Dum Pendebat Filius

Via Pandagon, this is possibly the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen R. Emmett Tyrell write:

[Rafael] Palmeiro flunked a drug test sometime in recent months, though he continued to thrill his Baltimore Orioles fans before his positive test for steroids was made public. On July 15, fans and teammates celebrated his 3,000th hit with gaudy fanfare. Major League Baseball took out newspaper ads congratulating him, though it is reported that league officials were aware he had tested positive for steroids. Palmeiro graciously accepted all the laudations. How could he do this while knowing that officials were wise to him?

In the 1990s, we called this “compartmentalizing.” It was approved by journalists and public figures alike. President Bill Clinton executed his presidential tasks exuberantly day in and day out while retaining subpoenaed documents from prosecutors, coaching witnesses to deceive and lying brazenly to his staff and the public. He compartmentalized, and to this day, there are public figures who admire his sang-froid. They would agree with John Harris’ assessment of him in Harris’ recent encomium, “The Survivor,” as being one of “the two most important political figures of their generation” — the other being, who else, Hillary.

… Palmeiro is one of Clinton’s finest students.

That’s right, readers: Bill Clinton is responsible for Rafael Palmeiro’s positive steroid-test result. The intrepid Tyrell believes that Bill Clinton paved the way for public figures to lie ‘n’ cheat and get away with it. From now on, any public figure who tells a fib can be assumed to be just another “student” of Clinton.

Tyrell seems to think that journalists “approved” of Clinton’s penchant for “compartmentalizing,” which is particularly disingenuous. What newspapers was Tyrell reading? What TV news shows was he watching? I seem to remember things a little differently than Tyrell does.

What other mishaps and dastardly deeds can we lie at the feet of Evil Clinton and the Culture of Permissiveness, Moral Relativity, and Compartmentalization that bastard ushered in, readers? Is there no end to the damage wrought by eight years under the leadership of that bad, bad man?