Slavery, Hillary and Foot-Stamping

Anyway who's ever raised kids knows the power of the apology. Millions of hours of parental wrangling are spent coaxing the talismanic "I'm sorry" out of children with dug-in heels and dug-in minds. So it's no surprise that when Americans grow up, we continue to hold the apology in a absurdly high esteem. It's a form of permission for us to give into our cultural urges.

Smart politicians and businesspeople have learned how to manipulate American opinion with a well-timed and appropriately contrite apology. We just saw David Neeleman of JetBlue give us a whopper. Bill Clinton was a master at it; as a child growing up in an alcoholic family he learned the classic strategy: focusing blame on himself created the illusion of functionality at home. It was all his fault, not the abuser's.

As a move-on people not generally inclined to hold ancient grudges, we welcome the apology as a slate-cleanser. We want someone to offer one up, and -- even as we recognize that the apologizer is likely to be making the gesture to get off the hook -- we accept it because a) there is a degree of public abasement involved, and b) we want to be cut the same slack when we need
to use the apology chit.

One example, though, where the apology has taken on mythic proportions is slavery. Stunningly, it is more than 100 years after the Civil War and it was only last week that we have seen the first apology for slavery, coming from the Commonwealth of Virgina. That kind of "symbolic sorry" is an element of a vastly different syntax of guilt than a personal apology from someone has done something apology-worthy themselves. Given that those involved in the original sin are long dead, and that their descendants have had to struggle with resolving the consequences of that immorality without the benefit of an apology, this belated mea culpa is more a political and moral artifact than any meaningful expression of regret.

Even so, Virginia has done something that Hillary Clinton refuses to do. Many appear to be fascinated by the fact that her refusal to apologize for her vote authorizing the war has taken on a political life of its own. I think the answer for the issue's persistance is clear, and goes well-beyond the explanation that her delicate dance of wordsmithing is reminiscent of her husband's classic parsing of the definition of "is"; the very essence of the adjective "Clintonian."

Senator Clinton's stance triggers the imprint of a petulant child stamping her feet and saying no, no no, I did nothing wrong, I am not sorry and I will not apologize. A child who would rather exhaust a parent with stubbornly well-defended explanations of her behavior, rather than submit to the emotional recognition -- or even the tactical prudence -- of simply uttering those two little words.

That could be a fatal political and personal flaw. Someone who is too prideful and inflexible to admit wrong-doing, even for purely political purposes, makes us really nervous. Love may mean never having to say you're sorry, but being a leader that people can love often demands it.