PENN STATE TO STATE PEN

It is common knowledge that in Texas football is king! According to TV legal analyst Star Jones, at Pennsylvania State University, “Football is the church.” According to NY Daily News sports columnist Mike Lupica, at Penn State it’s “The Church of Football.” In the wake of the child sex abuse scandal swirling around the university, Jones and Lupica were comparing the Penn State scandal to the cover up of the child sex abuse scandal surrounding the Catholic Church and its pedophile priests.

The Penn State case involves the tragic sexual abuse of at least eight young boys by former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky and the failure of university officials, including legendary football coach Joe ‘JoePa’ Paterno, to notify the police after they were informed that two witnesses – a janitor and a graduate assistant coach – had observed Sandusky having sexual relations with young boys in the showers of the university’s football facility.

The failure to notify the police was the result of an obvious cover-up to protect the cash cow that is football at any cost. The fall out of that cover up is the arrest and indictment of athletic director Tim Curley and school vice president Gary Schultz on charges of lying to the grand jury and failing to properly report suspected child abuse, and the firings of Penn State president Graham Spanier and coach Paterno.

Joe Paterno, 84, has been head coach at Penn State for 46 years. He was recognized as having high ethical and moral standards. He emphasized to his players that it was important for them to graduate from the university. JoePa notified Curley that Sandusky had been observed having sex with a young boy, but he betrayed his own standards when he failed to notify the police as well.

I have mixed feeling about the firing of Paterno. I feel that he deserved better than to fired after 46 years, especially since he had just announced that he would retire at the end of the football season. There’s even talk of removing the statue of JoePa from the campus. But I am also deeply disappointed that the legendary coach did not notify the police when he was told about Sandusky’s God-awful act.

I believe that Paterno was fired not because he failed to notify the police, but because university officials are trying to head off a shitstorm of lawsuits and soften any damage payments, a la the lawsuits against the Catholic Church. I’ve got news for them – even if they fired everyone associated with Penn State, razed the campus and moved it to another location, and changed the university’s name, they are not going to avoid those lawsuits and they’re going to end up having to pay the victims big time!

As for Sandusky, it looks like he’s headed from Penn State to state pen. If convicted, Curley and Schultz will probably get off with probation.