First Doctor to Treat Cheney Victim Tells Texas Paper He Wanted to Send Him Home

Editor and Publisher ^ | 2/14/06

[Mr. Brightside]

First Doctor to Treat Cheney Victim Tells Texas Paper He Wanted to Send Him Home

By Joe Strupp

Published: February 14, 2006 12:05 PM ET

NEW YORK While news reports from The New York Times to the Austin American-Statesman have been describing the injuries to Harry Whittington, the victim of Vice President Dick Cheney's accidental shooting, as more serious than first believed, as he remains hospitalized today, the tiny Alice [Texas] Echo-News Journal will offer a different version later today, E&P has learned.

According to the afternoon daily, located about 60 miles from the shooting site, the first doctor to treat Whittington immediately after the Saturday shooting contended that his wounds were superficial and not in need of further hospitalization.

"If it were just a normal citizen, he would have sent him home with antibiotics," said Ofelia Hunter, Echo-News Journal editor, who talked to the doctor. "He felt that it was more royal treatment that he was getting."

Hunter's comments referred to Dr. Raj Subnani, who treated Whittington at the Christus Spohn Hospital in Kingsville where he was first taken before being transferred to the Christus Spohn Hospital Memorial in Corpus Christi, where he remains.

Hunter, who plans to run a story about Subnani this afternoon, said she interviewed the doctor Monday. The editor, who is one of three newsroom staffers at the paper, indicated that the doctor was not in favor of transferring Whittington because he did not believe he required further hospitalization.

"He felt he was transferred because of his prominence, and that he was already stable," Hunter said. "It was more because of who he was." That is in marked contrast to reports in most major newspapers that Whittington required intensive care treatment, was hit with more than 100 pellets, and that some of the wounds were so severe the pellets could not be removed.

Hunter also reports that Subnani was upset that the Corpus Christi Hospital was being credited with treating Whittington. "More than anything because Corpus Christi staff is getting all of the attention and his staff did all of the work," Hunter said of Subnani. "Media outlets are giving them the credit."

The Echo-News Journal, which publishes every day except Saturday, did not get the early scoop that its neighbor, the Corpus Christi Caller-Times, did. While the Caller-Times has been credited nationwide with breaking the shooting story online Sunday, Hunter said her first report on the shooting was an AP story in the Monday paper.

While she praised the Caller-Times for its work, Hunter also criticized officials for not revealing the news earlier to local journalists. "We should be able to get that information," she said. Hunter also said the Armstrong Ranch, where the shooting occurred, is known as a place where political heavyweights often visit, noting that Cheney comes down at least once a year. But she said there had been no similar incidents therr in the recent past.

[macrahanish #1]

And it could have been punctuated by Cheney beating the s***
out of David Gregory.

[kcvl]

More proof the MSM manufactures news instead of reporting it.


I don't remember MSM 'reporting' this way on Clinton's knee injury at Greg Norman's mansion. He even had surgery without our knowledge until it was over. The press knew that and kept it quiet.