Rick Reilly Article - The sins of the father

If you want to move on at Penn State...you have to take down that statue. It represents more than football now...it represents failure to protect children from the most awful predatory behavior. Paterno is to blame for the tarnishing of a football legacy...this should not have been a difficult choice in the late 90's...he doesn't deserve the statue.

Take it down Penn State.
 
Even the family should want it taken down because all that statue does is keep reminding everyone of the scandal. You know damn well every Penn State game that gets televised they will flash the camera on that statue and use it to start talking about what happened at Penn State.
 
Imagine the Boston Archdiocese building a statute to Cardinal Law, who sheltered all those pedophile priests, all to avoid scandal. Reilly is right. Doing many good things doesn't whitewash a pattern of lies and coverups.
 
I have a question and will repeat it until I get an answer.

What was it about Jerry Sandusky that Joe PA and the all powerful at Penn State covered up for him and even allowed him to roam around the football facilities?

Was it because he was this defensive coordinating genius that contributed to all of the wins... couldn't be re-placed?

Was it because he snowed eveyrbody (obviously he did) about his charity and his almost 24/7 care and concern for young boys?

Still have no clue.
How in the hell did he get the greatest all term retirement package for a serial sexual predator to allow him to continue?
 
aaronzuriel said:
I have a question and will repeat it until I get an answer.

What was it about Jerry Sandusky that Joe PA and the all powerful at Penn State covered up for him and even allowed him to roam around the football facilities?

Was it because he was this defensive coordinating genius that contributed to all of the wins... couldn't be re-placed?

Was it because he snowed eveyrbody (obviously he did) about his charity and his almost 24/7 care and concern for young boys?

Still have no clue.
How in the hell did he get the greatest all term retirement package for a serial sexual predator to allow him to continue?
Click to expand...


I'm sure he snowed everyone for a long time. But evidence appears in the form of a small boy getting raped. It's all over right there for me. What Paterno did, the administration did, and the Penn State system did after that fact came to light from a respectable source who saw it first hand, is unacceptable and CANNOT be forgiven. They had everything they needed to put him in jail.

At that critical juncture, it wasn't about Sandusky anymore, it became all about cover up, damage control, and protecting the Universities interests. These men need to live with this for the rest of their lives. I hope it's like a lead weight. Children need to be protected and these were educated men...who failed in every respect possible.

Take down the damn statue...he doesn't deserve it based on what I've read.
 
It reminds me of what had gone on in the catholic church for decades. The church covered their own child molesting scandal because, I imagine, they thought it would hurt the church and the priests would stop doing it. I imagine paterno wanted to protect penn state and his football program, and the damage had already been done. Anyway, a person shouldn't believe in penn state, the catholic church, or even Iowa, but God. Men are always going to rationalize things to their own good unless their are guidelines to stop them.
 
The more I read about this situation, the more I am starting think the only thing that can save PSU is for the NCAA to give them the death penalty. No way the boosters are going to let them do what needs to be done to heal and fix the toxic environment.
 
CAARHawk said:
The more I read about this situation, the more I am starting think the only thing that can save PSU is for the NCAA to give them the death penalty. No way the boosters are going to let them do what needs to be done to heal and fix the toxic environment.
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Bingo...this is exactly right. This is a very proud fan base and I think most would give them a pass on this with minimal sanctions. The University system failed in an epic way and the level of criminal behavior is beyond a self imposed penalty.
 
aaronzuriel said:
I have a question and will repeat it until I get an answer.

What was it about Jerry Sandusky that Joe PA and the all powerful at Penn State covered up for him and even allowed him to roam around the football facilities?

Was it because he was this defensive coordinating genius that contributed to all of the wins... couldn't be re-placed?

Was it because he snowed eveyrbody (obviously he did) about his charity and his almost 24/7 care and concern for young boys?

Still have no clue.
How in the hell did he get the greatest all term retirement package for a serial sexual predator to allow him to continue?
Click to expand...

