UPDATE: Joy Behar apologizes to Christians on The View today.
It seems everyone gets a public apology when insulted these days. Unless it’s a Christian being insulted.
On the campaign trail, candidate Barak Obama insulted Christians in the Midwest when he stated, “They get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.”
In responding the firestorm, Obama fell short of an apology saying that he only used the “wrong words”, not that his sentiment was untrue.
Then in 2009, President Obama apologized for comparing his bad bowling to “the Special Olympics.” He could not have made the insult in a more public space. It was on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno.
Of course, there’s the time Biden made fun of Indians working at 7-11. And, who can forget the time the democrat insulted African-Americans when he said in 2007 that then presidential candidate Barak Obama was “the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean…”
In 2014 former Vice President Al Gore was forced to apologize after using an anti-Jewish slur when talking about individuals who make bad loans.
Each of those incidents required public apologies. So, why no public apology from Joy Behar after she insulted Vice President Mike Pence and millions of Americans who identify as Christian? After all, the show she hosts is under the official arm of ABC News–news gathering force of one of the three largest news organizations in the United States.
Pence told Fox News’ Sean Hannity this week that Behar called him to apologize for mocking his Christian faith — and he urged her to apologize to “tens of millions of Americans who were equally offended” during the conversation.
Behar has a long history of spewing “anti-Christian bigotry” after she said that communicating with Jesus is a “mental illness” during a Feb. 13 episode of “The View.”
“I give Joy Behar a lot of credit. She picked up the phone. She called me. She was very sincere, and she apologized and one of the things my faith teaches me is grace; forgive as you’ve been forgiven,” Pence said.
While Pence forgave Behar, he encouraged her to publically apologize.
“I’m still encouraging her, to use the forum of that program or some other public forum, to apologize to tens of millions of Americans who were equally offended,” Pence said.
“You and I know that criticism comes with public life,” Pence added. “But, I felt it was important that I defend the faith of tens of millions of Americans against that kind of slander.”
By Dwight Widaman, Editor
The vice president concluded his answer by saying that he hoped Behar “and others on the airwaves will come to appreciate the meaning and, if I could say it, the joy that comes from faith and respect that.”
Behar’s call to Pence was secret until Disney CEO Bob Iger was asked about the controversy during last week’s meeting with investors.
“What do you say to the tens of millions of Christians, and President Trump supporters, that your networks have so blatantly offended and ascribed hateful labels?” shareholder Justin Danhof asked Iger directly at last week’s meeting. “Specifically, do you think, like Mrs. Hostin and Mrs. Behar, that the Christian faith is akin to a dangerous mental illness?”
Iger responded by saying, “I don’t know where I start. First of all, Joy Behar apologized to Vice President Pence directly. She made a call to him and apologized, which I thought was absolutely appropriate.”
Media Research Council President Brent Bozell issued a statement declaring that Behar’s private apology was “not nearly enough” and promised to continue his campaign against “anti-Christian bigotry” at the network. Bozell’s watchdog group is presently running a campaign on behalf of aggrieved Christians, urging that viewers contact “View” advertisers about Behar’s “hateful, anti-Christian remarks.”
Despite the calls for a public apology “ABC is doing absolutely nothing about this,” an ABC source recently told disclosed.
