Stop the nonsense...Cheney was not drinking

[Atman]

The guy has a serious, serious heart problem. He's lucky he could walk into a field carrying a heavy shotgun without keeling over grasping his chest. I know we love to bash Bush and dick Cheney, but let's be fair about this. Of all the bizarro scenerios being posted here, one involving Cheney being drunk is perhaps the most farfetched.

Besides, everybody knows that every time Dick goes to the liquor cabinet, W's already drained the bottles and refilled 'em with water.

[rzemanfl]

1. A $6,000.00 Italian 28 gauge is not heavy. n/t

[OldLeftieLawyer]

20. Wait ...........

Didn't Dickless have a small Iraqi orphan tucked down there as a tripod?

Or am I thinking of ...........

Oh, never mind.

LOOK! You have a heart!!! I knew it.

[rzemanfl]

67. You have a bunch of hearts. And how did you "know it?" n/t

[OldLeftieLawyer]

74. Well, to be terribly unoriginal,

"Duh."

Ya think Cheney was trying to kill Whittington because he wouldn't kiss Cheney, a la "Brokeback Mountain"?

Me, too. Hell hath no fury like a fat fuck scorned.

I have hearts only because I'm being stalked.

[rzemanfl]

75. Well, thank you, in case it was you. n/t

[OldLeftieLawyer]

76. Shut up and

kiss my Cheney.

It's over here --------------------------------------->

Wear denim.

;)

[NanceGreggs]

2. Good one!

:rofl:

[KyuzoGator]

3. Goddammit...all he did was SHOOT A MAN IN THE FACE.

You chicken littles with your whining. Why are you all so worried about the Vice President SHOOTING A MAN IN THE FACE??

[TahitiNut]

17. Yeah. Happens in fraternities all the time, right?

:eyes:

[KyuzoGator]

47. One time at a party I was shot in the face fifteen times.

This is not a big deal. People get SHOT IN THE FACE all the time.

[TahitiNut]

56. This one time ... at band camp ...

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

[Atman]

60. Uhm...those aren't the kind of "shots to the face" we're talking about!

And quit playing with your flute while I'm talking to you!

[Vanje]

36. Best. Post. Ever!

.....and me out of hearts , and too cheap to buy more.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

63. Check out tonight's "Daily Show"

They do exactly this, and Jon Stewart keeps breaking up while they're doing it - something I've never seen him do.

They headline it "Cheney's Got A Gun."

I love this show.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

4. as a former bartender...

Who served all my Grandpa's buddies at the local VFW...

A heart condition won't stop them.

Kidney dialysis sometimes does, but a few heart attacks? nope.

[tridim]

10. Especially when you're a few months from being indicted

for treason. IMO it's completely plausible that Dick was sloshed, trying to forget his troubles.

[tenshi816]

72. Ain't that the truth.

The same is true for smoking. After my mother was diagnosed with Stage IV lung cancer, she still merrily carried on smoking all through her chemotherapy. She was still smoking even after the cancer reached her brain sixteen months later and she no longer knew who I was anymore. She smoked her last cigarette three days before she died, and only stopped then because she went into a coma.

Being sick won't stop an addict from using.

[Olney Blue]

5. The "replacing the liquor with water trick"- a true alcoholic trademark.

You nailed that one good.

[incapsulated]

6. You're right. He's a menace stone cold sober.

It's hard to be evil when you can't concentrate.

[MrTriumph]

7. Why is it far fetched? Do you know Cheney?

It came as quite a surprise when it was revealed what a drinker Nixon was. Am I saying Cheney was drinking? Are you telling me men on a hunting trip don't take a shot of Jack Daniels along?

Am I saying Cheney was on medication? Now that's an interesting thought, no?

[lady lib]

8. Randi Rhodes made a good point

when she said that they waited until after the Sunday morning shows were over before breaking the news.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

16. On the one hand, it's possible, but the PR disaster of covering it up

for a day FAR outweighs it not being on the Sunday shows, IMHO.

I really think they the most likely scenarios:

1. Someone actually thought they might be able to completely manage or hide the story, i.e. have a different version where someone ELSE shot the guy, or maybe have the story never get out, but maybe couldn't get everyone on board to support that story...

2. He had alcohol in him, wanted to give him time to sober up

3. They were just trying to "get everyone's story straight" and felt the consequences of delaying were worth it to do that.

4. There was some other undisclosed shenanigans about that weekend that they were trying to cover up.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

24. The old guy's in the ICU

That's not where they put people who are only "slightly injured," as these pricks would have us believe.

The old guy was hurt - badly. And no one was about to give out the news that Dickless accidentally killed someone.

That's my guess as to why it was hushed up.

