The Nittany Turkey

Primarily about Penn State football, this is a tale told by idiots, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

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McQueary Suit Will Proceed

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All anyone can talk about, think about, write about, or whatever is the Spring Game, but since I don’t know what the hell I’m talking about, I’ll change the subject to Mike McQueary. I don’t know what I’m talking about there, either, but the subject is worth trying to pin a tail on a donkey or something.

Erstwhile Penn State assistant football coach Mike McQueary’s whistle-blower lawsuit filed with the help of SEC whistleblower lawyers against his former employer will proceed,  ruled Judge Thomas Gavin on Tuesday.

The good judge felt that the suit made sufficient claims of “outrageous conduct” by Penn State, and gave the University 20 days to file a response.

Spokesmen for both the university and McQueary remained mum on Tuesday as newshounds hounded them for news.

What’s in a name? Well, McQueary’s lawyer either cheats on his golf scorecard or engages in onanism, as his name is Strokoff.

Big Red bases his case on a press release just as the Sandusky scandal was breaking by then president Graham Spanier. In it, Spanier expressed support for Curley and Schultz, dismissing the charge of perjury against them and implying that McQueary’s testimony was a lie. McQueary alleges that the university made him personna non grata in State College, isolating him from his established base of friends and colleagues.

What’s worse is who in the hell would ever hire McQueary after all the crap he’s been through? McQueary has got to be viewed as being a pariah wherever he goes, for God knows how long. Of course, this lawsuit won’t serve to reduce his notoriety any.  You’ve got to wonder where this thing will end up.

Good God, Rod!

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The Centre Daily Times  happened into some emails between former NCAA Chief Investigator Ameen Najjar and Nevin Shapiro, the jailed booster of University of Miami scandal fame, in which Najjar blasted Penn State University President Rod Erickson for handing Mark Emmert the dagger to do what he would.

“The Penn State deal is a travesty. The NCAA did not impose anything. Penn State agreed to and self-imposed the penalties, waived all due process and waived any right to appeal. The NCAA has/had NO authority to impose any penalties in that situation and PSU’s president sold the school down the river.”

Of course, we all know the story of how Erickson claims to have been threatened with the death penalty before he rolled over for Emmert. He said his hands were tied and it was either agree to the draconian sanctions or lose the football program completely for a long time.

But was it really that cut-and-dried a negotiation?

Najjar’s email might be the rant of a guy who had sour grapes for the NCAA, having been fired as the anointed scapegoat in the Shapiro case; however, what does he have to gain by demeaning Penn State’s president? By the same token, one has to question what Najjar really knows about the Penn State situation, as he was not involved in the (non-) investigation.

Nevertheless, if he is right, who knows how far back the deal goes? The Freeh Report led to the NCAA sanctions. Perhaps the whole course of affairs was a pre-ordained deal to hang Curley, Paterno, Schultz, and Spanier while saving the hides of the Board of Trustees and diverting attention from the sordid workings of Pennsylvania government and from the Second Mile. If anyone was following the money, they were headed off at the pass.

Meanwhile, Erickson saves his own ass by saying he had no choice.

So, our friends at PS4RS have requested transcripts of communications between the NCAA and PSU. As you might recall, Ed Ray, president of NCAA’s executive committee, claimed that PSU was never threatened with the death penalty. Later, he recanted somewhat, but this is enough to cast doubt on exactly who did what to whom.

Saith PS4RS spokesbabe Maribeth Schmidt:

“If the deal indeed went down the way Rodney Erickson has explained, then there should be nothing to hide. However, we now have two different representatives of the NCAA asserting that there was no such coercion as Dr. Erickson has described.

“Should we ultimately find that Penn State was complicit in the imposition of the sanctions, or that President Erickson misrepresented the events that led to the execution of the consent decree, then it is reasonable to conclude that the Board of Trustees and administration have been dishonest with the Penn State community and have failed wholly and completely in their fiduciary responsibility to the University.”

None of know what really happened behind those closed doors and secured telephone lines. It’s about time we did.

Has Ziegler Gone Too Far?

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We’ve seen documentary filmmaker and Paterno supporter John Ziegler making the rounds of the all too willing mainstream media of late, no doubt to promote his forthcoming film on the framing of Joe Paterno. ??? ???? ??? ???? Waving a three-hour-plus personal interview with the Tickle Monster in their faces provided appropriate bait to the sensationalist scumbags of the Fourth Estate. NBC and CNN slurped it up, giving Ziegler the national platform he craved to expand his sphere of influence far beyond the Paternoist backwater caverns of the PSU blogosphere.

“Quoting Sandusky as saying that Paterno didn’t know about the sexual abuse allegations is like saying that the iceberg didn’t mean to cause the sinking of the Titanic. ???? ????? ” —Holly Swanson, StateCollege.com

Drunk with the success of this ploy, however, Ziegler might have done himself considerable harm by attempting to leverage his knowledge of the Sandusky victims. Exploiting Sandusky is one thing, although the verdict in his child sexual abuse case has rendered anything Sandusky says as self-serving bullshit. It is quite another thing to blackmail victims of Sandusky’s abuse, which is precisely what Ziegler did by threatening “Victim Two” with exposing his name if he did not submit to an interview with Ziegler. ?????? ??? ???????? If Ziegler is seeking to obtain friends and supporters, this is a pretty funny way of doing it.

Holly Swanson of StateCollege.com has expressed her negativity toward Ziegler’s recent departures from propriety in this morning’s piece entitled “When the search for facts trumps the facts themselves: Filmmaker Goes Too Far by Naming Names“.  This turkey agrees with much of what she wrote. Ziegler needs to understand some boundaries here. As we mentioned in the previous post about Ziegler, public sentiment is not likely to turn in Penn State’s favor anytime soon, and Ziegler’s shenanigans are doing their part to keep the wounds open and festering in the public’s mind. Ziegler was on a good course with his vendetta to clear Joe Paterno’s name, but he took a turn southward with his heavy-handed tactics. Both the Paterno family and Penn State have distanced themselves from Ziegler through their spokespeople. Swanson agrees.

I support the effort to look closely at the media reaction to the Sandusky scandal and to examine the errors of the Freeh Report. And, most importantly, to educate ourselves about child sexual abuse and how it happens. But focusing on getting the exclusive or developing new theories that aren’t central to the goal isn’t moving us any closer to the truth. I don’t think the Paternos or Penn State needs this kind of help.

Why do people become so full of themselves that they shoot themselves in the foot? Maybe Plaxico Burress can tell you.

We need to get back to football soon! This Sandusky/Freeh/Paterno stuff is really annoying, right? I can stop anytime. Really, I can. I wanted to get out but they keep pulling me back in! Aaaaaaargh!