“Hypocrisy is the tribute that vice gives to virtue.” That’s an aphorism that has fallen into desuetude, along with the word “desuetude.” The saying was still in use in the mid-twentieth century but became virtually meaningless in popular culture after the sixties. That was when the moral imperatives now popular came into fashion: “Stand up for what you believe in” and “Be true to your values.” Instead of being encouraged to be virtuous, the public was told to exhibit for the world whatever their beliefs happened to be -- hedonistic, nihilistic, Marxist, Christian, et cetera.

Simultaneous with this dubious moral revisionism, hypocrisy was promoted to number one on the scale of bad things, standing as it does in direct opposition to the aforementioned imperatives. A hypocrite doesn’t outwardly embrace what he or she really believes. This reevaluation of values enables some airheads on Gutfeld to “respect” Nancy Pelosi’s angry “shut up” moment directed at a young reporter who pestered the former House speaker about her failure to deploy the National Guard at the Capitol on January 6th. At last, the panelists mused, Pelosi was being “authentic” since revealing her inner power-hungry vitriol deserves more praise than the patently absurd St. Francis of Assisi patina she embraces in her Congress-departing video. But if Nancy in a moment of pique deserves “respect” for revealing what’s behind........

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