StrangeSox

The problem is that many of these attacks on victims of abuse (and its certainly not new to these cases) often serve only to denigrate the accuser and don't actually call into question the veracity of their claims. It's an ad hominem. Now, obviously, if someone has a history of frivolous lawsuits, that's pertinent. Financial gain could be a motivation, but accusations from someone who is poor are no less reliable than from someone who is well-off (this is really an extension of the abusive power structure that leads to harassment or abuse in the first place). But that's not what we're seeing in the media pieces linked to in this thread--it's straight-up character assassination, serving only to bring up as many negative things about the accusers as possible in order to delegitimize their claims, no matter how unrelated the issues are. A larger issue than that, however, is the dismissal of sexual harassment as a real thing as has been done by several politicians and media personas. All claims of sexual harassment are said to come from uptight, unfunny gold-digging women egged on by lawyers. It's deeply sexist.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Nov 9, 2011 -> 11:04 AM) Probably. But if Paterno's was involved in the cover-up, I dunno why that wouldn't be included in the grand jury finding. He fulfilled his legal obligations, no one is really questioning that.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Nov 9, 2011 -> 10:51 AM) He reported it to the top guy in charge the very next day. They had a meeting. Schultz and Curley said they would look into it, and did, and banished Sandusky from bringing children in the locker room. As far as Paterno goes, you've given the allegations to your superiors and they brought down some punishment but nothing else was done. Why should he then go straight to the police? Wouldn't you assume that those people doing the investigations would have if the claims were credible? No. If someone I've known for years comes to me in distress, describes and awful scene of someone else I've known for years (who happens to have a close relationship with numerous young boys) was raping or molesting a young boy, I wouldn't kick the matter upstairs and assume it'll shake itself out. Sure, it's not unreasonable to react to that situation with initial shock and disbelief. But once you get past the immediate emotional reaction and look at the pattern of behavior... This isn't like this at all because he kept it internal to PSU and never followed up. His inaction protected his long-time friend from very serious allegations. Saying that someone shouldn't kick the can of alleged child rape down the road isn't unreasonable. Paterno knew of the allegations and they came from a trusted, credible source with no motive for making it up. Telling your superiors and then letting them sweep the matter under the rug is never a reasonable course of action. Sure, Paterno is far from the biggest villian in this story. But he is still morally culpable for enabling this man for years with his inaction.

QUOTE (GoSox05 @ Nov 9, 2011 -> 08:55 AM) Correct. Which is for the best. I don't know the general Packers fan mentality, but I cannot imagine how awful a team run on popular votes from the average Bears meatball fan would be.

Get a Keurig

I'd rather take into account ridiculously low interest and inflation rates and how wrong the WSJ editorial pages have been for the better part of a decade now.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Nov 9, 2011 -> 10:24 AM) Tex i'm in agreement here. I have no personal like of Paterno, but I don't understand the outrage towards him. I think him retiring and his otherwise flawless legacy has been ruined by all this. He'll no longer be the coach with the most wins. He'll be the coach with the most wins who left the school after a terrible scandal. Penalty enough (with the information out right now). It's not surprising that every one wants to jump to judgment here. But I dunno that any of us would have acted differently if we were Paterno. He was given second hand information, the specificity of which is in question. At the time, the information is probably completely unbelievable given his history and friendship with Sandusky. Still, he reports it to the highest person in the department (the AD) who may well have told him he'd investigate the claim and that he'd deal with it. For all we know (and can probably expect, given the perjury committed by the AD), Paterno asked what happened and the AD lied to him and said nothing happened. Why would Paterno need to do anything more? He can rightly assume that the AD looked into it and found that there was no credible claim. Until I hear from Paterno and he explains what happened and what he knew, i'm not going to have a conniption fit over him symbolically coaching a game. Based on that Grand Jury finding, there's no way Paterno can truly claim ignornance here. An assistant coach and former player told him what he saw and was very upset. I don't know how the information would be completely unbelievable given the source.

