I think we can all be grateful that we live in such interesting times. I, for one, had hoped to survive long enough so that I could use the phrases, "Vice President of the United States" and "bust a cap in his dome" in the same sentence. And now, I can.
I freely admit that I have followed woodland creatures through the woods without killing any of them. I spent three summers as a forest ranger in the service of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts (God save it!), and thus have had many opportunities to watch animals in what is their native habitat (and human beings in what is decidedly not theirs). For one thing, I have yet to determine what possesses a suburban couple to remove a disposable diaper and then toss it into a tree -- from where some poor state employee like me has to extract it lest it strangle a raccoon in the dead of night. I determined from this and other similar incidents that human beings no more become mellow when you bring them into the woods than grizzly bears would if you brought them into the parlor.
But I have not yet killed any of them -- the animals, not the tourists -- which perhaps leaves me out of the discussion somewhat in regards to the vice president's busting a cap in his friend's dome. Perhaps I should leave that to the likes of Paul Begala, who's talked so much about hunting in the last two weeks that he might wind up hosting the debut of a new political show on the Outdoor Life Network (which would be like the McLaughlin Group, but with gunplay, and without Fred Barnes, which is a helluva trade, now that I think about it).
Nevertheless, I remain curious about what kind of hunting it was during which the vice president shot his friend. Let's not even discuss the wilderness lessons he learned in Early Times from his Old Granddad about killing Wild Turkeys. I thought hunting was what the Indians did. I thought it was what Ted Nugent does. This kind of hunting seems to involve an awful lot of hired help and more expensive vehicles than the Rose Parade. This kind of hunting seems to come equipped with fully qualified waitstaffs and maîtres d'hôtel to introduce the participants to each other:
"Mr. Vice President, this is your cotumix cotumix. CC, this is the Vice President of the United States, who is going to try to bust a cap in your dome. Let's have some fun, shall we?"
And, they're off.
This isn't hunting. Do you know what this is?
This is T-ball.
Parents of young children know what I'm talking about. T-ball is the introductory form of baseball in which each player gets to knock a ball off of a stationary tee and then run around the bases, usually backwards. There has never been a single out made in the history of T-ball. Every game ends in a 325-325 tie. Everyone goes home happy, self-esteem intact.
That's what we seem to have here: a bunch of T-ball hunters. Everybody plays, and all must have trophies. They do everything except tie the birds to a rock in front of each hunter. And the vice president still winds up shooting somebody? Jeebus, poor Harry Whittington's lucky they didn't drive him to the emergency room lashed to the front of the car.
I am more impressed, frankly, by the quail in question, which now roams freely over the east Texas plains and is undoubtedly the envy of all the other quail in its social circle. This is a bird that's never going to have to pay for a meal again in its life. After all, it was supposed to be served up as easily as a roast out of an oven. Yet through luck, and pluck, and good flying, and basic quail survival techniques, this bodacious little gallinaceous fellow has thrown the press into a frenzy, the executive branch into a conniption, and enabled us all to point out that the vice president, you know, busted a cap in someone's dome. No bird in history has had this kind of impact on American politics -- not even the several lame ducks that leap to mind -- and it may well serve as hero and role model for succeeding generations of birds who take an active role in the great issues of the day. So we should all probably get used to that. Did you know, for example, what the quail's call is, reputedly?
"Wet my lips. Wet my lips."
Maybe that's what the vice president heard, immediately prior to peppering his buddy with birdshot.
Wet my lips.
Blammo.
Right there in God's country, where the Maker left his, ah, Mark.
Charles P. Pierce is a staff writer at The Boston Globe Magazine and a contributing writer for Esquire. He also is heard regularly on National Public Radio.
