You What??

In the spirit of this, we have this from the Age.

Nelson Mandela is still very much alive despite a gaffe by US President George W. Bush, who alluded to the former South African leader's death in a speech yesterday.

"It's out there," said Achmat Dangor of the Nelson Mandela Foundation of Mr Bush's comment, which received worldwide media coverage.

"All we can do is reassure people, especially South Africans, that President Mandela is alive," he said.

In a speech defending his administration's Iraq policy, Mr Bush said former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein's brutality had made it impossible to unite the country.

"I heard somebody say, 'Where's Mandela?'," he said.

"Well, Mandela's dead because Saddam Hussein killed all the Mandelas."

The bizarre gaffe was made in a press conference in Washington yesterday.

So that was the real reason for going to war in Iraq. He must be getting foreign policy advice from Miss South Carolina.

cj in comments clears it up for us.

It's clear from the transcript that the literal meaning of the question "Where's Mandela?" GWB was asked is "Where are the Iraqi leaders who will play the same role that Mandela played in the rebuilding of South Africa?" GWB's response was a pithy metaphor summarizing the situation there.

Apparently, GWB's critics are either (a) so dishonest as to give a false spin on the statement, (b) too lazy to check out the context before reporting it, or (c) too stupid to understand the analogy.

I plead guilty to (c)

Larvatus Prodeo has more, along with a very amusing comment thread.

Carry on everyone.