2A - The Michigan Daily - Monday, February 13, 2006 NATION/WORLD Cheney accidentally shoots hunter NEWS IN BRIEF 0_ Vice president becomes McBride, said the vice president met ; with Whittington and his wife at the.. first since Aaron Burr to hospital yesterday. Cheney "was pleased BAGHDAD shoot a man while in office to see that he's doing fine and in good A 1 ..afa1 ru 1ra ri-mtni et.ri 1 WASHINGTON (AP) - Vice Presi- dent Dick Cheney accidentally shot and wounded a companion during a week- end quail hunting trip in Texas, spraying the fellow hunter in the face and chest with shotgun pellets. Harry Whittington, a millionaire attorney from Austin, was "alert and doing fine" in a Corpus Christi hos- pital yesterday after he was shot by Cheney on a ranch in south Texas, said Katharine Armstrong, the prop- erty's owner. He was in stable condition yester- day, said Yvonne Wheeler, spokes- woman for the Christus Spohn Health System in Corpus Christi. Armstrong in an interview with The Associated Press said Whittington, 78, was mostly injured on his right side, with the pellets hitting his cheek, neck and chest during the incident which occurred late afternoon on Saturday. She said emergency personnel travel- ing with Cheney tended to Whittington until the ambulance arrived. Cheney's spokeswoman, Lea Anne spirits," she said. The shooting was first reported by the Corpus Christi Caller-Times. The vice president's office did not disclose the accident until the day after it happened. Armstrong said she was- watching from a car while Cheney, Whittington and another hunter got out of the vehicle to shoot at a covey of quail. Whittington shot a bird and went to look for it in the tall grass, while Cheney and the third hunter walked to another spot and discovered a second covey. 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." Whittington has been a private prac- tice attorney in Austin since 1950 and has long been active in Texas Republican politics. He's been appointed to several AP PHOTO Attorney Harry Whittington, 78, sits in his his office in Austin, Texas, on Jan. 25, 2005. Whittington was accidentally shot by Vice President Dick Cheney during a hunting trip on Saturday. state boards, including when then-Gov. George W. Bush named him to the Texas Funeral Service Commission. McBride did not comment about why the vice president's office did not tell reporters about the accident until the next day. She referred the question to Armstrong, who could not be reached again Sunday evening. 2 r~ £Y s i Wh3 orthwesternY We're Passionate About Your Future in NatumalHealth Care! "The high quality of the professors at Northwestern is a huge strength! The professors are very straightforward about the amount of work that is required, but I know Y. I will look back and realize that I learned from the best x of the 'best: f' Chris G~rier, chiropractic student, Student Senate President k NORTHWESTERN} HEALTH SCIENCES UNIVERSITY 2501 West 84th Street, Bloomington, MN 55431 (9S21800) 888-4777, ext. 409 www.nwhealth.edu x ATE O F ATT EN TION F RESH MEN, SOP HOMOR ES, AND JUNIORS Armstrong, owner of the Armstrong Ranch where the accident occurred, said Whittington was bleeding and Cheney was very apologetic. "It broke the skin," she said of the shotgun pellets. "It knocked him silly. But he was fine. He was talking. His eyes were open. It didn't get in his eyes or anything like that." Repot criticize..s Katrina XXL .I. l c lL V 1 .C ACJF Fl 11C 1 1.. 11 11 M I..J V V Shiite lawmakers yesterday chose incumbent Ibrahim al-Jaafari to be Iraq's new prime minister, endorsing the physician and longtime exile for a second term by a single vote - thanks in large part to support by a radical anti-U.S. faction. Al-Jaafari's selection paves the way for the Shiite alliance to begin talks with parties representing Sunni Arabs, Kurds, secularists and others to form a broad-based govern- ment, which the U.S. hopes can calm the insurgency so American and other foreign troops can begin leaving. Al-Jaafari edged out Vice President Adil Abdul-Mahdli during the balloting, largely thanks to support from followers of Muqtada al-Sadr, the cleric whose militia has staged two uprisings against U.S. forces since 2004. Al-Jaafari, who spent years in exile in Iran and Britain, is virtually assured of the top job once the new parliament convenes and a new president is elected in the coming weeks. The constitution states that the president must appoint a prime minister from the largest bloc in parliament. NEW YORK Record-setting snow buries Northeast A record-breaking storm buried sections of the Northeast under more than 2 feet of snow yesterday, marooning thousands of air travelers and making even a walk to the corner store treacherous. The National Weather Service said 26.9 inches of snow had fallen in Central Park, the most for a single storm since record-keeping started in 1869. The old record was 264 inches in December 1947. Wind gusting as high as 60 mph blew the snow sideways and raised a risk of coastal flooding in