I know I’ll have to find words a little less glib than Romney’s: “As to pranks that were played back then, I don't remember them all but again, high school days -- if I did stupid things I'm afraid I gotta say sorry for it,” he said in one interview last week. In another, “If anybody was hurt by that or offended by that, I apologize.”
If?
No.
An apology may not contain the word “if,” particularly in a case where the word implies that the victim was overreacting to ordinary hijinks and the pain was due to a misunderstanding.