QUOTE (Tex @ Nov 9, 2011 -> 10:06 AM) Because reporting laws generally rely on the head of an organization to report these allegations to the police. Where is the outrage over the grad student not reporting this to the police? Paterno did exactly what was required by law and if there was any training done by the University it would have told him to do exactly what he did. remember he's a University employee just like a faculty member or a librarian. From what we've read so far Paterno did not try to cover it up, he reported it. Paterno runs State College, PA. He did the bare minimum to cover his ass and never followed up.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Nov 9, 2011 -> 10:06 AM) http://cbschicago.files.wordpress.com/2011...presentment.pdf Grand Jury report. That report is pretty sickening. Yeah, Paterno met his legal obligation. He failed, inexcusably, to meet his moral obligation.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Nov 9, 2011 -> 10:03 AM) Operation Twist ring a bell? Sure, but that was relatively recent and the WSJ has been harping that crushing inflation is just around the corner for years.

BOND VIGILANTES!

QUOTE (PlaySumFnJurny @ Nov 9, 2011 -> 09:54 AM) If Paterno gets a gold watch, they should give it to him where Christopher Walken kept his in "Pulp Fiction." True Romance

A pretty good article examining the wide-spread opposition to that bill: http://www.salon.com/2011/11/09/how_missis...eat_personhood/

Cain's campaign accuses Josh Kraushaar of working for Politico and being Karen Kraushaar's son. Neither are true.

Even a good number of pro-life people were against that measure because of the consequences that would result.

I take issue with your egregious misrepresentation of the facts, sir. I myself noted that mr. genius was engaged in a highly successful troll of Balta. He is, after all, my favorite poster in the sub-forum.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Nov 8, 2011 -> 05:41 PM) Solid article. His "fact check" of basically laying Bloomberg's assertions out there and soliciting readers' input has produced some good letters. If you follow the link, you'll see several more.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Nov 8, 2011 -> 05:44 PM) Funny still that if they had simply made it an outright tax, instead of a mandated purchase, the constitutional arguments would not exist. Even though in some ways, the ultimate result is the same. I still think that a purchase mandate is one subtle difference too far, but that is just my view. According to an article I read earlier today (I'll see if I can find the right link again), courts have looked passed whether Congress specifically calls something a tax in the past and looked at intent and effect.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Nov 8, 2011 -> 04:54 PM) You receive no voting rights or anything of substance with the stock. It's essentially a decoration to hang on the wall.

I only followed it via Sullivan's blogging, but his press conference seemed...interesting. http://andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com/20...in-presser.html

I retract my "little" qualifier.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Nov 8, 2011 -> 03:06 PM) I'll admit I read about 3/4's before stopping. But what I was getting (correct me if I'm wrong) is that fantasyland of Happy Valley is now forever tainted and that his views of the people he knew or revered is now the opposite. I've just been reading a lot of those articles and it's so over the top that it's kinda dumb. Even though he's saying this isn't an indictment of the school or the students or the town, he still has to bring out this larger meaning about the life and times of the community, and I just don't buy it. s***ty people live everywhere. They don't define communities or schools or cultures. They're just s***ty people. I kinda agree with what both of you are saying. He's looking at the impact that this will have on a whole community that has strong ties to PSU and Paterno in particular, but he's probably being a little overdramatic and anyone who has so much of their identity wrapped up in a football team might want to take a step back.

He went after the attempt to distinguish "activity" and "non-activity" pretty harshly.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Nov 8, 2011 -> 02:22 PM) I have faith that powerful and wealthy people have more than enough means to muddy the waters enough to make sure that even when the truth is out, there is a large group of people who believe that the real truth is still yet to come by some unforeseen means. And that it's not a real problem anyway because sexual harassment is just a lawyers' invention, exploited by greedy incompetent women with no sense of humor.