I was not comfortable with apparent attempts to back away from the words “war on terror” to say we were in a struggle against violent extremism (without saying exactly which kind of extremism that is). I didn’t get the shift and didn’t buy the argument that the Pentagon changed the wording because they didn’t want us to think that soldiers are the solution. It is a war. And terrorists are the enemy.
Now it seems that Bush, too, didn’t like this odd Republican attempt at PC.
President Bush publicly overruled some of his top advisers on Wednesday in a debate about what to call the conflict with Islamic extremists, saying, “Make no mistake about it, we are at war.”
In a speech here, Mr. Bush used the phrase “war on terror” no less than five times.
