Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Michael Yardley: How not to shoot people: "When Dick Cheney accidentally shot and wounded millionaire lawyer Harry Whittingdon this weekend, he broke the first rule of gun safety. As Commander Mark Beaufoy put it in 1908: 'Never, never let your gun/Pointed be at anyone.' Cheney did, and the results, which might have been fatal, appear only to have been uncomfortable for his unfortunate victim. Shooting accidents in the US, which has 80 million gun owners, are not uncommon. There are thousands of fatalities each year. Happily, they are much rarer in the UK."