This was the same America whose mainstream press refused to republish the Danish cartoons in 2005. This is the same America whose president chose to deliver a historic speech in Cairo at the beginning of his presidency in order to mend fences with what he thought was a Muslim world aggrieved by American policies alone. 

It is the same America that "condemns efforts to offend believers of all religions", but where a Broadway show entitled The Book of Mormon derides the faith of the Republican presidential candidate with no detectable condemnation of, or consequence for, its authors. It is the same America where Mel Gibson's Passion of the Christ, which many Jews found deeply offensive and liable to stoke old anti-Jewish hatreds by reviving the accusation of Jews as Christ-killers, was shown across the country without any thought of censoring it.  

This America that rightfully and repeatedly defended the mockery of faiths in the name of its immortal freedoms now feels the need to apologise for an obscure movie nobody had ever heard of until September, just because an angry mob of bloodthirsty thugs uses it as a pretext for breaching diplomatic immunity and murdering diplomats.

Violence is what made them apologise — the bully always gets his way when he confronts the weak and the meek. But since when does violence weaken America's resolve to stand by its values?

Or is it that, as in Europe, America's leaders no longer have the moral strength to stand up to this type of bullying because they no longer know what is worth defending, and have forgotten that religious freedom and freedom of speech have no value if they are only there to protect mainstream beliefs and opinions?