I'm curious to know what else folks think JoePa should have done.

I would have started by banning Sandusky from using the facilities from his departure from the program up until last year, for one.

Sandusky was originally investigated by the university police in 1998. He retired in 1999. The GA witnessed the rape of the boy in 2002. Why did he still have access to the facilities?

You're completely right. After all, what would have happened if JoePa hadn't followed protocol???

He could have possibly prevented the rape of several more children, BUT Penn State's program would have suffered.

To me, this mindset is what will tarnish Penn State's reputation. Every facebook status I have seen from Penn State Friends had no mark of concern for the children who were harmed: it was about how JoePa was getting a raw deal. That disgusts me more than anything with this situation.

I get that JoePa is a grandfather and that he is the "head" of your Penn State family, which makes this 1,000x more painful. I would cry if this were happening to my alma mater. But, you cannot say that he wasn't wrong. He made a huge mistake in choosing to "only" report it and, unfortunately, he will have to pay in some manner. While I'm sad that this is how his legacy at Penn State will end (especially since he is my favorite Big 10 coach), I am also much more sad that this grandfather figure was capable of such wrong.

This is the dumbest thing I've read today. Please stop being an apologist to an apologist to a pedophile.

Okay, we all know that Joe Paterno fulfilled his legal obligation according to protocol. But, you know what? Joe Paterno is/was one of the most powerful men in college sports. Had he really wanted to, he could have superseded protocol.

It's not as if this hasn't been done before, by someone with a whole hell of a lot more to lose than a college football coach. A priest went to his superior about a suspected pedophile. When it appeared that the diocese was going to sweep it under the rug, guess who went to the authorities? That's right, the priest. Here's someone who superseded protocol in order to DO WHAT WAS RIGHT. Joe Paterno was too much of a coward to do that.

Also, if he didn't trust this McQueary guy enough to follow up on his concerns in more than a half-assed way, why is dude his assistant? He didn't believe him when he reported being an eyewitness to the rape of a child?

Oh, and this line, from Joe Paterno himself?

"The kids that were victims or whatever they want to say, I think we all ought to say a prayer for them. Tough life, when people do certain things to you."

Victims or whatever. Classy. It is tough when someone rapes you and the people who could help you look the other way for the good of a football team.

I've been very back-and-forth about all of this and what to think all day. In most cases, I've played devil's advocate in the conversations I've had with others.

My take on everything: I don't know who to blame. A lot of people dropped the ball. My biggest issue with this all coming down on Joe Pa is that this is ALL coming down on Joe Pa.. because of his position, because he's the coach, because he has "more power" than everyone else. People in this thread have even said that this isn't about sports, it's about a pedophile, and that pedophile not being stopped. And sadly, in all of the conversations I had today about this situation, not one person mentioned Sandusky. Not one.

I'm not disgusted by the students supporting Paterno.. instead, I find myself confused. While I won't be the one standing outside his house cheering, I also won't be the one to point the finger at him and place all of the blame on his shoulders. The fact of the matter is, no one knows what he knew, yet people have taken it upon themselves to fill in the blanks - and either support him, or turn their backs on him completely. And that I don't understand.

I might find that I'm stuck in the middle and not knowing which way to turn until the end of my days, and that's ok with me. I made this same argument in the Casey Anthony thread; that I can't comprehend how someone can feel so strongly about something that might not be true... that someone can stand up and cheer when a person is delivered a verdict that they agree with, or get pissed and be outraged over a verdict that goes against what they think. The only person who knows for sure what happened is Paterno, and he's the only one who has to live with the decisions he made.

It just seems crazy to me that the person who seemingly knew the least, is getting the most flak for what happened.

If Paterno leaves, yes, it will be sad.. and that doesn't mean I'm not saddened by what happened to those kids. It means that it's disappointing to know that someone who's had such a large impact on a college community - an impact that most college campuses will never experience or understand - might have to walk away with people shaking their heads in shame.

Just a few short days ago, if you asked me where Paterno would breathe his last breath, I would have told you there was no doubt in my mind that it'd be within those walls of Beaver Stadium. And now... who knows..?

I just want to jump in and ask if the GA's at Penn State are unionized. If they are not, it's very likely that the GA had no protection as a whistle-blower. Even state laws may not provide any protection, because of the bizarre way GA's are not-quite-employees of the university.

Now, does the guy still have a moral responsibility to report what he saw? Probably, but I don't know enough about the guy to know his circumstances, and what would have happened to him and/or his family if he had lost his assistantship.

Same goes for the janitor. What protections does he have? Could he find himself out on the street the next day?

I say this not to excuse these individuals, but to point out the importance of making sure low-level workers have rights.

PennState is not my college team of choice so I neither follow nor care about PennState and JoePa.

I say this because people are making this about the awesome sauce of PennState and JoePa when this is really about institutional power. PennState and JoePa are just the latest illustrations of this and the children are the victims.

I thought this was particularly damning.

"The failure to report the 2002 allegations would appear to break Penn State's own reporting methods for sexual abuse on campus," wrote Rep. Patrick Meehan, R-Pa., in a letter to Duncan. "Had the 2002 allegations been properly reported, investigated and disclosed, the later instances of abuse could have been prevented and future victims protected."

http://m.espn.go.com/ncf/story?storyId=7209890

Apparently protocol was not followed. It's not the job of administrators, football coaches, etc to decide if a claim is true or not. That's the job of the police. It protects further victims and doesn't "ruin" lives or careers if their are no victims. To an outsider, this looks like a group trying to protect a football program at the expense of young boys. Luckily the trustees of Penn State are ready to make sure that never happens again.

