Paterno’s Legacy

You don’t have to be a fan of Penn State to struggle with the question of what Joe Paterno’s legacy should be.

The man who died Sunday was the winningest major college football coach ever.

He was a coach who not only succeeded on the field but gained iconic stature through his many contributions to the university around him (Penn State’s library is named after him).

He proved you can have a good team and good students at the same time.

But 10 years ago, despite all of the influence he had, Joe Paterno chose to do the bare minimum when serious allegations of child sex abuse were brought to his attention.

This was a far more important moment than deciding whether to kick or go for it with the game on the line. He seemed to realize that later.

In his statement after the sex scandal broke, and in an interview shortly before his death, Paterno lamented his own lack of action.

His words: “I should have done more.”

Perhaps that’s what we should really take from Paterno’s life. For all the success, the national championships, the accolades, the adoration he earned he understood he fell short when something really mattered. And in the end, he made sure we all knew it.

We all face those critical times that press us to answer – - what’s the right thing to do? Paterno’s example may provide the most enduring lesson.

Transparency? Nowhere in Sight

A few months back, I gave Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings Blake credit for sticking to her word and moving forward with a badly needed financial plan for the city. Too bad we can’t say the same about her pledge for transparency.

She made the promise of an open and accountable government when she took over as Mayor in early 2010. Ever since, she’s increasingly chosen to keep the public in the dark.

Take, for example, the Grand Prix debacle. You’d think Rawlings Blake would demand a more transparent process this time around, considering how badly the first deal—cut mainly in secret—-turned out. Nope. As the Baltimore Sun reports, City Hall is refusing to let the light shine on the process to find a new operator for the race. A spokesman says the City Solicitor okayed the process…not a surprise considering he’s the Mayor’s appointee.

Monday, I repeatedly asked Rawlings Blake whether she’d step in to halt the highly embarrassing auction of the Housing Authority’s vehicles. It’s a move that adds insult to injury since it’s the result of the City’s refusal to pay court-ordered judgments involving lead paint poisoning. Rawlings Blake’s response? No comment. Might as well just tell the public it has no right to know how its money and assets are being handled.

The Mayor’s staff has become expert at managing her and, as a result, can easily keep a very tight lid on how she’s conducting the public’s business. Don’t want her to have to comment on the Grand Prix? Keep her off a public schedule. Don’t like the questions about the unpaid judgments? Cut them off and get the Mayor away from the podium.

Big work lies ahead. Another budget deficit must be solved. Taxes and fees are already too high. The city needs to grow, not continue to shrink. Remember your pledge, Mayor. Open, transparent, accountable government. The public deserves no less.

After The Robocall Verdict

Democrats are giddy about the conviction of Paul Schurick. The campaign manager to Republican Bob Ehrlich was found guilty Tuesday of four criminal charges related to the misleading robocall that was sent to more than 100,000 voters on Election Day 2010.

But the Dems’ glee should be tempered by some other realities of politics that may not make their way to a criminal courtroom but are just as damaging to the integrity of the political process and voter participation.

At the same time jurors in Baltimore were weighing arguments about the so-called authority line that was missing from the robocall, millions of dollars were flowing to candidates of both parties all over the country from donors who, by law, are permitted to keep their identities hidden. They funnel their contributions through tax exempt entities that are not required to disclose their names. This is one way special interests are able to gain such a powerful grip on people who get elected.

In Maryland, candidates of both parties happily accept money from big donors who get around the state’s limits on contributions by funneling their donations through llc’s that disguise the real source of the money. These are the same businesses and developers, by the way, that show up at the head of the line when it comes time to award state and local government contacts.

In Baltimore in the last election, there was no robocall to suppress the vote. Voters stayed home on their own…..in droves. Stephanie Rawlings-Blake trounced her opponents in the mayoral election but turnout was so poor she won with just 10.6& of all registered voters. That means 9 out of 10 city voters chose not to show up.

Just as troubling — Rawlings-Blake was able to spend $1.8 million to get elected. That is an astounding $46 per vote. This is the result of Baltimore’s rigged system that so heavily favors incumbents (all Democrats) and cuts out Republicans, Independents and others by refusing to allow an open primary. No wonder voters are so uninspired.

Prosecutors believe the Schurick case sends a message that discourages dirty tricks. But such tactics aren’t the only virus on politics. And the cure requires a lot more than one party’s celebration of a jury’s verdict.

