Bush's First Apology?

President Bush will give 10-minute interviews to two Arabic networks today that broadcast in the region. An interpreter will translate his speech to Arabic.

Translating President Bush has to be an interpreter's dream. You only have to know a dozen nouns, a few verbs and pronouns, and a basic understanding of the structure of English language. It's like a computer training simulation for a new interpreter.

"I'm George W. Bush, President of the United States. I have a message for you. Torture is despicable. The evildoers will be reprimanded. But freedom won't. Freedom will be anti-reprimanded. Iraq is now freed from Saddam. Saddam is a madman. He is mad because he hates freedom. What does Saddam love? Mass graves, torture, and rape rooms. We hate mass graves. Mass graves hate freedom. Torture and rape rooms--we're working on that.

Torture is still despicable. We will not tolerate it. The people involved will be ree---rep---repred--- rep-ri-man-ded. That word is torture! [grins]

But we must remember there are other despicable things in the world. What else is despicable? Enemies of freedom. Our enemies say, "Democracy is bad. We hate freedom." Enemies are bad. They torture democracy. Which is despicable. Iraq's people want democracy. Untortured. Iraq is a freedom-loving people. Things will improve. Things are stabilizing. Things are great. We are all optimistic. Democracy is at hand. Iraqis have nothing to fear.

I will read the report tomorrow."

Update: Bush finished giving the two interviews. For the purpose of comparison, and the more important purpose of being snarky, a snippet of one of them:

"And, of course, al Qaeda looks for any excuse. But the truth of the matter is, they hate us, and they hate freedom, and they hate people who embrace freedom. And they're willing to kill innocent Iraqis because Iraqis are willing to be free. Iraqis are sick of foreign people coming in their country and trying to destabilize their country. And we will help them rid Iraq of these killers."

Update 2: I'm still reading the interview. From a few paragraphs later:

"But inherent in your question was, you know, am I anxious to use military power? Iraq was a unique situation because Saddam Hussein had constantly defied the world and had threatened his neighbors, had used weapons of mass destruction, had terrorist ties, had torture chambers inside his country, had mass graves. It was a very unique situation. And he was given a chance to meet the demands of the free world in a peaceful way, but he chose -- he chose war."