A week after his offensive “joke” about Willow Palin, David Letterman decides to apologize for real this time as the New York Daily News reports:
No more stupid apology tricks.
Comedian David Letterman issued a full-throated mea culpa for delivering a raunchy joke at the expense of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s daughter, saying he takes "full blame" for the "bad" joke.
"I told a bad joke. I told a joke that was beyond flawed, and my intent is completely meaningless compared to the perception," he said on Monday’s show. "And since it was a joke I told, I feel that I need to do the right thing here and apologize for having told that joke."
"It’s not your fault that it was misunderstood, it’s my fault that it was misunderstood," he said.
"So I would like to apologize, especially to the two daughters involved, Bristol and Willow, and also to the governor and her family and everybody else who was outraged by the joke. I’m sorry about it and I’ll try to do better in the future."
I’ll update with the video later, as well as, Governor Palin’s response.
Update: My thoughts… I was going to update this a little later, but Strabo asked:
Considering your strong personal feelings about it, Shane I wonder what you own personal reaction to the apology is?
Initially I’m thinking, too little too late, because I believe the apology is more because he got called out, not likely remorse. I also am considering that Don Imus was fired from CBS Radio even after he apologized, and I would say that for consistency’s sake CBS should probably fire him.
Obviously it doesn’t really matter what I think though, I’ll defer to the Palin family. I’m sure they’ll likely be gracious and accept his apology. I believe that comments and jokes of this nature really need to stop. It only contributes to misogyny which seems to be ok for those on the left provided it is directed toward conservative women.
Full transcript from Newsday.com:
Letterman: “All right, here – I’ve been thinking about this situation with Governor Palin and her family now for about a week – it was a week ago tonight, and maybe you know about it, maybe you don’t know about it. But there was a joke that I told, and I thought I was telling it about the older daughter being at Yankee Stadium. And it was kind of a coarse joke. There’s no getting around it, but I never thought it was anybody other than the older daughter, and before the show, I checked to make sure in fact that she is of legal age, 18. Yeah. But the joke really, in and of itself, can’t be defended. The next day, people are outraged. They’re angry at me because they said, ‘How could you make a lousy joke like that about the 14-year-old girl who was at the ball game?’ And I had, honestly, no idea that the 14-year-old girl, I had no idea that anybody was at the ball game except the Governor and I was told at the time she was there with Rudy Giuliani…And I really should have made the joke about Rudy…” (audience applauds) “But I didn’t, and now people are getting angry and they’re saying, ‘Well, how can you say something like that about a 14-year-old girl, and does that make you feel good to make those horrible jokes about a kid who’s completely innocent, minding her own business,’ and, turns out, she was at the ball game. I had no idea she was there. So she’s now at the ball game and people think that I made the joke about her. And, but still, I’m wondering, ‘Well, what can I do to help people understand that I would never make a joke like this?’ I’ve never made jokes like this as long as we’ve been on the air, 30 long years, and you can’t really be doing jokes like that. And I understand, of course, why people are upset. I would be upset myself.
“And then I was watching the Jim Lehrer ‘Newshour’ – this commentator, the columnist Mark Shields, was talking about how I had made this indefensible joke about the 14-year-old girl, and I thought, ‘Oh, boy, now I’m beginning to understand what the problem is here. It’s the perception rather than the intent.’ It doesn’t make any difference what my intent was, it’s the perception. And, as they say about jokes, if you have to explain the joke, it’s not a very good joke. And I’m certainly – ” (audience applause) “– thank you. Well, my responsibility – I take full blame for that. I told a bad joke. I told a joke that was beyond flawed, and my intent is completely meaningless compared to the perception. And since it was a joke I told, I feel that I need to do the right thing here and apologize for having told that joke. It’s not your fault that it was misunderstood, it’s my fault. That it was misunderstood.” (audience applauds) “Thank you. So I would like to apologize, especially to the two daughters involved, Bristol and Willow, and also to the Governor and her family and everybody else who was outraged by the joke. I’m sorry about it and I’ll try to do better in the future. Thank you very much.” (audience applause)
What are your thoughts?
2nd Update: Here is video from last night.
HT: Bluegrass Pundit
Governor Sarah Palin issued a statement this morning via Facebook:
"Of course it’s accepted on behalf of young women, like my daughters, who hope men who ‘joke’ about public displays of sexual exploitation of girls will soon evolve.
Letterman certainly has the right to ‘joke’ about whatever he wants to, and thankfully we have the right to express our reaction. And this is all thanks to our U.S. Military women and men putting their lives on the line for us to secure America’s Right to Free Speech – in this case, may that right be used to promote equality and respect."
HT: Josh Painter