Now here’s a slogan we won’t hear chanted by drooling liberal mobs: “Newsweek lied, people died!” The mental picture of Howard Dean blowing spittle while chanting this little mantra brings a smile to my face.

But the hatred and illogic which gave rise to the “Bush lied, people died” motto will work to justify Newsweek’s crime in the eyes of the liberal throng. I’m sure it won’t really matter to the average liberal that 16 people died because of Newsweek’s false article. It was for a worthy cause, they were trying to smear Bush and the U.S. military.

Besides, Bush’s lies have caused the deaths of millions, right? Wrong. Practically every world intelligence agency worth its salt thought that there were WMDs in Iraq. Saddam prohibited the use of surveillance drones over certain parts of his country, indicating he was trying to hide something. The U.N. types who whined about us going in are now found to have been getting oil to sell on the world market courtesy of Saddam.

In short, Bush didn’t lie. Newsweek writers Michael Isikoff and John Barry decided to take the word of an unnamed government source who said he had seen reports of the Koran-flushings. Now this same source isn’t so sure he saw those reports after all. So maybe Newsweek didn’t lie, their source did. Or maybe Isikoff and Barry invented the source, and they were lying after all. That’s the thing with a single anonymous source. Who is to say the person really exists?

But Barry and Isikoff are following in a grand tradition of writers who invent stories. Remember Jason Blair, the guy who was fired from the New York Times for making up events? And we can’t forget Dan Rather, who went with the forged documents because they suited his political purpose.

This may be a good thing in America, because these kinds of fabrications only besmirch the already tarnished reputation of the mainstream media. However, a lot of Muslims aren’t buying Newseek’s admission of guilt. They think the magazine is under pressure by the government to retract its story. Isikoff and Barry may have succeeded in making America look bad in the eyes of Muslims everywhere, at least Muslims who aren’t familiar with the media’s perpetual war against Bush and conservatives.

If you hear a succession of very loud popping noises coming from both coasts, it will be liberal elites pulling their heads out. But I wouldn’t stand around waiting for it.