It should come as no great surprise to anyone that Vice President Dick Cheney took aim at a covey of quail and shot a fellow hunter instead. After all, this is the same vice president who urged the invasion of Iraq to battle the terrorists who attacked the nation on September 11, 2001. Even though Iraq had absolutely nothing at all to do with anything even remotely connected to the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. So he is very good at not only missing his intended target, but actually hitting a completely unrelated target.

It is also indicative of the (lack of) forthrightness of this administration that the shooting was kept quiet for almost 24 hours. In my opinion, that guy is lucky that he wasn't simply field dressed and buried (or, as we euphemistically say in the national security business, "disappeared"). There's no question the shooting would cause some embarrassment to the vice president, if not the administration. Tell me there weren't some political wonks who didn't run through the option of just burying him and stonewalling any investigation on the basis of national security. Too bad "Scooter" Libby wasn't there to take THAT smoking gun from the Veep.

This is the deal: When the Vice President of the United States of America does something noteworthy—good or bad—the White House ought to be smart enough to address it quickly. What were they waiting for? I suspect they were trying to work out feasible lies to cover it up, and just decided that too many people knew and there was no way they could control it.

If this administration isn't the home of the most screwed-up bunch of ideological bumblers, I don't know what it is.