Bush 'satisfied' with how accident was explained
WASHINGTON -- President Bush said yesterday that he is ''satisfied" with the way Vice President Dick Cheney handled the issue of a weekend hunting accident in which Cheney shot and injured a mutual friend, and that Cheney appeared to be ''profoundly affected" by the shooting.
''I thought the vice president handled the issue just fine," Bush said yesterday in the Oval Office, in his first public comments about the Saturday afternoon accident. ''I thought his explanation yesterday was a very strong and powerful explanation, and I'm satisfied with the explanation he gave."
The White House has come under harsh criticism in recent days for not disclosing the shooting of Harry Whittington until a day after it occurred, and for allowing word to filter out via the ranch owner who witnessed the shooting instead of through official channels.
In recent days, White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan hinted that the president and some of his top aides would have preferred more prompt disclosure of the incident. Bush gave no indication that he disagreed with Cheney's decision to wait until Sunday to inform the public, but he did not directly answer a reporter's question about whether he agreed with the timing of the disclosure.
''I'm satisfied with the explanation he gave," Bush answered. He spoke to reporters after a meeting with President Alvaro Uribe of Colombia.
On Wednesday, Cheney said in an interview with Fox News Channel's Brit Hume that he delayed telling the public about the shooting because he wanted to make sure that Whittington's family was notified, and because he did not want to disseminate early information about Whittington's condition that could have proven to be wrong.
''My first reaction, Brit, was not to think, 'I need to call the press,' " Cheney said. ''My first reaction is: 'My friend Harry has been shot and we've got to take care of him.' That evening there were other considerations."
Yesterday, as doctors reported that Whittington's condition was improving, the Sheriff's Department in Kenedy County, Texas, officially closed its investigation into the shooting and said no charges would be filed.
The department's final report largely supports Cheney's description of the events that wounded the 78-year-old Austin lawyer.
The report said that Whittington told investigators from his hospital bed that no one was drinking when the accident occurred, and that everyone in the hunting party was wearing bright orange hunting gear.
He told one investigator that the shooting ''was just an accident," and said he was concerned that the media attention would give hunting in Texas a bad image, according to the report.
Cheney offered full cooperation with an investigator on Sunday, according to the report. The accident left Whittington's face and chest peppered with birdshot, and he suffered a mild heart attack caused by a pellet that traveled to his heart.
Yesterday, Dr. David Blanchard, the director of emergency medicine at Christus Spohn Hospital in Corpus Christi, said Whittington could be discharged within the next five days.
Bush said that he knew Whittington from political circles in Texas. The president called him a ''fine man" and ''our friend," and said Cheney appeared to have been deeply affected by the incident.
''It was a deeply traumatic moment for him, and obviously . . . it was a tragic moment for Harry Whittington," the president said. ''The vice president was involved in a terrible accident, and it profoundly affected him. Yesterday, when he was here in the Oval Office, I saw the deep concern that he had for the person who he wounded."
This report includes material from Globe wire services. 