Somewhere back in the long ago, the setting of protocols probably incorporated doing what was right....in other words, letting morality be a part of your guide.

JoePa is from that old world. Don't tell me he didn't come out of a world that didn't include religiosity. Morals. Values. He grew up being taught better than that. I have to believe that about him. If his upbringing didn't teach him that it was better to risk "ruining" an adult's life in order to save a child's life, then who the rest of the country thought he was has been a sham for a very long time.

Like someone else said, we'll have to disagree on this.

It makes me sick to think of as well. But I also know that shock can literally render one speechless and unable to move. I want to think that I would scream and run for help, but in reality I have no idea what I'd do. Also if he had screamed, there could be a number of things that could have happened, not all of the outcomes being that Sandusky would have been able to be convicted or stopped. There are just too many what ifs. Literally, just too many. I do hold McQueary in a harsher light because he witnessed it, but he still technically did what he should have in this situation.

I have to disagree with you there. If Sandusky had been tipped off to an investigation he could have fled, gone further underground with his perversion, etc. Here is another article that supports how Joe reacted to it. I'm sorry, I agree with what he did. You can disagree with me, but in cases like these, there is a way laid out like this for a reason.

Now I know that this opens up another can of worms, but this may not be the best example to use as clearly, the whole priest scandal is far from over and this is not the same situation at all-- Joe's superiors made it seem like they were handling it. Haven't you ever been lied to convincingly before?
In reporting child abuse it is good to be cautious and let the facts speak for themselves. It's not that he didn't trust his assistant, but with allegations such as these one must always be able to see both sides of the potential issue.
Wow. If you didn't know this sound bite was taken after students went to JoePa's house to support him and he came out to talk to them even though he a. had zero obligation to do so and b. was completely unprepared for it. He's also over 80 years old and may have been trying to think of what he was going to say. Not to mention the fact that he may have been told by his superiors not to call the children victims because these are technically still allegations and if you haven't noticed, Penn State apparently thinks not talking about this is the best way to go.

Pillorying Paterno for being a hypocrite (in terms of how he held himself/presented his football team/"old world values") is missing the forest for the trees - there's a MUCH larger moral issue, completely unrelated from how he presents himself or his program.

Doing the bare minimum (as even Paterno's supporters note was the case) is really the virtue we want to espouse here?

Has this been posted?

http://msn.foxsports.com/collegefoot...-Valley-110811

I'm going to just say that I don't agree with much of what has been happening lately. I did not attend the riot nor would I ever, I don't even think most students really understood at that point what it was about. In the days to come we will find out more about what has taken place and I hope eventually, for the victims' sakes, that justice is served. I just beg of your patience and reserve of judgement of the culpability of some until this investigation rests.

To give you some perspective, it honestly feels like some long lost great uncle molested some family friend's kids and we now found out that our grandfather might have tried to cover it up. You really have no idea how hard our campus is taking this. These events go against everything we've ever stood for and have shaken us to our very core. We are rallying around our traditions and pride because we need to remember where we've come from to see where we need to go.

We are grieving for the families and know that the university that we have known and loved has forever been rocked and everything has turned upside down. We are trying to process what has been happening and unfortunately the university is staying silent on the matter which is not helping anything. Many of us feel betrayed, angry, and alone. We are also very young and may not be handling this in the best way, but we're trying. I hope that very soon more information can come to light and answers can be gained from this. I hope that the perpetrators can be brought to justice and I hope that the victims can find closure and healing. I beg again for your patience and understanding as we are all going through this difficult time.

And the GA or janitor for that matter couldn't have walked out of the building and called the police anonymously right then and there? I know, woulda coulda shoulda.

I find it hard to believe that Joe did not know the extent of what the GA saw- I would think that he is a savvy and political guy, you can't survive as a major college coach for that long without learning how to play the game with the administration and trustees- surely considering his friend and long time member of his staff was being accused of such heinous activities by another member of his staff, wouldn't he want the GA to tell him EXACTLY what he saw-not in a prurient way, but because he would want to have all the facts, as the GA believed them to be, before him? IF he truly didn't ask the GA, then he is guilty of being a giraffe and sticking his head in the sand.

Joe has (had?) great power, and thus has great responsibility, as the saying goes. He told the AD and president to shove it in so many words when they tried to oust him in 2004. He knew the board of trustees and big athletic donors had his back, and so he was bullet proof in that regard. Surely he could have had the ear of the administration to, at the very least, ban Sandusky from campus and revoke any privileges he had immediately. But as far as we know, he didn't. So he deserves to have some splash on him.

The failure to report it to someone outside of the Happy Valley chain of command (which is BS because everyone knows Joe is no. 1), isn't even my biggest beef. JoePa ALLOWED THIS MAN TO REMAIN AFFILIATED WITH HIS FOOTBALL PROGRAM. Even past retirement. This man continued to use the facilities and the program to continue his disgusting hobby. Sandusky was on campus as recently as last week (or the week before, can't remember exactly which).

Your blind faith towards a sports figurehead is exactly the mentality that allowed this kind of crap to happen in relation to this program for years.