Pulp fiction

In his weekly radio address, Bush praises Pakistan’s “President” Musharraf for “working to build modern democratic institutions that could provide an alternative to radicalism.” Yeah, Musharraf is all about the building of modern democratic institutions.

It may not mean anything, but in his most recent speeches, Bush has been backing away from describing the enemy as Islamofascist or indeed as Islamic anything, in favor of the more generic, basically content-free term “extremist.” In today’s five-minute address, he referred to “extremism” twice and “extremists” five times. Extremists are the bad guys in Palestine, Afghanistan, and Iraq. “All civilized nations, especially those in the Muslim world, are bound together in this struggle between moderation and extremism.”

Note that in that version of reality, Bush is a moderate.

Metaphor of the day, from Capt. Phil Waddingham of the Office for the Administrative Review of the Detention of Enemy Combatants at Guantanamo, about the possibility of releasing detainees: “I think what we have here is an orange. What we’re doing is squeezing out the juice and what we’re left with at the end of the day is pulp that will just stay here.”