Three Reasons To Be Worried About America

1) Congress can’t agree on a plan to reduce the federal deficit. This offers more proof that partisan politics trumps any sense of acting for the good of the country.

2) The “one percent” has too much clout. This is closely related to Number 1 on this list.

60 Minutes just told the story of Grover Norquist. He’s the anti-tax activist that is thought to control the Republican Party more than any other individual. There are too many like him — a tiny percentage of special interests that wields way too much power and influence over the country’s direction and future.

3) As many as 100 million Americans fall into the classification of “poor” or “near poor.” This is the result of an analysis done recently by the Census Bureau for The New York Times. It is nothing short of tragic.

Think about it — one third of all Americans barely able to scrape by as a result of unemployment, underemployment, and wages and earnings too meager to provide a decent living. So much for the proud middle class.

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Paterno’s Departure

What to think of Joe Paterno?

If you visit Penn State, you see his name on the library. An ice cream honors him at the famous creamery. His statue outside the stadium is a popular stop for pictures.

It is true that no football coach has ever before (or likely ever will) meant so much to his school. But it is also true that Paterno’s failure to act when it really mattered has badly stained Penn State – and his own legacy.

Perhaps Paterno reached a point where he thought he was bigger than the institution. No need to be accountable, no one was powerful enough to enforce it. Sadly, Penn State allowed Paterno’s sense of “I can do no wrong” to prevail.

In his statement Wednesday, Paterno said he wished he had the benefit of hindsight. “I wish I had done more,” he said.

In fact, he had the past nine years to do more, but did not.

This will be remembered as a story of someone who allegedly did horrible acts (Jerry Sandusky) and powerful people (Paterno, Tim Curley, Gary Shultz, Graham Spanier) that made horrible judgments. It is a story about lying, and betrayal, and shattered trust. It is a story of taking a proud institution to its knees in disgrace.

And in the face of all of that, Paterno’s regret falls woefully short.

Penn State’s Shame

Penn State is in my DNA. My grandfather played football there. My father played on the baseball team. Aunts, uncles, cousins, nephews – all of us are Penn State graduates and consider ourselves better off for the education and experience we received.

But the scandal that now clouds this proud institution demands swift, firm, and yes, painful action.

The Board of Trustees should order an internal investigation to determine who knew what about the allegations concerning Jerry Sandusky and what did they do about it. The goal of this investigation is not to mimic the criminal case. It is to unravel what is apparently a culture of silence, of looking the other way, of protecting careers and reputations regardless of the harm that might be inflicted on others — in this case, vulnerable children.

At the same time, the Board must decide whether President Graham Spanier, who was informed of an alleged incident in 2002, can truly lead Penn State in what is arguably its most trying moment. If Spanier himself participated in the cover up, how can the university possibly convey an image of integrity and transparency?

The Board must also decide the question about Joe Paterno. Paterno may have passed on the information he heard about the 2002 allegation to Tim Curley, the Athletic Director. But if he did nothing else, he badly failed his own moral and ethical standards that had served his university and football program so well.

This story is only beginning to unfold. It is bound to become messier and uglier as more details surface. The sooner the Board of Trustees acts decisively, the more confident the public will be that Penn State is committed to restoring the honor and respect that’s been so badly shaken.

The Grand Prix’s Results

It’s time to face the facts about Baltimore’s Grand Prix. No matter how you cut it, the three day racing weekend falls short of what the public was told to expect.

An independent study out Friday (weeks late) puts its economic impact, at best, at $47 million — far short of the $70 million promised by race promoters and City Hall. The study was done at the request of the city. A few weeks ago, a different study, done by professors at the University of Maryland and UMBC, put the economic benefit even lower and concluded the race really didn’t give Baltimore much more of an economic boost than it would get on a typical Labor Day holiday.

Add to that the news, courtesy of reports in The Baltimore Sun, that the race organizers are having trouble paying their bills. That means taxpayers could get left holding the bag as well if organizers can’t pay back publicly funded support.

The City spent at least $7 million to pave downtown streets and provide police security on overtime.

