Clemens' so-called answers aren't really answers at all

It all comes down to the tongue, the butt and the nanny.

I'm talking about the Roger Clemens Affair and who's the bigger liar, Clemens or Brian McNamee, when it comes to whether McNamee injected Clemens with human growth hormone and steroids.

Clemens and McNamee had their day in Congress Wednesday, hanging out with those fun guys and gals from the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, or something like that. What a committee with a stuffed-shirt name like that has to do with baseball, I don't know.

The committee was allegedly investigating the efficacy of the Mitchell Report on performance-enhancing drugs in the big leagues, but the hearing wasn't about that. No way. It was about whom we can believe, the Rocket or the Needle, about who seemed the more credible in this nasty business. As I say, much of it comes down to the tongue, the butt and the nanny.

The tongue in question is the Clemens tongue. As Clemens addressed the committee, his tongue seemed to have a life of its own -- it looked like a snake that had taken up residence in his mouth. While Clemens spoke, the pink tongue would dart here and there like a serpent contradicting everything Clemens said. The snake-tongue was the "No" to Clemens' spoken "Yes."

Did Clemens ever take banned substances?

"No," he said while the snake darted and danced and mocked him, and Clemens looked down to the left, avoiding eye contact with whoever was asking the questions.

Much of the time, Clemens hardly answered at all. McNamee, lowlife that he is, answered directly, forthrightly and in short, declarative sentences. In spite of yourself, you believed him because he was convincing.

Clemens was a whole other thing, Clemens with his two lawyers buzzing in his ear, telling him what to say and what not to say. If someone asked Clemens about HGH or how his testimony contradicted Andy Pettitte's -- I'll get back to that -- he talked around things, talked around the bush and behind the tree and under the train trestle. He gave long, tedious dissertations on how his dad died when he was a kid and how he never had a car in high school and how he did everything on his own and how he never took any shortcuts (except maybe the HGH shortcut) and how he's been accused of taking illegal drugs but he can't prove a negative (that he didn't do it). That not proving a negative was one of his big lines -- you could imagine him rehearsing it in the shower.

The Clemens butt figured large in the hearing. It seems McNamee gave Clemens an injection in the multimillion-dollar butt, which caused an abscess. Clemens swears it was Vitamin B-12. Why he needs B-12 is a mystery -- he said his mom told him always to get B-12. What a heartwarming story.

McNamee says ixnay on the B-12, says the injection was Winstrol, an anabolic steroid. Some medical evidence seems to indicate Winstrol, not vitamins, caused the abscess. If that is true, Clemens failed the butt test.

He failed other tests, like the Pettitte test. Pettitte, whom I don't know, is supposed to be an honest guy. Even Clemens said he is -- he said it Wednesday. Well, Pettitte has corroborated that McNamee gave him (Pettitte) illegal performance enhancers, as McNamee claims. Chuck Knoblauch also confirmed this about himself. You have to wonder why McNamee was on the level about Pettitte and Knoblauch but lied about Clemens.

In his deposition, Pettitte said Clemens told him that Clemens had used HGH. How did Clemens explain this in the hearing?

"I think Andy has misheard," he said.

How in the world do you mishear a bombshell like that? Is there another word that sounds like HGH -- coffee and cake? Pettitte misheard so much, he even told his wife about it. Rumors will get around.

And get this, McNamee injected Clemens' wife, Debbie, with HGH. Everyone agrees on this -- it's just that Clemens says he was out of town and didn't know McNamee injected Debbie in the bedroom. Is this another butt test?

Now we come to the nanny. Considerable discussion and testimony focused on a barbecue at Jose Canseco's house, which Clemens did or did not attend. Somehow his credibility hung on Canseco's party. I can't understand why anyone would attend a party at Canseco's house -- Canseco a known drug fiend and snitch.

I guess some people want to place Clemens with Canseco -- guilt by association. Clemens swears he wasn't there. Congress was trying to find the nanny who looked after his kids to say whether or not he was partying with Canseco. Funny thing, Clemens tracked her down after an absence of years, invited her to his house, where they had a private face-to-face. You don't have to be Oliver Wendell Holmes to think Clemens was trying to influence the nanny.

"It sure raises an appearance of impropriety," committee chair Henry Waxman said.

You think?

To which Clemens replied, "I was doing y'all a favor. I wanted to get her to you as fast as possible."

Really?

You may think all of this is unfair to poor Clemens -- Congress hauling him into D.C., making him put on a suit and grilling him for hours. Well, get this. The Oversight Committee didn't want this hearing. Clemens demanded it to clear his good name. What a laugh. If people doubt Clemens based on his verbal wanderings and his refusal to talk straight, it's his own fault because he asked for the hearing.

Elijah Cummings, a representative from Maryland, a convincing figure, said this to Clemens near the end.

"It's hard to believe you, sir. You're one of my heroes but it's hard to believe you."

It sure is.

So what happens next? The Justice Department could pursue criminal proceedings against Clemens or McNamee or both.

Give it a rest. It will be especially hard to make a strong legal case against Clemens and, frankly, the nation doesn't need any more of this. Both disgraceful men have been publicly disgraced. Let them quietly fade from view.

You can reach Staff Columnist Lowell Cohn at 521-5486 or lowell.cohn@pressdemocrat.com.