Dick Cheney’s little hunting accident, of course, raises many questions. Why did the Vice President’s office maintain a stout media silence for almost 24 hours? Why was it only after Katharine Armstrong, the ranch’s owner, reported the incident to the press, that Cheney’s office opened its mouth on the subject? Was the hunting accident reported to the authorities promptly? If so, were they sworn to media secrecy (and if so, why)? If not, isn’t it a legal requirement that you must promptly report it to the authorities if you accidentally let loose a shotgun blast through someone’s face, neck and chest? So is there more to all this than meets the eye? Was Cheney maybe displaying a touch of his famous anger when he mistook Harry Whittington for a quail and tried to turn him into lunch? What the heck did Whittington say to Cheney anyway to get him so riled up? Doesn’t he know better (Whittington, not Cheney)?

All of the above – in case you couldn’t tell – was flung out in a light and bantering tone. But to me, Cheney’s little adventure does raise one serious issue. The Washington Post tells you and me:

Whittington was treated on the scene by Cheney’s traveling medical detail before being taken by helicopter to a Corpus Christi hospital.

This man travels with a medical staff? Everywhere he goes? Including private trips which have nothing to do with his Vice Presidential duties? How much is this costing you and me exactly? And why on earth should you and I have to pay this bill? What kind of health care plan is the Vice President on anyway? What’s his deductible, what’s his co-pay? How much have you and I paid for things like Viagra over the last five years?

Who’s paying for the helicopter? And the Corpus Christi hospital? Could it possibly be you and me? Have we unknowingly bestowed upon Cheney a zero-deductible, zero co-pay, no annual limit Friends and Family plan? I’m sure there’s a word for taking you and me, and adding the insult and injury of his health plan to the insult and injury of our own pathetic and exorbitant health plans, but I have no idea what it might be.

More from the Post story:

“Fortunately, the vice president has got a lot of medical people around him and so they were right there and probably more cautious than we would have been,” (Cheney’s charming hostess, Katharine Armstrong) said. “The vice president has got an ambulance on call, so the ambulance came.”

See what I mean? It is too a Friends and Family plan. There’s an ambulance on call for the Veep. So it comes for his friends too.

Speaking of “on call”, maybe that traveling medical staff could just be on call, as well? Maybe it’s not entirely necessary for multiple medicos to travel with the Veep? This is, after all, the guy we are repeatedly assured is in perfectly reasonable health, and quite capable (or medically capable, at least) of discharging his duties as Vice President. Or if it is deemed necessary to have medical personnel on hand at all times, surely one emergency care provider is sufficient? How many medical emergencies has the Vice President had in the last five years anyway? And was there a single one which couldn’t have been handled easily by a competent emergency care provider? Why are our tax dollars spent on his health care without even a rudimentary cost-benefit analysis, while you and I are always at the receiving end of cost-benefit analyses from our health care providers?