Last weekend, Dick Cheney shot Harry Whittington. Emerging from several days in an ICU, Whittington abjectly apologized to Cheney for all the inconvenient questions the veep had to answer while Whittington was distracted by birdshot in his heart. Those with a historical bent might see vague parallels to the humiliations that some of the bad Roman emperors inflicted on unfortunate courtiers, but that's silly. There are important differences. For one thing, no Roman emperor ever had access to firearms...