On tonight's edition of Fox News' Hannity, host Sean Hannity and guest Michelle Malkin spent the better part of a segment criticizing President Obama for answering a question from an Indian student on the nature of jihad.

This past Sunday Obama was asked during a town hall meeting in Mumbai, "[W]hat is your take on opinion about jihad, or jihadi? Whatever is your opinion, what do you think of them?" He responded in part:

Well, the phrase jihad has a lot of meanings within Islam and is subject to a lot of different interpretations. But I will say that, first, Islam is one of the world's great religions. And more than a billion people who practice Islam, the overwhelming majority view their obligations to their religion as ones that reaffirm peace and justice and fairness and tolerance. I think all of us recognize that this great religion in the hands of a few extremists has been distorted to justify violence towards innocent people that is never justified.

Hannity and Malkin were enraged at Obama's answer. Hannity said Obama's response was “shocking,” “tortured,” and painful," and said that the “simple answer” is that “jihad is holy war, those who use religion to ... justify the killing of innocent men, women, and children.” Malkin said that “millions” of Muslims believe jihad is “violent, armed struggle” and was shocked Obama wouldn't just say that. From tonight's Hannity:

Hannity's criticisms tonight echoed those made by a variety of Fox commentators -- including Hannity -- on Monday night. We responded at the time by noting that Obama's statements about jihad had been entirely uncontroversial.

But maybe we were a little quick to criticize. After all, the president has been known to make rather equivocal, nuanced, sensitive comments - thus inimical to a conservative pundit's soul -- on this topic:

“This form of radicalism exploits Islam to serve a violent, political vision: the establishment, by terrorism, subversion and insurgency, of a totalitarian empire that denies all political and religious freedom. These extremists distort the idea of jihad into a call for terrorist murder against Christians and Hindus and Jews -- and against Muslims, themselves, who do not share their radical vision.”

“These extremists distort the idea of jihad into a call for terrorist murder against anyone who does not share their radical vision, including Muslims from other traditions, who they regard as heretics.”

I can't seem to find clips of Hannity criticizing the president for these similar comments though. I wonder why...

Oh. Those quotes come from President Bush.

In fairness to Hannity though, Bush made those statements in 2005. Maybe Hannity has had a change of heart since then, and he just hasn't had the chance to mention it?

Oh. Yesterday, Hannity aired an hour-long interview with Bush -- the day after Hannity demanded to know, “Why couldn't [Obama] just say, 'jihad killed 3,000 Americans'?”. Well, maybe Hannity was too busy asking Bush other tough, hard hitting questions to get to jihad. Questions like:

HANNITY: Do a little stumping with Bill Clinton? How's that going?

HANNITY: You don't seem like you went through any transition. You just...

HANNITY: You said it was a regret of yours, you didn't get Bin Laden. You went after him - hard.

HANNITY: [Bin Laden] doesn't come out in public anymore, does he?

HANNITY: At one point, this really struck me, you said Tom Daschle didn't like the fact that you were using the term war...what did he call it?

HANNITY: There was the unscripted moment in New York, after 9-11...

HANNITY: I don't think it was ever a problem, where the American people knew where you stood.

HANNITY: Isn't it almost counterintuitive, to get elected, don't you need to be liked?

Hmm. So to reiterate, here's Sean Hannity's timeline:

Monday: Eviscerate Obama for giving a nuanced, well-received response to a question from a student

Tuesday: Heap praise on George W. Bush like an ever-loyal, ever-loving puppy dog

Wednesday: See Monday