Letterman Apologizes

Letterman re-addresses Palin: 'I had no idea [Willow] was there'

I am going to paste his entire commentary and apology, as I believe that it is relevant to what has happened in review of context.


“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)

The bottom line....I believe that David Letterman would have never apologized if he and CBS hadn't felt the heat on this for the past week. They have lost audience share and advertisers over this blunder. And the sad reality is? He is probably being honest in his most recent remarks as opposed to that BS apology he was floating the day after his remarks.

I suppose that on the night in question, that he just felt that he was being his usual comic smart ass and had no idea that Sarah Palin's 14 year old daughter Willow was at that ball game with her.

Personally, I believe that this apology would have had far more benefit and effect had it been tendered immediately. But it wasn't. Instead, Letterman felt that he would pursue a contrived path and continue to make jokes about the incident and play stupid. Obviously that didn't work.

What a difference a week makes. Never fear though, this won't have any lasting impression on Letterman's success. He will continue to have his regular audience of loyal leftist loons who will continue to swoon over his top ten lists and stupid pet tricks. But you can bet that from here on out, that he will vet anything that he plans to say about Sarah Palin and her family.