New England. And in a rare display, lightning lit up the falling snow before dawn in the New York and Philadelphia areas, producing muffled winter thunder. WASHINGTON Hoekstra questions value of spying program Al-Qaida has had plenty of time to figure out how to avoid government prying into its communications with associates in the United States, says a congressman overseeing U.S. intelligence, and that probably means the eavesdropping is no longer effective. "Does anyone really believe that, after 50 days of having this program on the front page of our newspapers, across talk shows across America, that al-Qaida has not changed the way that it communicates?" asked Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-Mich.), the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. Although he defended the legality of the National Security Administration's eavesdropping, Hoekstra said Sunday, "The problem now is the program is really of questionable value:' 0 response RosEVLLE, Calif. Loklunu . for a Ive,rvi.shp? Gov't-wide failings to blame for debacle, House report finds WASHINGTON (AP) - Unheeded warnings, poor planning and apathy in rec- ognizing the scope of Hurricane Katrina's destruction led to the slow emergency response from the White House down to local parishes, a House investigation concludes. The 600-page reportby a special Repub- lican-dominated House inquiry into one of the worst natural disasters in U.S. history concluded that late state and local evacu- ation orders exacerbated an untrained and inexperienced force of federal emergency responders. It also said President Bush received poor and incomplete counsel about the cri- sis unfolding in the Gulf Coast. Overall, the House report said, the federal government's response to Katrina was marked by "fecklessness, flailing and organizational paralysis." "Our investigation revealed that Katrina was a national failure, an abdication of the most solemn obligation to provide for the common welfare," said a summary of the scathing report obtained Sunday by The Associated Press. "At every level - individual, corporate, philanthropic, and governmental - we failed to meet the challenge that was Katrina," the report concluded. "In this cautionary tale, all the little pigs built houses of straw." The House findings mark the first of two congressional inquiries and a White House review of the storm response expected over the next six weeks. The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee was to continue its own investigation today into the Aug. 29 storm response by examining potentially widespread abuse in federal emergency cash assistance programs for disaster victims. Up to 900,000 of 2.5 mil- lion applicants received aid based on dupli- cate or invalid Social Security numbers, or false addresses and names, congressional investigators found. "Everything that we have found ... con- firms exactly the indictment of the House Republicans," Sen. Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut, that committee's top Demo- crat, said Sunday. "It's shocking and it is unsettling." Excerpts released from the House report, which issued a total of 90 separate findings, spreads the blame through all levels of government. Among the conclusions: Late decisions by New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin and Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco to issue mandatory evacuations in the New Orleans area led to deaths and prolonged suffering. The White House was unable to effectively sort through conflicting reports about levee breaches and other disaster developments, preventing rapid relief. . ..... Small plane crashes into California home A single-engine plane that appeared to be performing an aerobatic stunt lost control and crashed into a suburban home yesterday, killing at least one person on board the plane and sparking a fire that gutted the house, police said. The crash killed the pilot, according to the Federal Aviation Administration and local police. But there were conflicting reports about whether there were other fatali- ties or if the home was occupied at the time. The FAA reported two deaths, including the pilot, but fire and police officials at the scene said only the pilot was killed. The FAA also said two people were missing in the homes, but local authorities reported the houses were unoccupied. CORRECTIONS An article on the front page of Friday's edition of the Daily (Professor nabs three classical Grammys) incorrectly stated that Prof. William Bolcom had been working on his Grammy-winning album for 20 years. The article should have said he worked on the piece itself for 20 years, and finished it in 1984. A story on the front page of the Jan. 30 edition of the Daily (Amind controversy, NAACP VP resigns) incorrectly identified LSA sophomore Saddam Shalhout as Raheam Shalhout. Please report any error in the Daily to corrections@michigandaily.crom. 420 Maynard St., Ann Arbor, MI48109-1327 www.michigandaily.com DoNN M. 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