Weasel Words

"Where mistakes have been made, the responsibility rests with me."

Give me a break.

Maybe the President's team needs to read Susan McCarthy's excellent essay, How To Say You're Sorry. I understand if they didn't get a chance to read it when it was published -- things got kind of busy a few weeks later -- but they should certainly read it now. After all, "where mistakes were made" is nothing but a different, wordier way of saying "if," and as McCarthy says, the word "if" never belongs in an apology.