More to come on Cheney

I can hardly wait to get the transcript from today's press briefing by Scotty Boy McClellan regarding the Cheney shooting. I have seen some video (and that is supposed to posted on the White House website soon, and is on the Washington Post site right now), and it is rather appalling. The basic reasons being given for the almost 24-hour delay in the White House even acknowledging the incident are:

1. the priority was getting medical treatment for Whittington, and
2. the White House did not have sufficient information and details until the following day; and
   
3. the White House deferred to Armstrong to give out information since it happened on her property.

What a bunch of unmitigated bullshit. Of course the priority was to get medical treatment for Whittington. However, that has nothing to do with the issue at hand. Obviously, Whittington received medical treatment quickly. Cheney always has a medical team with him, and they provided treatment for Whittington on the spot. And then he was rushed to a hospital. As reported by the Washington Post,

Whittington was treated on the scene by Cheney's traveling medical detail before being taken by helicopter to a Corpus Christi hospital.

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"Fortunately, the vice president has got a lot of medical people around him and so they were right there and probably more cautious than we would have been," (Armstrong) said. "The vice president has got an ambulance on call, so the ambulance came."

All of that did not take 22 hours. Nor did it take 22 hours to determine Whittington's condition--especially if it is true that his injuries were not serious. Remember what the AP article said: 1) Armstrong contacted the Corpus Christi paper; 2) then reporters contacted the White House;, and 3) the White House simply confirmed the report without providing any further information. What this tells me--especially when combined with Reason 3-- is that if Armstrong had not contacted the newspaper at all, the White House never would have disclosed the incident at all. That's why Reason 1 has nothing to do with explaining the White House's delay in disclosing any information. Had the delay been several hours only, Reason 1 would make sense. However, in light of the facts, it makes no sense.

This is SO typical of the Bush administration--try to divert focus on the real issues by asserting as a defense or explanation something that no one can disagree with or argue against but really has nothing to do with the matter at hand.

And they have got to be kidding about Reason 2. They couldn't get any detailed information for hours? That is so unbelievable it is not worth discussing--except for one possibility. The only way the White House did not have information is if Dick Cheney his ownself kept that information from the White House. Now that would be so much better, wouldn't it?

As for reason 3, as I said in my previous post, "What the #$@*! kind of sense does that make?" Since when does any White House--and especially this one--leave the decision and responsibility of disclosing information to the public to the discretion of a private citizen who has no official capacity whatsoever?

You know, folks, this incident is nowhere near as serious as matters such as taking us to war or trying to respond to a devastating hurricane, but if you haven't wondered before, it's way past time you wondered that if this administration is going to such lengths to keep the truth from the public on this matter, then what might they have done on the really big issues like war, disaster relief, corruption, etc.?