The Corpuscle

People drive me nuts.

This Cheney thing. You've got the press all in a tizzy over WHY didn't you notify US??!!

Well, okay, that's a problem, but not much of one. Does anyone seriously believe that somehow this wouldn't have come out? Does anyone seriously believe this could have been covered up?

And then you've got all your conspiracy theories and suggestions of marital infidelity and various other lunacies…

Look, there's only one issue here, and it's an important one, and all this other crap just obscures it.

Here's the problem. One of the reasons you want your cops on the scene as soon as possible after an accident is so that things like possible alcohol consumption can be determined conclusively. Now what we have so far is that Cheney had a beer at lunch. That's fine, that's not a problem, though I'm not sure I would have gone back to the hunting after a beer, but never mind, that's just me. I can see that not being a real problem.

But then you have this hunting accident, no cops on the scene, the guy goes off to the hospital, the group sits down to a big dinner at which (we might wonder) if alcohol was served ("Jesus! I need a drink!"), thus making any possible test for alcohol consumption at the time of the accident useless. And then we finally have the interview with the cops the next morning at 9:00 a.m. Oh, and I guess we also have the hospital spokesman quickly closing up the press conference when a reporter asks inconveniently whether the shooting victim's blood had been tested for alcohol.

Oh, and we also have the peace officer stopping by the evening of the accident, saying he heard there'd been someone injured and wondering if they needed any help. He was told, no, everything's fine, the Veep will be talking to your office in the morning, thanks for stopping by.

What a perfect opportunity for an alcohol test, if anybody felt it would be, you know, smart to get one. But, no, everything's fine here, thanks for stopping by.

Cheney has been a public figure for years. It's very difficult for me to believe that, once the medicals got the poor guy packed into the ambulance and off to the hospital, a public figure wouldn't think, "Jeez, I'd better establish I haven't been drinking." It's not impossible for me to believe a public figure wouldn't think that, but it's very difficult.

Think Cheney was maybe too upset to be interviewed by the cops just then? Well, that's possible.

I guess he wasn't too upset to sit down to a big dinner, though.

WHY are people such IDIOTS? At the moment, the only issue that matters is why did Cheney not arrange to be tested for alcohol consumption as soon as reasonably possible after the accident. If he had alcohol in his system and took steps to make sure it wasn't detected, that would be extremely damaging, and so it is an important question to ask. Can you believe he wouldn't know better? Can you believe he wouldn't have demanded that he be tested?

All the rest of this crap just "damages the case", as the prosecutors say.

I guess this wouldn't bother me so much if this Administration wasn't let off the hook time and again by being handed opportunity after opportunity to point at its critics and say: "Look at them! They are behaving like morons!"

Because, you know, they actually are behaving like morons.

I've always been against Secret Service personnel being interviewed with regard to the behavior of the people they are protecting, but what's sauce for the goose...

WASHINGTON (AllPolitics, July 7 [1998] ) -- A federal appeals court ruled Tuesday that three Secret Service employees must testify before Independent Counsel Ken Starr's grand jury investigating the relationship between Monica Lewinsky and President Bill Clinton.

... ought to be sauce for the gander.