Penn State Girl Out of Love With Paterno: Margaret Carlson

[seafan]

Margaret Carlson writes at Bloomberg:


November 16, 2011, 3:25 PM EST

.....

I’m a Penn State graduate, one who worshiped at the church of Joe Paterno, the plainspoken Warren Buffett of the Nittany Valley. Despite making, bringing in and giving away millions over his 46 seasons as head football coach, including financing a new library and chapel on campus, Paterno has always lived as a modest man. His home is a 1950s ranch that’s never seen a granite counter or stainless-steel appliance. Paterno famously taught his players values, along with football. No one danced in the end zone or spiked the ball, and almost everyone graduated.

I find it hard to believe that Paterno, bolstered by his own authority and legend, stood by as one child after another became a victim. It’s as if he’d never heard the cliche that for evil to triumph, good men need only do nothing. Sandusky, who has been charged with 40 counts of sexually abusing children, says he is innocent. Yet reading the grand jury’s report is like watching a movie where you shout at the screen “Call the police!” No one does, and catastrophe ensues.

.....

The next morning, McQueary described what he had witnessed to Paterno, who waited until the following day before relaying the allegations to Athletic Director Tim Curley. No one appeared to be in a hurry. A couple weeks went by before Sandusky’s keys to the facility were taken away and the incident was reported to Sandusky’s charity. Along the way, McQueary’s description of “anal sex” seems to have mutated into something like “horsing around” in the minds of Curley and another administrator, former senior vice president Gary Schultz, both of whom say they are not guilty of charges that they covered up the allegations against Sandusky.

.....

Via the NY Daily News:

November 15, 2011


From the interview that stunned observers.

BOB COSTAS:

18:58:59:00: "But you're a man who by his own admission has showered with young boys, highly inappropriate. Who has continually put himself in the presence of young boys, volunteer high school coach, volunteer at a small local college, even after -- you were largely disassociated from Penn State. Multiple reports of you getting into bed with young boys who stayed at your house in a room in the basement. How do you account for these things? And if you're not a pedophile, then what are you?"

JERRY SANDUSKY:

18:59:30:00: "Well I'm a person that has taken a strong interest. I'm a very passionate person in terms of trying to make a difference in the lives of some young people. I worked very hard to try to connect with them. To make them feel good about themselves. To -- be something significant in their lives. Maybe this gets misinterpreted, has gotten depending on -- I know a lot of young people where it hasn't. I have worked with many, many young people where there has been no misinterpretation of my actions and I have made a very significant difference in their lives."

BOB COSTAS:

19:00:28:00: "But isn't what you're just describing the classic MO of many pedophiles? And that is that they gain the trust of young people, they don't necessarily abuse every young person. There were hundreds, if not thousands of young boys you came into contact with, but there are allegations that at least eight of them were victimized. Many people believe there are more to come. So it's entirely possible that you could've helped young boy A in some way that was not objectionable while horribly taking advantage of young boy B, C, D, and E. Isn't that possible?"

JERRY SANDUSKY:

19:01:01:00: "Well -- you might think that. I don't know. (LAUGHS) In terms of -- my relationship with so many, many young people. I would-- I would guess that there are many young people who would come forward. Many more young people who would come forward and say that my methods and-- and what I had done for them made a very positive impact on their life. And I didn't go around seeking out every young person for sexual needs that I've helped. There are many that I didn't have-- I hardly had any contact with who I have helped in many, many ways."

.....

(emphasis added)



Today, we hear that Penn State is attempting to claim immunity from this moral failure.



Carlson notes:

In 1999, Sandusky retired from Penn State with an emeritus status that enabled him to continue using campus facilities, including the football locker room, which made it easy to attract star-struck youngsters. Paterno stayed on the honorary board of Sandusky’s charity. ..... It all stayed in the family, the religion of football mimicking that of the Catholic Church. Paterno, Curley, Schultz and McQueary all had powerful reasons to believe that a sexual predator was running a charity for kids. The moral poison didn’t stop there. Last week Penn State students rampaged through the streets, incensed that the coach had been let go. They were seemingly unmoved by those who had been hurt, concerned only for those whose power had been taken away.

.....

When it came down to either protecting this university's lucrative and venerated sports program or protecting young children, we see clearly that cruel, soulless power dominated.


Our country is very, very sick.

[TheWraith]

1. This is what drives me absolutely fucking nuts...

When someone takes a single outrage and extrapolates it to everyone, or the entire country, as a means of scoring moral superiority points.

"Our country is very, very sick."

