Cheney to Unload...

...in an interview setting today on Fox News (2pm EST). This tidbit from Salon's War Room:

Fox News, where Bill O'Reilly has already declared that "the vice president's hunting accident affects no one" and "means nothing."

Good to see that it'll be a whitewash, as expected. So really, there are no questions to ask. But Daily Kos diarist BarbinMD has a very good breakdown of issued statements and finds quite a few holes. Including these juicy bits:

So, what happened that day, according to Armstong?

Whittington "came up from behind the vice president and the other hunter and didn't signal them or indicate to them or announce himself," Armstrong said.

"The vice president didn't see him," she continued. "The covey flushed and the vice president picked out a bird and was following it and shot. And by God, Harry was in the line of fire and got peppered pretty good."

But what is left out of that now familiar quote is this important detail:

From what Armstrong said she saw as she sat in the hunt vehicle about 100 yards from Cheney and the other hunters...

Think about that. Armstrong was sitting in a car that was parked the length of a football field away, yet she not only could see that Whittington didn't signal, she knew that he didn't announce his return. Even accepting the story that she could see the events clearly from that distance, she certainly wouldn't have been able to hear what Whittington did or didn't say.

[...]

And of course there is the burning question; was alcohol a factor in the shooting? According to the ever-accomodating Armstrong:

None in the hunting party was drinking alcohol, Armstrong said.

"No, zero, zippo and I don't drink at all," she said. "No one was drinking."

When someone starts throwing around "zippo," you know they must be serious, right? But one must ask about the now scrubbed MSNBC story where Armstrong said:

...she believes no one that day was drinking, although she says there may have been beer available during a picnic lunch that preceded the incident. "There may be a beer or two in there," she said, "but remember not everyone in the party was shooting."

From zero and zippo to beer being available...not that anyone was drinking it.

[Flash UPDATE] FireDogLake notes the following about Cheney's Fox interview with Brit Hume:

Faux News now reporting that excerpts of the interview will air at 2:00 pm ET, with the full interview to air at 6:00 pm ET. This says to me that they are doing the interview this morning, and will be slicing up the raw footage into a favorable interview piece fo the Veep.
[...]
Fox now spinning the interview as Cheney has to get the information out, according to their WH correspondent Molly Hannenberg, so that he won't eclipse the President's major health care speech later this afternoon. (Yeah. Good one.)

More on that health care speech soon.