Comments on: Hagel, Hormel, and Franklin https://sorrywatch.com/hagel-hormel-and-franklin/ Analyzing apologies in the news, media, history and literature. We condemn the bad and exalt the good. Fri, 07 Aug 2020 02:04:56 +0000 hourly 1 By: sumac https://sorrywatch.com/hagel-hormel-and-franklin/#comment-1086 Thu, 27 Dec 2012 17:58:35 +0000 https://sorrywatch.com/?p=716#comment-1086 You’re right. He got an apology, but not a good one.

In Hagel’s favor, the apology was delivered in the same way as the original offense — not face-to-face, but through the media.

On the other hand, when you say someone is unfit for a job, a little more effort is required to take it back. Maybe that’s the sort of decorous distinction that ambassadors are better at than senators or defense secretaries.

]]> By: Calton Bolick https://sorrywatch.com/hagel-hormel-and-franklin/#comment-1079 Thu, 27 Dec 2012 09:07:26 +0000 https://sorrywatch.com/?p=716#comment-1079 Begging Mr. Hormel’s pardon, but he *did* get an apology. Assuming he’s a native speaker of English, he should be able to recognize that Hagel said “I apologize to Ambassador Hormel” and not “I have apologized”, he was using the present-simple verb tense, meaning “The apology? It’s the words I’m using RIGHT NOW.”

Maybe Hormel finds it insufficient or insufficiently private, but he’s wrong to state flatly that it didn’t happen.

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