Huckabee's Unsafe Gun Handling On Display

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Waitone

New member
Not clear if Huck fired the errant shot(s) or if someone in his posse did it. In any case this is the nonsense that gives shooters a bad rep.

http://weblogs.chicagotribune.com/news/politics/blog/2007/12/huckabees_muzzle_control_probl.html
Huckabee's muzzle control problem

by Jim Tankersley

Republican Mike Huckabee took his presidential campaign for a quick pheasant-hunting expedition in Iowa on Wednesday, and at one point, a reporter asked why he hadn’t invited sporting enthusiast Dick Cheney along. "Because I want to survive all the way through this," Huckabee replied, in a chuckling dig at the vice president’s accidental shooting of a quail-hunting partner last year.

Any good sportsman, though, couldn’t miss a distinctly Cheneyesque moment in the press accounts of the former Arkansas governor’s morning hunt: At one point, Huckabee’s party turned toward a cluster of reporters and cameramen and, when they kicked up a pheasant, fired shotgun blasts over the group’s heads.

This, friends, is dangerously bad hunting form.

Your Swamp correspondent, the son of a longtime hunter education instructor, grew up plying the corn rows and stream banks of rural Oregon with a Labrador retriever and a Mossberg 20-gauge pump shotgun. On our hunts for pheasant, grouse and quail, merely swinging a gun barrel in the general direction of another person was grounds for day-long banishment to the truck (which smelled like wet dog).

Suffice to say, if any of our hunting mates had pulled a stunt like Huckabee’s yesterday, we never would have invited them back. It’s the sort of behavior that drives safety-conscious hunters up the wall, because it reinforces a reckless, gun-totin’ stereotype.

My colleague James Oliphant reports that Huckabee’s party was about 75 yards away from the press corps Wednesday when a pheasant jumped up and flew toward the reporters, drawing several shots. “That was too close,” he reports a cameraman saying.

Perhaps Huckabee missed hunter’s safety classes – Arkansas only requires them for hunters born after 1968 – but the etiquette on this point is clear.

“Never point a firearm at yourself or others,” the International Hunter Education Association declares in its Basic Safety Rules. Later, it adds, “Never point your firearm at something you do not intend to shoot. Make sure you positively identify what you are shooting at and know what lies in front of and beyond it.”

Huckabee emerged happily from his hunt, three dead pheasants in tow, Oliphant reports. Asked for a metaphor to describe the hunt, he replied, "Don't get in my way. This is what happens."

Posted by Jim Tankersley on December 27, 2007
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Huckabee emerged happily from his hunt, three dead pheasants in tow, Oliphant reports. Asked for a metaphor to describe the hunt, he replied, "Don't get in my way. This is what happens."
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Ha! I'm startin' to like him more and more. :D
 
Dang, he missed. He needs to go back to the range and practice some more if he can't hit a bunch of reporters. :p
 
Any good sportsman, though, couldn’t miss a distinctly Cheneyesque moment in the press accounts of the former Arkansas governor’s morning hunt: At one point, Huckabee’s party turned toward a cluster of reporters and cameramen and, when they kicked up a pheasant, fired shotgun blasts over the group’s heads.
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The author tries hard to make it seem as if Huckabee did the shooting, but nowhere does he come right out and say it was Huckabee who shot over the heads of the reporters.

He only mentions "Huckabee's party"

I suspect Huckabee didn't shoot in the direction of the reporters, only someone in the hunting group.

If this reporter from the notoriously hard left Chicago tribune had any real evidence that Huckabee did the shooting, he'd be shrieking exactly that, not trying to sneak in the "Huckabee's party" reference.
 
What's funny to me is that no one in the press gave a tinker's damn about Huckabee until he became a front runner.

Now anyone and everyone is trying to dig up dirt on him and portray him in the most unfavorable light possible. It's disgusting -- and unfortunately it's the norm these days.
 
My first thought when i seen video was terrible gun handling, does that
make him a bad person, no, just another politician trying to shine on
peons.
 
There are probably two sides to this story.....I'm only hearing one. Years ago Sen Phil Gramm (R-Tx) was running for president and had a sporting clays shoot at our club. Over 600 press credentials had been issued and press from all over the world were present. Just as Gramm was getting ready to call his target two cameramen jumped in front of the Senator to get a better camera angle. Fortunately safety officers grabbed the jerks by their collars and pulled them to the ground. They looked stunned and asked why they'd been restrained?....(duh, you can't stand in front of someone shooting) Media types are not the brightest, they'll do anything to beat someone out of a story or photo.
 
I wish these fools (both parties) would bag the pheasant hunt as a way of demonstrating fealty to the second amendment and simply participate in a 3-gun match. And for the unmitigated entertainment value I'd accept participation in a SASS match. Rudy in western garb . . . . wait, he's already been there. :p
 
So ... I know that when bird hunting, especially dove hunting, sometimes shotgunners are relatively close to each other. Close enough to get peppered by falling shot (though it doesn't fall hard enough to hurt anyone).

Is 75 yards too close? And isn't pheasant hunting normally shooting at birds on the ground or down low?

I just shoot sporting clays ... and those courses are set up quite safely!
 
When I see him I think of John Kerry

Its all a pony show....does Huckaboo really think (me as gunowner and a voter) I will look as this photo-op and not look at his record??

What a joke.

Can we stop with the stupid painfully obvious pony shows......

I wish these fools (both parties) would bag the pheasant hunt as a way of demonstrating fealty to the second amendment and simply participate in a 3-gun match.
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I'm inline with this logic. The 2A is about hunting politicans not birds. (I wonder if Huckaboo knows that??)
 
Who cares about Mike Huckabee hunting? It was for show. His stance on 2A issues are on the record. He seems like a nice guy with morals and ethics who can be tough if he needs to be.

He does need to control his muzzle a bit better. The main one he needs to control is his mouth.
 
Huckabee’s party was about 75 yards away from the press corps Wednesday when a pheasant jumped up and flew toward the reporters, drawing several shots.
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Not close enough to hurt anyone with birdshot.

Your Swamp correspondent, the son of a longtime hunter education instructor, grew up plying the corn rows
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Chicago reporter tries to qualify himself as "experienced" or "neutral". I, for one, demand to see his father's certification as an instructor.
 
We only have the word of the reporter that the range was 75 yards. The youtube video means nothing as professionals often videotape such events with telephoto lenses. Range could have been 300 yards for all we know.

My 2 cents worth, but it looks like the press has decided Mr. Huckabee should inherit their notorious Bush - Cheney hatred. :(
 
At least he didn't have to get someone else to take off the safety this time around. He reminds me of the John Kerry type hunter.
 
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