[lady lib]

38. We keep hearing about how well he's doing and

like you, I keep thinking, but but but he's in the ICU!

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

43. Yes, and you always hear "he's smoking and joking" from that ranch heiress

or some Cheney spokesperson. We haven't heard ANYTHING from this guy's family, to my knowledge. Makes me wonder if they are still considering their options, deciding whether to support the Cheney camp version where it's all this guy's fault, or to say some thing different, or to sue, or to wait and see whether the billion dollars of Coalition Provisional Authority money wires into their bank account.

[lady lib]

57. Hmmm...stand by everyone while the plot thickens! n/t

[Laelth]

61. Most likely ...

... the family has already hired an attorney to represent them. Whittington was a partner in a big law firm, after all. And the only question remaining is how much will the confidentiality clause cost Cheney and the BFEE (the clause that prevents the family from saying anything at all about the incident).

imho

-Laelth

[Garbo 2004]

65. Whittington's daughter said Cheney's "a very accomplished hunter."

From Time online:

After the accident, Whittington's face "looks like chicken pox, kind of. He's so lucky, it's a miracle," Whittington's daughter Sally told the Dallas Morning News. Cheney visited Whittington in the hospital the next day. The vice president "feels so bad," said Sally Whittington. "He's a very accomplished hunter. He was obviously relieved to see how well my father was doing." http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1159061,00.html

[Bluebear]

88. Well, he accomplished alright. nt

[lady lib]

37. Your reasons # 3 & 4 really resonated with me

even if there are other reasons as well.

[Zen Democrat]

48. Well, Howard Dean thwarted their little plan.

There he was on Face The Nation comparing Cheney to Aaron Burr as Worst Vice President Ever. And saying that if Libby's telling the truth, Cheney may have to leave office before the fall elections.

Cheney didn't have a good morning ... or afternoon ... or weekend.

[TomInTib]

9. He used to knock 'em back when he was with Halliburton...

and the only thing that has really changed is the insertion of his stent.

And I am talking about serious drinking just a few years ago.

I know this for a fact but cannot elaborate here out of concern for a family member.

[pitohui]

50. alcoholics drink, it's what they do

anyone who thinks cheney doesn't knock em back hasn't been paying attention

[spanone]

11. I know heart bypass patients that LOVE a good stiff drink.

friends who have heart disease...and they get pissed too. Not farfetched.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

12. Actually, someone with a serious heart problem shouldn't be out hunting

Hunting is not exactly meditative. It's stressful.

[Erika]

13. Caller on Michael Savage says Cheney's story is a farce

What about the Secret Service workers? Were they there only to protect Cheney from those who might shoot him, not those who he might shoot?

It was hilarious.

[libnnc]

14. My dad's ticker was far worse than Crashcart's

Never made him put down the bottle. In fact, during the attack that eventually put my dad in the hospital, he turned up a bottle of Jack Daniels while lying on the sofa. He went to the hospital later that night, died there exactly a month later.

Dick's still drinking.

[tinfoilinfor2005]

15. I don't know about that, but doesn't Mrs. Armstrong look like

a blonde Katherine Harris? Do they clone these lying wingnut women?

[carolinalady]

18. He has gout. Gout is caused by excessive alcohol intake. I beg

to differ with you on this one. I know people who have had quintuplet bypasses and still drink themselves silly day after day.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

27. My understanding of gout

is that it's also caused by obesity. Plus, it can be caused or exacerbated by diuretics (which Dickless has to take).

I still think the victim was really badly hurt, and that's what they're (badly) covering up.

[Atman]

33. Fatty foods

Dick was a fat fuck. He supposedly lost a lot of weight after his ticker gave out last time, but he's still a fat fuck. Just look at him...try to imagine him ever ordering a salad at lunch, or the grilled fish at dinner. He eats raw meat for every meal, organs too. No doubt.

[carolinalady]

45. My mom got real fat from the large bottle of Golden Sherry she

drank each and every day. No breakfast, no lunch-just supper and lots of sherry.

[Klukie]

58. Hilarious!

The tears are streaming.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

62. You betcha

Very often, the Washington Post's Style section will report on Dickless and his twisted wife dining in a DC restaurant. They always list what they ordered, and Dickless always chows down on steak and other fatty foods - plus dessert (not fresh fruit, if you get my drift).

Why won't he die? I mean, what's it gonna take - a silver bullet, a wooden stake?

[carolinalady]

34. Gout is primarily caused by excessive alcohol although some

(a few) can get it by eating certain types of foods such as red meat and shell fish. (There are others I just don't remember from my nursing training years ago.) Most often the food factor comes in after a person has it. Then it can irritate the symptoms. The obesity thing may be related because the foods and alcohol are rich in calories.


