is kind of drab. But yesterday he put up lights along his doorframe and now in the night it looks bright and cheery and festive.

And I was thinking: why can't we have all these holidays all year round? People should always give each other gifts and have trees in their houses and string pretty lights indoors and out. You should aways be able to put on a silly costume and then go knock on the doors of strangers and ask them for candy. People should always give each other flowers and chocolates and tell 'em they love 'em. Always there should be colored eggs hidden round the house and the yard for children to find. It should aways be acceptable to give thanks and eat mass quantities of turkey and lie on the couch and bloat. And, in keeping with gulfgal's story, and the Jewish tradition, people should always apologize without reservation and without the expectation of forgiveness.

important than many realize it is. Great OT. Thank you.

I had my run-ins and inner musings about apologies, not only personal ones, from one person to the next, but also about the public apologies from one country to the world over amorality in past political actions like genocide, unjustified wars etc. You know, something many Germans may have struggled with, at least in the past and in my generation.

Because, after all, an apology doesn't bring the dead back to life and the responsibility can't be mitigated, the blame not put on others most of the time, so how can those apologies be important or serious or meaningful, if they are given many years after the murder and destruction happened, years after the enslavement or exploitation of ethnic groups still cause and incite the inequality and injustice today.

Doesn't it seem to be impossible to apologize for something like that and isn't it even more like an offending effort leaning towards the ridiculous, if you, several generations after your ancestors had committed these crimes, ask for forgiveness? How can you ask for forgiveness for something you personally, or even as a citizen of a country, haven't done, as it happened decades and centuries ago?

You can do that, but what does it really do to help? The most it can do is for those who are the descendants of the victims to know that, ok, yeah, I understand that YOU today know that what your ancestors did, was dead wrong. Checked. Accepted (may be with eyes rolling upwards). End of story. Better so say something than nothing. An attempt to make a gesture. Fine. No problem, but also, you know, not really meaning much. Right?

That is something that has followed me around for a long time in life. Mostly I found apologies by politicians either fake, ineffective or a method to mitigate responsibilities.
Rarely an apology touched me as coming "from the heart" or "sincere". I remember the only apology I found somehow convincing, when I was still young and in Germany, was one without words. It was this one: Warschauer Kniefall.

All I remember, I was 22 years old at that time, is that his apology's "body language" was accepted almost world-wide. I remember having been amazed for him to be able to convincingly apologize. Though Brandt was as much loved by one side of the German population, as he was hated by the other (division went clearly according to ideology, the CDU/CSU who couldn't stand him, the Socialists and Social Democrats and much of the civilian population especially in Berlin, loved him), I never understood those, who tried to put him down.

As much as that apology convinced me, the other one, I remember, one which Sen. Jim Inhofe gave in a speech he had given on a trip to Africa (I remember that vividly, though have never found the video again), in which he apologized for slavery, didn't convince me at all. Contrary, I found it hypocritical and an almost insulting offence on honesty. But apparently that's just my own sensitivities on that subject.

I was also a bit overwhelmed once in the past, when I read an apology diary of OPOL, he had written to the black community on dailykos and its readers:
To my brothers and sisters of color, which he wrote as a consequence for the reactions his diary he wrote a couple of days before:
You don't have the standing to invent a 'race problem' for Bernie

I believe that the current version of this apology diary is not anymore the original one I read back when it was first published. I remember a much longer and way more humble, if not submissive apology diary. I remember that I had the feeling that it was over the top and that he shouldn't have needed to formulate his apology in the manner he did. I really like OPOL's spirit and way to express himself artistically and verbally. I wouldn't want to miss his voice over there at all. The version of the diary you can read now is not anymore what I had read, much shorter and in its content and expression rising up to the objective goal of apologizing proportionally to what he considered necessary to apologize for. But then I also questioned myself, because I am not a "Child of the US and the South" and what do I really know about the necessities to apologize to the Afro-American community in this country. Nothing. So, you see, I kind of struggle with the whole thingy.

I ran also into an incident I insulted some kossacks, one in particular, with an expression I wouldn't have expected to be taken literally or as a severe insult and certainly not personally by someone, who I didn't know could rightfully have felt to be a target.

I apologized several times, but it was not accepted.

It was then that I became aware of the importance to ask for forgiveness. I don't think I said that literally, I don't remember. But I think in relation to that part of apologizing, the step to ask for forgiveness for something you said or did, you must be convinced that what you did was intentionally malicious and very damaging. Often you can be insulting or hurtful unintentionally and then I wonder, while it is very appropriate to apologize for what you recognize was insulting, if it is possible to ask for forgiveness in addition for something that was not malicious in its intent.

Oh, lord, now I apologize for all my "over the top" comments, which often are rude and insulting. Should I ask for forgiveness? For speaking my mind? My way?

It's kinda tough to do and sometimes it feels to me as if one would have to deny one's own convictions. That also can feel like being untrue to yourself or being too easily pressured and muzzled.

Ah, so many problems, so few solutions....

Have all a wonderful rest of the day. I try not to insult anyone today. Promised.

distinguish, even in your own transgressions, between an apology and a rationalization of behavior and thought which is not forgivable. We watched last week the movie Philomena. One of the themes it explored was forgiving. Philomena forgave the unforgivable evil that she suffered under the institution of the Irish Catholic church. Martin Sexsmith who was the other character in the movie could not forgive what the nuns had done to her and her son, in the name of Christ. When social institutions like religions or the state commit horrifying crimes against humanity and then 'apologize' in a non apology that is just a justification of their inhumanity or a 'mistake' they are apologist's and do not seek forgiveness but instead they are rationalizing , normalizing the evils committed.

When Obama is going to implement unspeakable nastiness he always says 'I do not make this decision lightly.' A preemptive apology? Hard to forgive an institution that claims divine or political power and cloaks it's evils as 'inevitable', necessary and righteous. I don't care about apologies offered by the official's of societal institutions that claim to be doing 'god's work'. It's an ugly spectacle to see the tears flow from the likes of Boner or some nasty clerical who leads a flock of believers. Some transgressions do not merit forgiveness which is then turned into acceptance. I can feel compassion for say George Bush as he's damaged but I cannot accept an apology as it seems to mean that the transgression was separate from the larger evil being implemented by those who abuse their power.

Accepting a sincere apology requires forgiveness and compassion within your self as well as the transgressor. As my granddaughter used to say 'We're all only human'. Sorry to wax on here but this is complicated sticky subject.....Fault and blame are also emotional factors that get involved in the human interaction of forgiving and apologizing.

has grown a beard.

That is why Ryan spoke so strongly against The Hairball's plan to prevent any Mooslem from coming into his country. Because Ryan is now a secret Mooslem himself.