Caroline Overington and The Australian try to put the past behind them:

The apology, published in today’s Australian, states: “On Saturday morning, November 24, 2007, Caroline Overington had an encounter with the Labor candidate for Wentworth, Mr George Newhouse, in circumstances that she sincerely regrets. She hopes that she and Mr Newhouse can put this incident behind them and she wishes him all the best. The Australian regrets any embarrassment Mr Newhouse has endured and also wishes him well.”

Formal and public apologies can make for an interesting exercise in semantics, as our beloved former PM can attest. In this case, Ms Overington regrets the “circumstances” in which the “encounter” occurred - both words that relate to the situation and the nature of the interaction, rather than having anything to do with her own individual behaviour. And both Overington and the GG “regret” rather than apologise for the events.

It’s an apology from Overington without indicating any ownership of her own behaviour, and without any admission that the event occurred as it had been reported by those present (who weren’t Ms Overington). The language tends toward the “past exonerative” - a culpa without the mea.

It’s a shame to see the journalist who did such great work in uncovering the wrongdoing associated with the AWB’s oil-for-food kickbacks reduced to this type of dissembling to escape her own personal scandal.