You're so right. They were anxious to get in that reassurance that it

[Nothing Without Hope]

wasn't serious and that it was all the victim's fault. Very clear in the NYT article on this:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/13/politics/13cheney.html?hp&ex=1139893200&en=ef5d2efe3efde24c&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Has all the elements you pointed out. Also makes it sound like it happens all the time:

"This all happened pretty quickly," Ms. Armstrong said in a telephone interview from her ranch. Mr. Whittington, she said, "did not announce — which would be protocol — 'Hey, it's me, I'm coming up,' " she said.

"He didn't do what he was supposed to do," she added, referring to Mr. Whittington. "So when a bird flushed and the vice president swung in to shoot it, Harry was where the bird was."

Mr. Whittington was "sprayed — peppered, is what we call it — on his right side, on part of his face, neck, shoulder and rib cage," she said, noting that she, too, had been sprayed on her leg in a hunting accident.

"A shotgun sprays a bunch of little bitty pellets; it's not a bullet involved," Ms. Armstrong said. She said she believed that Mr. Cheney was shooting a 28-gauge shotgun and added that guests typically bring their own firearms.

She's quoted again later as saying Mr. Armstrong "is fine. He's sitting up in bed, yakking and cracking jokes." This is after she is quoted as saying "A shotgun sprays a bunch of little bitty pellets; it's not a bullet involved."

Why, it sounds like fun! No worse than a day at the spa, getting those unsightly dead skin layers sanded off, or whatever they do.

The man is 78 years old, too, so his healing ability isn't going to be as robust as it would be for a younger person.