What if that money had been, instead, devoted to:

- Cleaning up the blight along the Amtrak line. A friendlier view from the train might actually encourage people to get off in Baltimore and spend time and money year round. As it is now, it looks like you’re entering a third world country.
- Tax incentives to encourage private business to bring jobs to the city. I mean permanent jobs, not temporary jobs associated with a once per year event.
- Recreation programs that actually interest kids. Everyone agrees the City can’t afford to operate more than 50 aging rec centers. But how about some contemporary programming that truly gives kids alternatives to the street.

I could go on. The point is the Grand Prix might have been fun for Indy racing fans. But budgets are tight. The City needs smart investment that will pay dividends for the long term. That would be the real “game-changer.”

No Wonder The Public Is Cynical

If, by any chance, you’re still wondering why the Tea Party formed, or voter turnout is pathetic, or young people are camped out in cities protesting all kinds of things, look no further than what’s playing out in federal court in the Ulysses Currie trial.

Currie is accused of illegally lining his pocket by going on the payroll of a grocery chain and using his influence to get the chain favorable treatment from the state.

He has chosen to employ what experts call the “idiot defense.” It essentially asks jurors to believe there’s no way Currie could have carried out a criminal scheme because he’s just not smart enough.

“No one would call him smart”, former Maryland Delegate Tim Maloney testified. Maloney went on to characterize Currie as unable to remember things well, produce coherent work, and adequately communicate.

If Currie was just another defendant, such a strategy would be fine. He’s not. During his now admitted lack of smartness, Currie was Chairman of the Senate Budget and Taxation Committee, one of the most powerful positions in the state that demands leadership on complex matters of tax and fiscal policy.

If Currie’s lack of ability was obvious to other legislators, how did he ever get named to the job by Senate leaders?

Whether Currie is guilty of a crime remains to be seen. But, if the sworn testimony of defense witnesses is to be believed, the public already has one more reason to be disgusted by our state of political leadership.

The Next Steve Jobs

The girl or boy who will become the next Steve Jobs-like genius is already among us. Here’s the question: is America still capable of nurturing her or him to achieve the same explosion of world-changing brilliance?

Think about it. Jobs’ father was from Syria. If the same anti-immigrant fervor that grips the country now had existed in 1955, Jobs’ father may not have even been in the U.S. when his son was born.

Adoptive parents raised Jobs. They apparently didn’t try to quell his brash and inquisitive nature. Instead, they provided his early laboratory. It was in their garage that his first computer was built.

Jobs was a college dropout. But learning was important. He revolutionized the way computers type because of what he’d learned in a college class about calligraphy.

If Jobs was honest on a job application today, he likely wouldn’t get past the first cut with most employers. As a young man, he admitted, he experimented with LSD. Imagine trying to get that past a background check now.

In sum, Jobs was a diamond in the rough. But, lucky for him and for us, he grew up in America at a time when the country encouraged dreaming and doing big.

He was allowed to take a risk, to follow his curiosity, to fail but try again. It didn’t matter that he was the child of an immigrant, a little nerdy in school, caught up in the culture of his time. America then welcomed, encouraged, and supported ingenuity and uniqueness. Is that the country the next Steve Jobs will find now?

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True to Her Word

Some folks don’t care for Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake because she doesn’t show a lot of personality and can be, well, just plain boring. But maybe her straight-faced, bluntly worded demeanor will serve the city very well in trying to solve its long term fiscal problems.

Wednesday, she kept her word to city taxpayers when the city hired an outside consulting firm to come up with a ten-year financial plan for Baltimore.

This is not your typical commission or advisory panel in Baltimore made up of the usual friends and associates of whoever’s in City Hall. This is a firm that’s done similar work in other cities in the country. It is being asked by Rawlings-Blake to lay out a real reform plan — not some meaningless paper that everyone will read and then put on the shelf.

The Mayor was frank in describing the goal. Some services, she said, may have to go. Employee and retiree benefits have to be changed. They now total a staggering $431 million in the city budget. No other item in the budget comes even close.

Rawlings-Blake also said she wants this ten-year plan to reform the city’s tax structures, including its burdensome property tax. She used the term “pro-jobs, pro-growth” as it pertains to taxes—music to the ears of critics who’ve long argued the city’s tax rates keep private investment away.

Baltimore’s leaders have kicked the can down the road on the question of budget reform for way too long. It’s too early to tell whether the decision to bring on an outside consultant will lead to the bold changes Baltimore needs. But, at the very least, we ought to get plenty of new ideas. And that is a promising start.