The Veep on Fox

There was one line in Cheney's interview that really jumped out at me.

Here he was, telling Brit Hume about the awful experience of pulling the trigger and seeing your friend fall, rushing over to find his 78-year-old companion bloodied, and yet he couldn't resist a shot at the national press.

In the process of defending his decision not to put out the information right away and not to tell the national media even the next day, Cheney said: "I had a bit of the feeling that the press corps was upset because, to some extent, it was about them--they didn't like the idea that we called the Corpus Christi Caller-Times instead of the New York Times."

Does that sound like a man who views national news organizations with disdain?

Now that the veep has availed himself of a Fox forum, I wonder if the debate will start to turn. We're already seeing rising criticism of the White House press corps.

Bill O'Reilly has been arguing that the shooting doesn't affect the average American one whit but that "the press is making a big deal out of this because they despise Dick Cheney."

I'd concede that the vice president is probably not their favorite politician. But in terms of it "mattering" -- did it matter to the average American that Bill Clinton was fooling around on his wife, or that Vince Foster committed suicide (to pick two matters that seemed to matter a great deal to the conservative commentariat)?

It matters when the vice president shoots another man because the character and responsiveness of our elected leaders matters. Had Cheney addressed this right away, it would have been a far more modest story.

The question now: Will the media clamor die down or intensify? And if journalists keep cranking up the volume, will the country conclude they're going too far over a private tragedy?

Cheney took full responsibility for the hunting accident that landed Harry Whittington in the ICU and looked, as you might expect, remorseful--steps that critics say he should have taken days ago. He offered no second thoughts about not notifying the press. His critics will not be satisfied--I can hear the long lists of "unanswered questions" being unfurled now--and are already demanding that he hold a news conference. Personally, I wouldn't hold my breath.

But you have to wonder why Cheney didn't get out in front of this story much earlier rather than take birdshot from just about everyone.

I have the story here of Brit Hume and how he got the interview, with these comments from Cheney adviser Mary Matalin: