I think it was National Review that did a column today I posted entitled "Cowboy Come Back", that begged for W to show a set.
Durbin should have said something like "I don't know what I was thinking! I must've been smokin' crack, or drunker than my esteemed red-nosed/purple-faced colleague from Hyannis Port when I said that stuff!"
Jane Fonda, when promoting her new book, was confronted with her "Hanoi Jane" legacy. She did not apologize for what she did, but she regretted the effect it had on some people. All she had to do was say "I am soooo sorry. I was young and stupid when i did that, and if no one ever forgives me, I understand, because what I did was, frankly, unforgivable."
The other area of apogies that bugs me is when people apologize for some comment that is taken as "un-PC" but the thought police (like when a governor said "the natives are restless", or someone says "niggardly"). In those cases, I'd like to see someone show some cojones and say "I don't apologize for anything! You all knew what I meant, and if you didn't you're too stoopid to bother wasting an apology on!"