PALMEIRO CAN'T TALK HIS WAY INTO HALL OF FAME NOW.

Byline: STEVE DILBECK

Can you see the index finger?

Pointed right at our congressmen. Part exclamation point, part defiance.

Can you see the steely-eyed gaze?

Like he was trying to burn a hole right through them. Bold, strong, challenging.

Rafael Palmeiro sat at that table last spring and directly told the congressional committee:

``Let me start by telling you this: I have never used steroids - period. I don't know how to say it any more clearly than that. Never.''

And it was all a sham, flimsy as wet tissue, just so much puffed up conviction.

Of all the players who sat there March 17, it was Palmeiro who spoke with the most assurance, who gave a declaration in denial.

Maybe we were so captivated by his hand with the pointed index finger we failed to notice his other hand had fingers crossed.

Apparently, what he really meant to say way: ``I have never intentionally used steroids. Never. Ever. Period.''

That was his statement Monday when Major League Baseball announced Palmeiro had tested positive for steroids and would be banned an entire 10 days.

Although not much of a suspension, it will be enough to tarnish Palmeiro's career forever and keep him out of the Hall of Fame.

An amazingly consistent, remarkable career just ruined - by his account - by mysterious forces that somehow floated steroids unknowingly into his system.

``I am sure you will ask how I tested positive for a banned substance,'' Palmeiro said in his statement.

``As I look back, I don't have a specific answer to give. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to explain to the arbitrator how the banned substance entered my body.''

Maybe he was kidnapped by aliens and kept in an unconscious state while the evil juice was dastardly pumped into his body.

Palmeiro's sad explanation almost elevates Barry ``Puffy'' Bonds' lame flaxseed oil excuse into simple idiocy.

That would be the Bonds who testified he was unaware that his personal trainer, who recently pleaded guilty to his steroid involvement, was actually giving him steroid cream.

The same Bonds who is recovering from the world's most inexplicable knee injury while still using the same personal trainer.

The only thing that even remotely makes Palmeiro's quasi-explanation the slightest bit believable is a single thought - that nobody alive could be that stupid.

That apparently works for our fearless leader. No, not commissioner Bud Selig, but President Bush.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan, proving that one truly is born every minute, said President Bush considers Palmeiro ``a friend, and he believes him'' when he says he never intentionally took steroids.

Hey, it's good to have friends in high places, especially when you could be brought up on perjury charges for lying to a congressional committee.

Knowing stronger testing was in place this season, knowing better than most that steroids were being monitored more closely than at any time in baseball history, Palmeiro has to be either a moron, addicted or very desperate to continue taking the steroids.

He did get off to a slow start this season, but, oddly, even Jose Canseco - who identified Palmeiro, along with Mark McGwire and others, in his tell-tale steroids book - finds it difficult to believe Palmeiro's continued illegal performance-enhancing usage.

``I definitely do not believe that Rafael is using steroids right now. In the past he has, but not right now,'' Canseco told a radio show.

This from a man who said he used to inject Palmeiro in the buttocks with steroids while they were teammates with the Rangers, then owned by Bush.

However pitiful McGwire's testimony was to Congress, when he simply refused to answer questions of his steroid use, at least he didn't flat out lie.

He might have looked ashamed and embarrassed and beaten, but he didn't try to act defiant.

Maybe Palmeiro would have been better served by refusing to discuss his past, or, like Sammy Sosa, suddenly forgetting how to speak English.

Palmeiro becomes the first superstar, really the first player most have ever heard of, to be suspended for steroids.

Just two weeks after he became only the fourth player to reach 3,000 hits and 500 home runs in a career - joining Willie Mays, Hank Aaron and Eddie Murray - his legacy is shot.

Not that Palmeiro appears to understand any of this. Monday in his conference call, he somehow managed to both deny and apologize for steroid use at the same time.

Managed to deny and ask for forgiveness in the same breath.

Palmeiro must believe the general public is astonishingly even dumber than him.

Most will see how transparent his blubbering is, some won't care one way or another, and a precious few will believe his I-just-don't-know-how-it-could-have-happened denial.

Palmeiro has stained not only his career, but the entire effort to eliminate steroids from sports.

Three weeks ago, Palmeiro took part in a roundtable discussion via a conference call with Government Reform Committee chairman Tom Davis, R-Va., and representatives of the NBA, NFL, NHL and MLB.

Palmeiro was supposed to be communicating the dangers of steroids to children and other players.

And it was just more hollow words, more posturing, more lying.

No doubt he did it with great conviction. If you closed your eyes, you could almost see his finger pointing, just not at himself.