Tony Snow, Educator

At today’s White House press briefing, Tony Snow did a little teaching when a press corps member asked the sort of question that’s brought the corps into such low public esteem.

QUESTION: Let me ask you this, because I suppose another way of looking at this is if somebody hadn't flipped, if somebody hadn't tipped off everybody, Zarqawi would not have been targeted. So a lot of this is dependent on another terrorist, perhaps, wanting to see Zarqawi dead so that they could move into the created vacuum.

TONY SNOW: That would be a really stupid terrorist, because the life expectancy of people who have been succeeding these guys, and the life expectancy of being Zarqawi's number two has not been very good. So if somebody was trying to tip off Zarqawi in sort of a Machiavellian attempt to re-jigger things, I think they ought to think twice because what is happening -- and we've seen this and we've heard reports of it, but I think this dramatizes it -- the Iraqi people are saying, we've had it with these guys. We've had it. We're not going to take it anymore. And that is an important step. And this is the kind of thing that can reinforce those who want to go ahead and stand up against terror in their midst.

Nice lesson, Tony. I hope the reporter learned something.

Hat Tip: Greg Sheffield