"I think that should end the matter entirely"

Vancouver Mayor Tim Leavitt and Councilor Jeanne Stewart have gone back and forth over Leavitt referring to her as “pandering” in an email.

Hopefully, what we here are now calling “Pandergate” has come to an end as of Monday. At the end of Monday’s city council meeting, Leavitt apologized.

“I want to express to you my apologies for a comment that I made — I guess it’s been about a week and a half ago or so — out of frustration about some other comments I heard made publicly about this council and the actions we took,” he said. “I responded and I used the word pandering. And, you know, it was probably not the best choice of words. Really, the Websters dictionary definition of pandering isn’t really up to speed with most people in today’s world understand that to mean.

“My use of that word was not the best choice of words. I want to apologize for that comment and express that to you all.”

Stewart: “Is that like an apology?”

Leavitt: “That is an apology for the use of that word, yes.

Stewart: “Since I think my name was attached to that, I graciously accept your apology.”

Councilor Jeanne Harris (referring to the fact that Leavitt did not specifically use Stewart’s name in his original email): “There wasn’t a name attached to that.”

Leavitt: “I didn’t specifically indicate who I was frustrated with. I think others assigned Ms. Stewart’s name to that comment.”

Stewart: “We’re going to get in deeper water if I ask if you meant me, and if it was put in a way people knew it meant me.”

Leavitt: “I suspect it was easy for people to figure out, who listen to talk radio, that I was referring to statements made by you, yes.”

There’s some talk in between with Harris questioning Stewart about just what she’d said on what talk radio show. Harris said she’d like a copy of the comments that Stewart made when she called in to the Victoria Taft show.

Finally, Leavitt said, “I’d like to thank Ms. Stewart for accepting my apology.”

“I think that should end the matter entirely,” she replied.

Conservative blogger Lew Waters put up the interaction on YouTube.