Well, if we're getting into semantics and trying to communicate as clearly as possible, "homicide bomber" is redundant, while "suicide bomber" adds additional descriptive information. The common word, bomber, all by itself does a pretty good job of describing someone who detonates a bomb with the intention of destroying lives and/or property...NOBODY hears the phrase "bomber" and thinks it means something else. "Suicide" in front of the word "bomber" would then mean someone who commits suicide in the process of being a bomber. It is clear from sentence construction and usage that the word "suicide" modifies the word "bomber" and not the other way around.
"Homicide bomber", by contrast, is a perfectly good phrase to describe something else...someone who commits murder using a bomb. Someone can be a bomber and not kill themselves or anyone else, but if they are a HOMICIDE bomber, that means they kill people in the process of bombing whatever it is they were trying to bomb.
So it would appear that both phrases are right, a "suicide bomber" could be someone who bombs something, killing themselves but nobody else, while a "homicide bomber" could be someone who kills others (but not themselves) with a bomb. When the two overlap (both the bomber and others are killed), either would be semantically correct.
But of course this isn't just about dry usage of words deprived of context. Almost every rendition of a "bomber" story involves a death toll, making "homicide" either an inaccurate or redundant word. "Suicide", however, describes the METHOD of bombing used, making it a very important piece of the story. And suicide bombers rarely survive their attacks, whether or not anyone else is killed, "suicide bomber" is probably an accurate way to describe their methods.
Arguing over semantics seems silly, probably because that's not what this is really all about. The main complaint is that "suicide bomber" was the accepted phrase for a long time, there wasn't really anything wrong with it, except that some folks felt it didn't convey the proper attitude towards terrorism...so they opted for a less accurate phrase to make sure everyone knew where they stood on the issue. Please don't insult our intelligence and suggest that the motive of the White House and Fox News was to better inform, it was all about twisting language to make sure that the proper attitude gets conveyed, and to hell with accuracy.