It had nothing to do with Sandusky himself. No coach, no matter how talented he may be would be worth doing what they did, and the report shows that he didn't "snow" anybody. They all knew in 1998 what they had on their hands.

It was all about JoePa, his legend and the image of Penn State football. They turned a blind eye, tolerated it, aided and abetted and covered it up because they wanted this devastating truth to never leak outside of the walls of PSU. They didn't want the saintly legend JoePa or the program he built to be in any way sullied or tarnished by this ghastly behavior. They didn't want anyone to know, especially potential recruits, theirb families and donors, to know that a monster had been harbored in their hallowed halls.

Who it was that committed these horrible crimes was beside the point. It was all about JoePa. It was all about reputation. It was all about winning football games.
 
The fact the current trustees won't take it down pretty much tells you all you need to know about the "culture" there. They don't get it. They just don't. It's sad. They should take it down erase the anything and everything that says Joe P on it in regards to wins librarys you name it. Suspend the program for a year or 2 and start from scratch. The B1G should consider cutting ties with em. If you can't ever do these sort of things for this then there never ever will be.
 
WinOneThisCentury said:
Bingo...this is exactly right. This is a very proud fan base and I think most would give them a pass on this with minimal sanctions. The University system failed in an epic way and the level of criminal behavior is beyond a self imposed penalty.
Click to expand...

I'm glad people are coming around to my way of thinking.

It's obvious, isn't it? If Penn State plays football this season, then Joe Pa and his three cowardly amigos in crime were correct in their horrific calculus: College football trumps serial child rape.

Nice f'n society.

The departures of Paterno, Curley, Schultz, and Spanier were necessary but not sufficient. Consider that after Sandusky was indicted on sex crimes charges, Penn State’s general counsel Cynthia Baldwin advised Spanier that it was a bad idea to appoint a body to investigate the school’s athletic programs. “If we do this, we will never get rid of this group,” Baldwin said. Even after it became clear that athletic department officials allowed Sandusky’s predation to continue, the school’s top legal mind was worried that Penn State’s sports teams would be subject to too much oversight.

That shocking attitude – we sheltered a child molester for a decade, but that doesn’t mean we should answer to anyone – makes it seem like benching football is the only way to help Penn State help itself. On Twitter on Thursday, Penn State alum Jason Fagone listed reasons why the football team shouldn’t get obliterated: It would destroy every other athletic team football finances, it could force Penn State to drop out of the Big Ten, it could decrease state appropriations. Considering Penn State had its second-best fundraising year ever in 2011-12 ($209 million), I don’t believe those predictions would come to pass. But in the worst world, Penn State would do itself a favor by figuring out how to survive without football.

If Penn State did decide to have the football team take a few years off, they would still be morally obligated to honor the players’ scholarships if they chose to stay. They would also likely be compelled to the NCAA to allow them to transfer without penalty. And the Nittany Lions’ program would be forced to rebuild itself from the ground up.

Shuttering Beaver Stadium for two years would take Penn State football down a peg. It would also punish loads of hard-working athletes who have done nothing wrong, as well as all the fans. But that will be a far better than allowing a pedophile-sheltering athletic department that was bent on self-preservation to have itself preserved. If Penn State football carries on this fall, then the worldviews of Curley and Schultz and Spanier and Paterno will prevail. Though all four men lost their jobs, their mission to protect Penn State football at all costs will win out in the end.
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http://www.journalgazette.net/article/20120714/SPORTS02/307149945/1085/SPORTS03
 
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I've never been a fan of articles Reilly has written, but I have to appreciate how honest and sincere he comes across. That and he's calling for the head of Penn State.

I've been spending some time perusing the boards of Penn State and it's bewildering to me how people can still defend the BOT and Peterno after what's gone down. I seriously hope the NCAA makes them an example and gives them the death penalty and I hope the B1G kicks them out of the conference. After all is said and done I hope it destroys their entire program for years to come.
 
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