The Ole MMQ’s heart is heavy and eyes are misty as the fingers tap the keyboard this AM. After hearing an almost constant stream of rhetoric on the radio and TV, its appropriate to add some insight into what can only be called a total catastrophic collapse of moral integrity at PSU.
The facts (or some of them, anyway):
- The Grand Jury Indictment. I have read the 23 page PDF. (you can link to it by clicking)
-It takes 10-12 minutes. It’s not for everyone. It might make you feel, strike that, if YOU’RE A HUMAN BEING, it WILL make you feel very uncomfortable.
- I’m not exaggerating on the second bullet. It’s a sad, disturbing account of the victims of a predator.
- The incidents were happening since 1994. That’s 15 years.
- It went on at BOWL GAMES, for God’s sake…
- Joe Pa knew of a “single” incident in 1998.
- Then McQueery came to him in 2002 with another incident, but Sandusky wasn’t a PSU employee at that point.
- Joe Pa reported it, “Up the chain of command.”
- Incidents continued while a whole lot of PSU people looked the other way…
I’m not going to trample Joe Pa’s reputation or that of PSU and it's employees any more than it has already been thrown under the bus. That’s been done. Add my “Ditto” to everything that’s been written and said. Too much was known by WAY too many people and nothing was done to stop a predator. Joe Pa had more than a moral obligation to protect those human beings. Everything he has ever stood for, well, it’s been wiped away by overlooking something this grotesque. Sorry, but that’s a fact. Yes, he’s a great coach, humanitarian, etc., but this, this ongoing destruction of lives that he obviously knew about and let continue simply erases all those acts of a great man.
End of Story.
However, how PSU and particularly, Joe Pa, recovers from this is what can either
a.) Hold any semblance of integrity together at PSU and save the institution or
b.) make it a continuing laughingstock of the collegiate world.
Joe Pa needs to resign today. He got win #409. (Which, BTW, isn’t that a coincidence? Why did the Attorney General of Pennsylvania wait until after that win to announce the indictments?? More cover up scandal, anyone?) Joe Pa can do more to save his reputation by quitting and calling out the people above him that failed to act. His testimony and admission that he didn’t do enough would go a long way towards restoring the faith in PSU. In fact, without it, the whole university slides into oblivion.
The Pennsylvania Board of Trustees announced they will launch their own “investigation” and offer swift justice for those that are to blame.
Please.
Did they read the grand jury document? Is there anyone with any sense in that group that can’t see the writing on the wall and realize that there must be a sacrifice at this point? And it needs to happen quickly? An investigation? To figure out what, exactly? What more additional information do you need besides what’s in that document? Again, I’m not trying to sound judgmental here; I’m just playing politics and the media with an understanding that the beast needs to be fed.
If I were to write an open letter to Joe Pa, it would go something like this:
Joe,
You’ve got nothing left to prove on the football field. You need to do what’s right and save the University that you built into the great institution that still stands today. And you are the only person that can save it. It has to be you. You are without a doubt the most powerful person at PSU and probably in all of Pennsylvania, for that matter. Without your sincere actions (resignation), remorse and apology over this incident, I’m afraid PSU doesn’t ever return to a place of honor amongst institutions of higher learning.
Joe, you know what to do.
Do the right thing.
The MMQ
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