Excuse me, but FUCK THAT. I didn't have anything to do with covering up child molestation. Neither did my friend from LA, or some random person in Florida, or 99.9999% of the other people in the United States of America. The sick people are Sandusky, the administrators of Penn State, and the others who knew and took no action, a group possibly ranging from his wife to the local police. This isn't some nebulous collective ill; there is a very specific group of responsible people here, and turning this into some kind of "Oh, America is sick" nonsense only provides an excuse to spread out and diffuse the blame.

[truedelphi]

2. There is a some sense in what you say, as

Most people spend every day of their lives doing the right thing, and weren't part of this mess.

However people who work in the Family Court's system, which in so many counties aids and abets the richer half of a couple, whenever a custody battles is being waged, see the same sickness in the courts as well.

If the daddy is rich enough, the mother is ignored, even if the man is a pedophile.

One woman in Marin County went to jail for years on account of the fact that she was forced to kidnap her daughter away from the sadist the court decreed the child must live with.

And only after that monster killed his next domestic partner, did the court acknowledge its blunder. This is not an isolated incident, but something that goes on in County after County from California to Maine and down to Florida.

Follow the money. It ends up being about money. The people in the Penn State matter brought roughly some 52 millions of dollars into the Penn State school system every year. They were untouchable.

[TheWraith]

4. A system not being perfect and mistakes being made is not the same as "the entire country is sick!"

And you don't have to bring in money for the system to be flawed, either, since plenty of decisions get made for asinine reasons unrelated to cash. That's the nature of having a system run by humans; but it's also a far cry from blaming the whole entire United States for covering up child rape that 310 million people had nothing to do with.

[AlinPA]

8. Agree with you 100%. Here's another one that showed up in my W. PA paper today:

http://www.al.com/newsflash/index.ssf/story/bc-fbc-paul-newberry-111611-fbc/cbe578447ec047dc90d70868ec148f70

[JVS]

11. +1 Such people are exploiting molested kids.

[noiretextatique]

3. "And I didn't go around seeking out every young person for sexual needs that I've helped"

:wow: unfngbelievable.

[alcibiades_mystery]

5. TOTAL BULLSHIT: "Today, we hear that Penn State is attempting to claim immunity"

The news article says no such thing. Show even one sentence from that news article that states that anybody at Penn State "is attempting to claim immunity." It is speculative drivel of the worst sort. The entire "news" article is nothing but the reporter's speculation of what might happen.

Stop spreading distortions and lies.

[Angry Dragon]

7. It has been reported in other papers ..... do a google , i did

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2011/11/16/bloomberg_articlesLURFYN6K50Z3.DTL

[alcibiades_mystery]

10. That article says the exact same thing: a reporter's speculation

Show me where in that article it says that PSU officials are actively pursuing this route.

Here's a clue: it doesn't say that AT ALL. And if it doesn't say that at all, your claim that "PSU is attempting" is, just as I said, TOTAL BULLSHIT.

Try again.

[Angry Dragon]

6. If the football program suffers or Penn State suffers it will be because

they tried to cover it up and not because there was a pedophile

[MADem]

9. Our country is very, very appalled It's only a few dickheads at Penn State that are very,very sick.

I don't see too many people saying "Oh, pshaw, let's just sweep this under the rug" now that it's out there. People are disgusted.

A few oddballs who put football and money-money-money and MORE money ahead of child safety are at the heart of this. This was all about protecting a franchise, greed, self-aggrandizement, and a feeling that an elite few were above the law. Some of the students and alumni bought the bullshit, but some didn't, and from the outside looking in, the bulk of the nation is saying "Those people are complete and total assholes who should be held accountable to the fullest extent that the law allows--and then some, for good measure."

[seafan]

12. Attorney: "There's a great deal of fury and confusion." (as Sandusky is free on unsecured bail)

And we can thank a compromised judge for that.

As of tonight, she has been removed from this case.



SF Chronicle:


November 16, 2011

.....

Berks County lawyer Jay Abramowitch, who has represented about 150 child sex victims, many of them in clergy abuse cases, said he is following the Penn State case closely. He declined to say if he was representing anyone accusing Sandusky of abuse.

"The real significance of what happened in the Sandusky situation is that people are beginning to understand the cover-up that goes on in any structural organization that employs a pedophile," he said. "And that's why these pedophiles are running wild."

"What's the answer? One of the answers is to allow these victims the right to go to court and file suit against not only the pedophile but the group that employed them ... and didn't do anything," Abramowitch said.

Abramowitch long fought to get around the legal time limit for victims to sue the Roman Catholic Church for decades-old abuse. In 2005, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court rejected his argument that the suits should go through on grounds the church had concealed the abuse.

.....

Keep up the fight, Mr. Abramowitch. We are in new territory now.