Saturday, January 28, 2006; A20

OPRAH WINFREY for president? Well, maybe not. But it's tempting to consider a draft-Oprah movement after she demonstrated a talent so missing here in the capital city: the ability and willingness to admit error and apologize. We don't propose here to go through the details of the saga of the partly fictitious "memoir," "A Million Little Pieces" -- either you're familiar with those details by now, or you're never going to care -- but rather to salute Ms. Winfrey for her actions on Thursday. Two weeks ago she had suggested, disturbingly, that it didn't much matter whether the book was true or not. This week on television she said she had "made a mistake" and was "deeply sorry." She added: "To everyone who has challenged me on this issue of truth, you are absolutely right."

Maybe that doesn't sound like it was hard to say. But we who live in the land of shifting rationales and weak excuses, of "I take full responsibility for what my subordinates did" and of "If I offended anyone who misinterpreted my remarks, I'm sorry" -- we know better. A little Winfrey candor would go a long way.