You head up PR at Turner Broadcasting, a job you love, in part, because--unlike your friends who work for politicians, oil companies, or spinach producers--you're rarely, if ever, responsible for writing public apologies.

Unfortunately, an ad campaign that was approved by the network has gone horribly, terribly wrong in one of the 10 major cities in which that campaign was used. On Wednesday, January 31, the whole city of Boston was shut down as police and bomb squad units moved about the city blowing up your seemingly harmless Lite Brite Moonites, an advertisement for the Cartoon Network's underground hit, Aqua Teen Hunger Force.

Now the city has egg on its face, and they're looking for someone to blame for their too-hasty attacks on what was, essentially, a child's toy. They want apologies, they need to make the situation appear just as serious as their reaction to it was: they want Turner Broadcasting to pay. Your bosses have cried "uncle" and given the city $2 million to cover costs, but a formal apology--one that paints the network in a more favorable light--is in order.

You have been asked to use your considerable rhetorical skills to write the apology that will appear on newscasts and in local newspapers around the Boston area and, undoubtedly, around the world.

What should you think about?

What should you say?

How should you frame your apology so that it is sincere and so that it avoids any appearance of intentional wrongdoing?

How do you re-build your company's ethos with the adults who mistook these toys for bombs?

Here's how Turner Broadcasting responded.

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