Cricket, I'd say there's a possibility you would be jailed for that, but on the whole, probably not. Really depends on a bunch of other things though, like were the cops out to get you in the first place for all sorts of other dumbshit stuff you've done, or if you're a rich VIP and the local constabulary don't see the why and wherefore of ruffling your feathers.
This is a weird story. I can't quite get a bead on what it's all about. It kinda reminds me of when Clinton fell down and hurt his knee; there was a lot of speculation in the media that booze or other drugs played a role in the mishap. This story, I think, is the same thing, just much larger, since there was a gun, and an innocent bystander nearly killed.
Also, I think it gets to the central hubris of the Iraq war, the concocted WMD claims, etc. All we hear from the White House and the dittoheads is how great everything is going... that got us through the election but the message is beyond shopworn now. And then here's Cheney, who stands by all the decisions he's made on supremely important matters of life and death, matters which affect the entire nation, who's convinced himself and so many others that what he did was right, by God, even if it was done for the wrong reasons... turns out wise old Mr. Cheney is just as fallible as the rest of us.
Of course he will come through this near-tragedy with an even firmer conviction in his faith, that's how the script plays, but for a little while there, for about a day after the VP had shot a man, he kinda seemed like he was teetering on the brink of maybe kinda pretending like it wasn't really a big deal and maybe kinda pretending it wasn't really his fault and that he's really basically incapable of doing anything wrong. A tiny crack in Humpty Dumpty's Beltway-buffered shell, from a secure location somewhere on a Texas ranch.
Failure to respond swiftly to unforseen crisis is the hallmark of Bush administration failures. They are at their best when they have a script to follow. They ran the PNAC playbook after 9/11 to a 90% approval rating. But when they're caught without a plan, as by Abu Ghraib, Katrina, Cindy Sheehan, and as epitomized by this accidental shooting, they waffle and cast about and insist that everything is going just fine, when it's plain as day that something is wrong as hell, and they just refuse to admit it.