Official explanation:

Gout is caused by the buildup of uric acid in the joints. Approximately 18% of people who develop gout have a family history of the condition, according to the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases. Diseases and conditions that increase the risk include diabetes, obesity, kidney disease, and sickle cell anemia.

Regularly drinking alcohol interferes with the removal of uric acid from the body and can increase the risk for developing gout. Other risk factors include the following:

Exposure to lead in the environment
High dietary intake of rich foods that contain purine (e.g., cream sauces, red meat, sardines, liver, scallops)
Medications that may interfere with the body?s ability to remove uric acid (e.g., aspirin, diuretics, levodopa )

http://www.podiatrychannel.com/gout/

[lady lib]

46. Here is some more info about gout:

The main predisposing factors for gout in men are a family history, obesity, an excessive alcohol intake, a high purine diet, and raised triglyceride concentrations.7 Patients may be broadly classified as overproducers or undersecretors of urate. In most cases of gout decreased urinary excretion of urate is the most common metabolic abnormality. This may be due to genetic factors, but usually drugsincluding alcoholresult in the low urate renal clearance. This is a particular problem in elderly people, who are often taking thiazide diuretics and low dose aspirin, and have concomitant impaired renal function.
http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/full/320/7228/132

He could have a family history, he could be an undersecretor, he could be taking thiazide diuretics and low dose aspirin given his heart history. Toss in a few foods that are high in purine, and voila, gout attack.

[Hubert Flottz]

71. Curses can cause Gout too!

Not that I'd ever do that or nothing!

I drank a half gallon of Absolut every week, for four years after my bypass. I found out that the combination of the booze and the meds I was on, were junking my liver, so I quit. The meds had a label on the bottle that said that if I drank daily, not to take those pills. I was drinking at night and didn't think it would hurt a thing, but the doctor said I was crazy. I've been depressed ever since I quit.

[DearAbby]

41. I tend to agree with you...they spent that time because the victim

was seriously injured...Otherwise this would have never been mentioned. I am almost sure that other incidents happened before, that were quitely solved. Little cash here a promise there.

[Cleita]

19. Of course he wasn't drinking. After all they said so.

I mean, who is really going to question the VP, if you're just taking a report on the incident. If he say's he wasn't drinking that has to be good enough for the guy taking the report, who has a family living in a trailer and needs his job.

No siree! He didn't see any drinking and it's good enough for him. Of course anyone else would have had to do a sobriety field test, a breathalyzer if the field test was failed and a blood test if the breathalyzer showed evidence of intoxication.

[1620rock]

26. Well if he wasn't drinking...

...then he is even more stupid, careless, and reckless than we thought.

[Cleita]

30. Good point!

A good one to keep on top of one's mental arsenal when the freepers want to challenge you.

:thumbsup:

[H2O Man]

21. You have no idea.

Ron Reagan, Jr. mentioned it as an issue worthy of consideration tonight. Ron can't say for sure that he had been drinking. You can't say for sure he wasn't.

[progressivebydesign]

22. My Dad drank after heart attacks, until it killed him at 54.

A heart attack doesn't stop people from smoking or drinking... or hunting.. or anything. Cheney is a well known alcoholic. Drinking while hunting, while incredibly stupid, is very common.

[Dem Agog]

23. So it was crack, then?

Or perhaps heart medication?

He couldn't have been in his right mind.

[Junkdrawer]

25. Drunk as a Monkey...Bet on it...

And a hungover fool on Sunday...

[Jane Austin]

28. Sometimes I wonder how bad his heart is.

At Arlington Cemetery on Veterans' Day, he walked up those steep steps much more briskly than I could have.

He also didn't have to stop at the top to catch his breath.

Made me wonder if his heart is all that bad now.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

29. It isn't the drinking that bothers me - whether or not he was drinking

If the guy who got shot was also drinking or was hunting with a drunkard, he was just asking for trouble as well.

What bothers me is that according to what I've read, Cheney didn't make himself available for the police to rule out drinking. Even if there was a one percent chance that drinking was involved, it's the principle that matters. Cheney cannot place himself above the law and prevent the civil authorities from doing their job.

[pitohui]

52. of course he didn't make himself available to the police

he was drinking, whittington was drinking, they needed that sober up time

it just ain't that mysterious

they were drunk, they had a stupid drunken accident, and they didn't want to pay the price

[Art_from_Ark]

53. Maybe you should take a look at this

http://www.cfif.org/htdocs/legal_issues/legal_updates/other_noteworthy_cases/judge_bates_dick_cheney.htm

[seabeyond]

31. are you f*in serious. you think he quit eating meat, and is exercising

regularly too. wow.....

well, i say not. like i say not to bush having stopped drinking.

