On Tuesday, Hank Williams, Jr. apologized for his comments about President Obama. The apology was posted on the Bocephus blog, one entry after Hank expressed a little defiance in response to the reaction to his suggestion that Obama golfing with House Speaker John Boehner was akin to Hitler golfing with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Now there’s a new entry on Hank’s website, with this title: “Was Hank Williams Inappropriate? Whoopi Doesn’t Think So.” And then pasted under the video of the discussion was this sentence: “The ladies of The View discuss the statement Hank Williams made comparing the President Obama to Hitler.”
So much for any argument that Hank wasn’t actually comparing Obama to Hitler.
(Of course, Hank’s website makes no reference to his own son’s comments on the matter. Hank III told TMZ that musicians are “not worthy” to engage in political discourse.)
Setting aside the political aspect of this situation (which may be difficult to do but we’ll do it anyway), the placement of an apology between two messages that suggest Hank isn’t really sorry makes the apology seem perfunctory and disingenuous. At a time when ESPN is still figuring out what to do about Hank and his trademark launch to Monday Night Football, Hank is doing himself no favors with the mixed signals he’s sending.
