Political Apologies Mean Nothing to Me

The Associated Press has a short recap of some memorable recent apologies: A Look at Political Apologies. The list includes President Richard Nixon (Watergate), Senator Edward Kennedy (Mary Jo Kopechne), President Ronald Reagan (Iran-Contra), President George H.W. Bush ("Read my lips"), President Bill Clinton (the Lewinsky affair), Senator Trent Lott (the Thurmond incident), and ex-White House counterterrorism adviser Richard Clarke ("the government failed you" on 9/11).

It is nice to hear politicians going public and admit wrongdoing. It's nice to know that they will occasionally leave their offices and fund raising parties and attempt some level of humility. However, most apologies are made after dead obvious errors. They never apologize for the odious laws they foist upon us each year.

As far as I'm aware, no major politicians involved in the following have apologized for the following:

• Taxes, especially the federal income tax
  
• Public education
  
• Social Security and other welfare programs
  
• The massive expansion of the economic regulatory monster
  
• Gun control
  
• The draft
  
• Imminent domain

Those are just the big ones that come to mind at the moment. I'm open to read evidence that shows our representatives felt sorry about slowly taking over our lives and replacing our individual responsibility with collective control. I'm even more open to see our "leaders" actively try to roll back laws and rules they helped enact after understanding the damage they helped cause.

But I'm not holding my breath.

Posted by Drizzten at May 05, 2004 04:43 PM