I don’t want to beat Daughtry up too bad over this debacle, because he seems like a fairly well-spoken nice guy, and his apology does appear to be a genuine from-the-heart mea culpa. If we savage every person who offers up a heartfelt apology for their actions, we may actually dissuade people from publicly apologizing at all. That being said, the thing he’s apologizing for was indeed a rather cringe-inducing affair.

If you weren’t following the saga, the former American Idol finalist performed on the Fox & Friends stage in honor of the 70th anniversary of D-Day. But when asked to sing a patriotic song with the Fox hosts directly afterwards, he declined, stating “I’m off the clock”:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlZcmGjBg6Y

Of course, our military men and women are NEVER “off the clock,” so singing one measly patriotic tune is the least Daughtry could have done on such an important day. My guess is the real reason he walked away had nothing to do with a lack of patriotism or anti-military bias at all, but rather, he was probably ashamed to admit that he simply doesn’t know the lyrics to our nation’s most well-known anthems. And that doesn’t make him anti-American so much as it just makes him a typical famous dummy.

But make up your own mind and sound off below. Twitchy has already put together a compilation of the angriest tweets. Do you accept Daughtry’s apology? Will you still listen to/purchase his music? Or are you like me and never listened to him in the first place? And most importantly, could he beat Clay Aiken in a Game of Arms?