Laura Ingraham, a host of one of the many highly opinionated right wing shows over at Fox “News”, got into it with Parkland survivor David Hogg. She took a dig at him via twitter, writing:
David Hogg Rejected By Four Colleges To Which He Applied and whines about it
This… did not go well for her.
Over at cnn.com, Tom Kludt writes about the after effects of this ill-advised twitter statement:
Laura Ingraham apologizes for mocking David Hogg
What happened, in a nutshell, is that the Parkland students, including Mr. Hogg, hit back at Ingraham.
Hard.
It started with some of them shaming her but then moved on to pointing out her advertisers.
And her advertisers took note and, at least in a couple of cases, decided Ms. Ingraham had crossed the proverbial bridge too far.
So, facing a possible flight of advertisers (and, thus, revenue to her program), Ms. Ingraham offered this apology via twitter:
On reflection, in the spirit of Holy Week, I apologize for any upset or hurt my tweet caused him or any of the brave victims of Parkland. For the record, I believe my show was the first to feature David immediately after that horrific shooting and even noted how ‘poised’ he was given the tragedy. As always he’s welcome to return to the show anytime for a productive discussion.
Ho boy.
Look, I guess she’s trying to show genuine contrition, but for crying out loud, why start with this “in the spirit of Holy Week” crap?!
She is, rightfully IMHO, getting raked over the coals for this opening line. Some have wondered if she is somehow implying that had it not been Holy Week, then the remarks made would be perfectly acceptable?!
Of course not.
However, if you remove those six words from the rest of her apology, even someone as turned off by the likes of Ms. Ingraham and her type of opinion hit pieces will recognize it is a refreshingly direct apology (no “if my words offended anyone” type garbage).
At least an attempt was made to offer a genuine apology, flawed as it was in its opening.