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Ron Musselman, I'm calling you out.

Ron,

You follow PSU football pretty closely. You work for State College.com, and I do enjoy your antics on Twitter most of the time, especially when you put a capital "LOL" after things. Having said that, there's a good chance you read this site or are aware of it, so here goes.

You've been saying a lot of thing on Twitter the past few days, and I'm going to challenge them because I think they have no basis (also, you won't tweet me back, so I figured this was as good of a place to challenge you as any).

20h

I am not taking sides, but JoePa was the most powerful guy in Pa.:

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Really? He was? In terms of power, the person signing his paycheck had more than him. This is pretty much inarguable. After all, these same people cancelled the Most Powerful Person in PA's (would have been) final press conference even though he wanted to speak. These same people didn't allow the football program to ban JS from Lasch. Moreover, If he was the most powerful guy in PA, why couldn't he stop himself from being fired? He couldn't even ban Sandusky from Lasch. You keep asking questions about JS's access to Lasch, and I have an answer from a guy who is close to the program:

"This is what I was told. Jerry used to workout in the PSU weight room most mornings. He came in early and was done before 8am. When the news of the pending investigation, the PSU S&C staff went to the football administration (Ganter) and asked if they should still allow Jerry access. Fran then went to Old Main and asked how should they handle it. Fran was told by Old Main that Jerry was granted access and all of his benefits granted via his retirement package. In other words, proceed as they were and not do anything. So, Jerry was allowed to continue using the weight room and locker room. It was not until the grand jury report was made public that they (the football admin) were told he was no longer allowed to use the facilities (emphasis mine.)"

-Chester Copperpot, fairly respected dude on Blue-White Illustrated's message boards.

In other words, it was a part of his contract. I don't know if it could've been voided, although I imagine Old Main would've had some idea. But there's the reason why he was around after '98, and even '01: Old Main told the football program that they had to do it.

What option did Joe (the "most powerful" person in PA) have at that point? If Old Main said Jerry gets access, he gets access. They give out keys to these buildings and handle access. In other words, whatever perceived failure you are attributing to Joe is actually Old Main's. That's not to say Joe is without fault. Even the best of people have flaws and make mistakes, and I think Joe may have made some decisions that indirectly made it easier for Jerry's atrocities to go on. I think maybe Joe was too old to be in the office as much as he should have been, and maybe this allowed for some of the things to happen that did happen.

Joe was not "in charge" of Lasch, Old Main was.

But all this is relatively minor quibbling, IMO.

I think my bigger issue is that by perceiving that Joe had more power than anyone else, you give everyone else a pass. You give everyone an excuse for not being vigilant, and this is the most dangerous lesson anyone could take from Sandusky's alleged atrocities. "Well, Joe should have stopped him." This is a fallacy. Child predators are often charming and deceptive. They don't have to fool just one person to be able to abuse a child; they have to fool everyone. Even trained law enforcement were fooled by Sandusky (multiple times, IMO). We could pick many people that were fooled. Ray Gricar. The Second Mile. The victim's parents. JoePa. Anyone who worked with Sandusky. And on and on.

It's okay to accept that all these people were fooled. Mistakes were made, that much is obvious. But to make this as black-and-white as Joe being "the most powerful" and still not "stopping" Sandusky, you give everyone a pass for not being more vigilant, and I think this is the most dangerous idea/lesson anyone could take from this. Many, many people could have "stopped" Sandusky. We all need to play our part in our communities to stop these monsters, watching for signs and having the wisdom to know when a report should be made. Be brave enough to make it grey and think through it. I know you're smart enough, Ron.

Your friend,

Thinkin' Lincoln

(I included this pic because everyone loves a good Abe Lincoln shot)

Alincoln_medium

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