Snarky James Taranto of the WSJ recently wrote:

Interesting too is [Jon] Stewart's acknowledgment of his own "cognitive dissonance" and "mixed feelings" over the Iraq liberation. It's a version of an argument we've been hearing a lot lately: As our Brendan Miniter puts it, "The president's critics never seem to tire of claiming that the war in Iraq began over weapons of mass destruction and only later morphed into a war of liberation."

Miniter correctly notes that "this criticism isn't entirely right," but for the sake of argument let's assume it is. What does it mean? President Bush has altered his arguments to conform to reality, while his critics remain fixated on obsolete disputes. This would seem utterly to refute the liberal media stereotype. Bush, it turns out, is a supple-minded empiricist, while his opponents are rigid ideologues.

Just beyond hilarity. What planet is James living on? He first wants us to believe that GW altered to fit reality -- and yet this is a president that exactly DOES NOT do that. GW believes what he wants to believe no matter the evidence to the contrary; he simply declares he needs more science (i.e. the verdict is still conveniently out). And what about the ample intel that existed and was provided to the president showing that Iraq had no WMD, and yet GW and Cheney chose instead to ignore it? That's very different than altering one's view to conform to reality after the fact. The reality was always very much there to begin with!

Yet, in describing Bush as flexible and his opposition as "rigid" is all you need to know about Taranto. Yeah, Pelosi is as attack dog as Newt Gingrich, and GW/Cheney/DeLay and the rest of the GOP are a bunch of fun-loving, easy-going compromisers -- right....