[Swamp Rat]

32. OK, then prove he was NOT drinking!

:D

[Blue Diadem]

35. I've known some pretty serious drunks who had bad tickers,

numerous heart attacks and by pass surgeries and it didn't stop them.

[Cleita]

40. So have I. I used to be a bartender.

Some of them would come in for a drink with their hospital bracelets still on them when they were released.

Can you imagine what someone, who has his own MASH traveling around with him, can do if he wants to?

[pitohui]

55. oh yeah here's a funny story

one time i was playing blackjack and the drunk next to me pulled off his shirt to show off his brand new bypass surgery scar!

try that at the $5 table and they'd run you out of the place but the kind of money this old fool was betting, they just put up with it

rich drunks think they'll live forever, the open heart surgery, the accidents, whatever, it's all just proof to them that they are survivors

[Call me Deacon Blues]

39. The only thing he was drinking was

huuuuummmmaaaannn bloooooooood! Bwah-hah-hah-hah!

[A Simple Game]

44. Well that Quail blood is kind of bland and weak. n/t

[DeaconBlues]

42. He was drunk without touching a drop

Drunk on power,as usual

[goodboy]

49. I met a girl who works for the company who made his internal defibrillator

I asked her what the chances of it failing were.

She said, "zero"

I said, "fuck"

[proud2BlibKansan]

51. Yes I think they were tripping on some might fine LSD

or maybe some good mushrooms.

My bad . . .

[Brain In Vat]

54. DUI

We know that Cheney has several DUIs, so why is it so farfetched that he was drinking before the hunt?

[pitohui]

59. i think the original poster is being ironic

of course he was drunk, he's famous for his DUIs and his alcohol problems

i just looked at the police report on smoking gun, they say the two old fools were indeed wearing blaze orange on a clear afternoon on a flat field, and while they try to claim no alcohol was involved, then the dude had to be drunk as a skunk not to notice that the old dude wearing orange was not a bobwhite!

but how do you ticket the veep for drinkin while huntin? i don't blame local law enforcement for not wanting to touch that one w. a ten foot pole

[Junkdrawer]

68. Beg to differ...Atman is dead serious. IMHO wrong, but dead serious..

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x417436

[Klukie]

64. I posted on another thread

that it would be real interesting to know if the hospital checked whittingtons blood alcohol levels. I can't imagine that these guys drink alone.

[Maddy McCall]

66. He was chauffeured around the field in a car.

He got out when he saw a covey and shot at them. He was carrying a girl-gun.

Even a heart patient on a gurney hunt under those conditions. :eyes:

[Beaverhausen]

69. I was just going to mention that

He was too wasted to walk so Mrs. Armstrong had to drive him around.

[LSK]

70. tons of people shouldnt drink for health reasons, but they do

And not all of them have an army of doctors on standby incase something happens like the VP does.

[roseBudd]

73. an alcoholic continues to drink regardless of diabetes, cirrhosis etc

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

77. Kicked, but not recommended.

[mattclearing]

78. Shrewd move.

Clearly this deserves some renewed debate.

[dchill]

79. "renewed debate"

He's just admitted to having "a beer". Where does that leave us?

[Solomon]

80. Ooops. How embarassing.

[Walt Starr]

82. I schwear offisher, I only had,...hic...one beer at lunchtime. n/t

[Bluebear]

87. :)

[librechik]

81. ha ha yes he was, he admitted it on FAUX!!

I understand the sentiment, Atman--you just jumped the gun on this one, as it were!

[seabeyond]

83. giggle giggle giggle. atman doesnt know the alcoholic well n/t

[Geek_Girl]

84. so you believe people with serious heart conditions don't drink?

My grandfather was a very heavy drinker and this was after 2 heart attacks. In fact most of the people I know with serious heart conditions are heavy drinkers.

[NorthernSpy]

85. maybe you're assuming based on what YOU would do...

... if you had Cheney's medical problems. But it is a fact that some people continue to drink too heavily, despite knowing for a fact that they are causing themselves serious harm.

Anyhow, Cheney has now admitted to having been drinking before the incident.

[Buck Rabbit]

86. "Cheney being drunk is the most far fetched" thats nothing try this

Some people say.

Cheney can drink all he wants. The secret is every couple of months he goes out with a Republican "donor" on a hunting trip. The selected hunting companion has been secretly tissue and blood typed by the NSA. Dick then shoots the donor and his medical team transplants the heart for Dick in a mobile field SUV. No human heart can last in Dick more than 3 months.

In this case, Dick was drunk and instead of a clean head shot he peppered the torso. Since Dick liked this guy and he was of no use to him dead they took him to the hospital.

Anyway that's what some people say.

:evilgrin: