OFFICIALLY AN ACCIDENT:  Dick Cheney's breathing a lot easier ... thanks to the incredible speed and professionalism of the Texas cops!

Wit Memo sez, lay off Dick Cheney!  Enough with the jokes that could write themselves!  Instead, hats off to the Texas county sheriff's office, which announced that the shooting was officially an accident ... only a crackerjack police force could wrap up such a major investigation so soon!

One thing we all know from following real-life police investigations on cable tabloid shows:  they take time, and lots of it.  Leads must be followed, pavement pounded, all clues gone over with fine-toothed combs.  Even Nancy Grace accepts that reality. 

So it's a true feat of modern law enforcement, a wonder of dedication to duty, that the Texas county sheriff's office was able to determine in less than a week that Vice President Dick Cheney's shooting of big-shot Austin lawyer Harry Whittington during a quail hunting party was only an accident ... that the veep really was aiming for a drab, sparrow-sized bird when he shot a six-foot man clad in blaze orange hat and vest. Imagine all the work they had to do!  At the very least, the cops must have determined--

• Whether Cheney owed Whittington any money, or whether the two men were otherwise enmeshed in financial shenanigans that Cheney would want to keep quiet. The police would have examined both men's banking and financial records, and interviewed friends and business associates, looking for the scent of any business dealings that might seem even the tiniest bit less than above board

• Whether there was any romantic intrigue or jealousy between the two men. Was there any evidence of an illicit affair between Whittington and Lynne Cheney, the VP's sex-scene-writing wife, or between Cheney and Whittington's wife or Whittington's mistress, if he had one? (Not unheard of among rich, powerful men of his vintage.)  Or was there any other kind of sexual entanglement that might have engendered bad blood between the two men?  They were, after all, in a hunting party with two women who weren't their wives.

• Whether Whittington was a potential target of a subpoena by special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald in his investigation of the Valerie Plame affair. Scooter Libby's recently-revealed claim that he was acting on orders would provide Cheney a powerful motive to silence a possible corroborating witness.

• Whether Whittington was speaking freely, without outside influence, when he said it was an accident. Did he speak confidentially, away from the presence and pressure of anyone associated with VOTUS?  For instance, when the cops interviewed Mr. Whittington, were they alone?  Were there any armed men nearby who answer to the Vice President and not Texas law enforcement, such as Secret Service agents, or perhaps Halliburton/KBR security guards functioning as defacto Secret Service agents, in the way that private contractors in Iraq have assumed responsibilties that were once the exclusive province of U.S. armed forces?

Obviously, to make these determinations, the Texas cops must have conducted numerous interviews and painstakingly pored over ream reams of documents. And given the Veep's history of making false statements in public settings, the Texas cops must surely have asked him to submit to polygraphic examination. Only the cream of the law enforcement crop could get all that done in less than a week.  Your own local cops should work that fast!

On the other hand, having the shooting declared an accident might not be the best thing that could happen to Mr. Cheney.  It invites comparison to the other Vice President known for accidentally striking people with round projectiles capable of deadly injury, Spiro Agnew!  He hurt two people in a single day with sliced golf shots, and directed a tennis service straight into the skull of his doubles partner.  And look what happened to him!  Makes the Aaron Burr comparisons seem downright complimentary.