<p>cosmic - great post!</p>
<p>greenbutton - thanks for my morning laugh!!!</p>
<p>Greenbutton and cosmic fish are my new heros. Maybe I’ll start a new cult and worship them instead. That’s what PSU’ers do, right?</p>
<p>SansSerif - can we get special tshirts for this new cult??? ;)</p>
<p>Absolutely! Perhaps the shirt can depict St. JoePa and the Nittany Lion handing over the Sacred Football Helmet to Cosmicfish and Greenbutton. After all, there has to be a valid order of succession so that it’s verified they are the True Chosen Ones.</p>
<p>Not 100% in agreement, but I think Cosmicfish has put together a great post, and I agree with a lot of what he writes.</p>
<p>SansSerif - can we get our own flavor of Kool Aid, too???</p>
<p>"Cowardly, yes, "</p>
<p>The janitor told his supervisor what he witnessed. The supervisor told him to go over his head with it. The supervisor would not. The janitor took his lead. Stop vilifying the janitor. Paterno, Spanier, Schultz and Curley, on a much higher level, just like the supervisor, would not let it see the light of day. The janitor and McQueary told their bosses. The bosses failed.</p>
<p>The Koolaid has to be Peachy Paterno, of course.</p>
<p>"Cowardly, yes,… "</p>
<p>This janitor was a Korean War veteran. He was not a coward. The politics at PSU and what he witnessed rivaled his Korean War experience though. That’s for sure.</p>
<p>
As I noted above, it is not my intention to vilify the janitor - I was simply using the same hyperbolic language that coureur used. The janitor was a witness and despite the certainty of his knowledge was afraid to pursue the matter with the authorities for the risk of losing his job. Regardless of whether or not that fear was justified I do not blame him for making that decision given his standing and circumstances.</p>
<p>
First of all, the janitor and McQueary were direct witnesses - as tough as it is, being an actual witness carries more weight and responsibility than being an intermediary between witnesses and the police. If the police indicate that an investigation has been completed and that the accused has been cleared, then the witness still knows the truth.</p>
<p>Second, no one is questioning that the bosses failed. The question is the relative magnitudes of the failures, from “tragically ordinary” to “criminally irresponsible”. The most diehard Paterno fans I know put him in the “tragically ordinary” category, mini and a few others put him in the “Not Hitler but reeeeeealy close” category. Most of us are still trying to figure out where he falls despite a tremendous dearth of evidence.</p>
<p>
Cowardice is not an on/off thing. It is the inability to do what you think you should do, because of fear. Different people respond to different fears in different ways. When I say that this guy was afraid to come forward in this case, it has no bearing on his courage under fire.</p>
<p>Saying the janitor was a coward is vilifying the janitor, i.e. speak ill of, defame.</p>
<p>
Then please decribe the janitor’s actions in a way that you consider appropriate.</p>
<p>" The most diehard Paterno fans I know put him in the “tragically ordinary” category, mini and a few others put him in the “Not Hitler but reeeeeealy close” category. Most of us are still trying to figure out where he falls despite a tremendous dearth of evidence."</p>
<p>Thank you, but I eschew Godwin’s Law. There is no dearth of evidence that he refused to defend his Black players who were receiving death threats (and one Black student was in fact shot), and that his players had to walk to their own graduation in bullet-proof vests. There is no dearth of evidence that the football program, under his direction, paid for the trip of the former Professor Emeritus to the 1998 Alamo Bowl (or was it the Outback? I get them reversed) where Mann Act child sex trafficking violations took place.</p>
<p>@CF He reported what he saw to his supervisor. I believe that the reporting laws in PA stated at that time that a witness should report to their supervisor. He did that. The supervisor did not take it up the chain. Yes, he could have gone over the supervisor’s head, but this was an elderly janitor who feared for his job. I will not call him a coward or judge him. He did report it. In that way, he did his part. His supervisor dropped the ball.</p>
<p>
What does this have to do with anything? I lived in town when this happened, and it was not a coverup and was well known. It was not limited to the team, it was across the campus, and all the assorted police agencies knew about it - given that it was not a football issue, what was the football coach supposed to do about it? And regardless, what does this have to do with anything?</p>
<p>FWIW, the victim you are referring to was recovered off the schedule warned about in the letters, was NOT a PSU student, and was determined by the FBI to be a coincidence. Of course, Paterno controlled the FBI as well, but still…</p>
<p>
Just like the football program paid for trips for Sandusky and other people associated with the program to go to that and other bowl games. There IS a dearth of evidence that anyone really knew what was going on with Sandusky at that point, and without that knowledge there is no wrongdoing on the part of anybody but Sandusky at this point in the story.</p>
<p>
Did you notice that this is very similar to arguments made in defense of Paterno? Strange.</p>
<p>Also, “he could have gone over the supervisor’s head, but this was an elderly janitor who feared for his job” is exactly what I described. If you want to get upset because I used the word “coward” in response to another poster who used the word “coward”, go ahead, but what you wrote is quite literally the definition of cowardice in this case. I do not hold it against the janitor because in his situation I think said behavior is ordinary, and I do not condemn people for being ordinary.</p>
<p>“Did you notice that this is very similar to arguments made in defense of Paterno? Strange.”</p>
<p>I’ve posted this before on this thread and I’ll do it again:</p>
<p>“To whom much has been given, much is expected.” - Bible, Luke 12:48</p>
<p>In addition, many suspected on this thead it was Paterno’s decision to keep this hush hush because of the power he held, then the email confirmed it. Paterno reported and he also squashed the others from further reporting. He passed the ball and then fumbled it.</p>
<p>
Unless their name is Spanier, Curley, or Schultz? All of whom had specific and greater responsibilities in this area, and all of whom are documented in their own communications as being involved in the cover-up? Paterno is known to have done exactly what the janitor did - passed what he knew up the chain of command - and he did it without personally witnessing anything at all.</p>
<p>
So Paterno convinced men to cover up horrific crimes in return for what, exactly? What did he give them, or what punishment could he have laid upon them? </p>
<p>Oh, and the email did not confirm diddly. The email averred at best - it is non-specific and has no support outside of the vague words of a couple of guys going to trial for felony perjury. That is the problem - the evidence is slim, even though certainties are high.</p>
<p>This is the part of the situation that confuses the heck out of me. What EXACTLY did Paterno gain? There seems to be a lot of evidence that he didn’t particularly like Sandusky. The football program would have been better off if this all came out years ago (no cover up issues). Paterno reported what he knew, as required. Should he have done more? In hindsight, yes. </p>
<p>I just don’t see any evidence of some huge cover up by Paterno. I think he reported, and went on with his focus (football). Since Sandusky had previously been investigated with no charges brought against him, the fact that no charges were brought in this case would not really seem out of the ordinary. The email evidence in the Freeh report is not strong enough to convict anyone.</p>
<p>“Unless their name is Spanier, Curley, or Schultz?”</p>
<p>No not all all. They are just as responsible. They allowed themselves to be pursuaded by Paterno not to report.</p>
<p>Why? He wanted to keep the football program pristine. It was his life. That’s my assumption. Why do you think he and the others who should have known better kept this to themselves, even though they were making themselves “vulnerable” by doing so?</p>