Libya: Most Snarktastic Operation in Recent Memory?

From a piece today in the New York Times:

Tonight, in a speech that probably should have been delivered before American planes began flying missions over North Africa, Barack Obama will try to explain to a puzzled nation why we are at war with Libya. 

Not that the word “war” will pass his lips, most likely. In press briefings last week, our Libyan campaign was euphemized into a “kinetic military action” and a “time-limited, scope-limited military action.” (The online parodies were merciless: “Make love, not time-limited, scope-limited military actions!” “Let slip the muzzled canine unit of kinetic military action!”) Advertising tonight’s address, the White House opted for “the situation in Libya,” which sounds less like a military intervention than a spin-off vehicle for the famous musclehead from MTV’s “Jersey Shore.”

After the (admittedly hilarious) snarking over the nigh-Orwellian mangling of language is over, though, we're still left with some significant and significantly troubling questions such as this one (as Jake Tapper endears himself to me even more).