Aftermath of Cheney shooting incident highlights need to communicate in crisis

“What we've got here is failure to communicate.” So said a vicious captain guarding prisoners in the 1967 film “Cool Hand Luke.”

And it seems relevant to the failure of Vice President Dick Cheney to communicate with the nation after he accidentally shot his friend Harry Whittington in the face during a hunting trip Feb. 11.

It was the first time a sitting vice president shot someone since Aaron Burr fatally shot Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton in July, 1804. It’s newsworthy, and certainly deserves coverage, but shouldn’t be the end of Cheney’s career, since he didn’t exactly shoot Secretary of the Treasury John Snow.

It’s not career-ending, that is, unless the aftermath continues to be handled badly. Then, it could very well be.

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