Say it ain't so Joe

What a terrible way to end a coaching career! Joe Paterno resigns over a sex abuse case. I just don't understand it. I know how college football coaches are respected and revered. I know that they carry clout in their respective Universities.

My dad was a great sports writer before he retired. He interviewed Bo Schembeckler many times. I spent many Saturdays of my childhood in the University of Michigan stadium. I looked at Bo as the hero and Woody Hayes as the villain. My dad told me about Woody Hayes. He said that an OSU player fumbled the football during a game so Woody made him carry the football for a week every minute of everyday. He had to take it to bed with him and to every class. My dad said that player never fumbled the football again.

In my imagination I could see the player carrying the football into and English Comp class and the professor asks him, "why are you bringing a football into my class?" The player replies, "Coach Hayes told me to carry it all week." The professor nods. "well far be it from me not to comply with Coach Hayes' orders."

So why did Joe Paterno resign? He didn't do anything wrong. Mcqueer witnessed an act of sexual child molestation and did nothing about it. He didn't stop Sandusky nor call the police. He called his own dad. Ummmm excuse me, Mcqueer was a graduate student at the time. I have two undergraduate degrees and I attended Western Theological Seminary for a year and I know that when witnessing a crime in action to call 911. Yes! report the crime immediately. Why doesn't a graduate student at Penn State University know this. He calls his father as I said before and his father must not be very smart either. He told him to tell Joe Paterno.

Does this mean that if I ever witness a crime that I should call Brady Hoeke? Don't call the police! call your local Division I football coach when you see a crime being committed. What was Joe supposed to do call the police and say, "someone told me he saw a crime being committed?" Isn't that here say?

So it goes and Joe Paterno ends a great career by resigning in disgrace. He doesn't get to finish off the season. Maybe PSU grad students need to take a required class in common sense. Had McQueery acted responsibly Joe Paterno would still be Nittany Lion's head football coach. What is a Nittnay Lion anyway?

Web impacts TV

It was during the time when ABC was broadcasting the show "Lost" that I saw how the Internet was generating interest in a very different type of television series. There was a lot of Internet chatter about Lost on the websites I visited, such as, the Survivor Sucks message board and Wikipedia. I read that ABC was thinking of dropping "Lost" but they kept it going because the ABC executives were surprised by how many times the show was viewed on the ABC website. Unlike Nielson ratings which only selected households participate in, shows watched on the networks websites are more accurately measured. They know how many times a show is viewed, which translates into accurate advertising ratings on the episode viewer. Six years ago I truly doubt that shows with complicated and intricate plots and characters , such as, "Ringer" and"Revenge" would have been developed. The success of "Lost" proved that people who watch prime time television are not stupid and have the ability to process and be entertained by multi-layered plots. Television has become more complicated with the diverse programming allowed by the expanded cable stations, such as, the CW and ABC Family. No longer are TV viewers constrained to four major network channels, ABC, NBC, CBS and Fox. People watch TV on multiple stations and networks, which, supply programming supporting a special interest. Thanks to the Internet, chatter and viewer interaction makes shows popular not by clever advertising and network promotion, but my word of mouth, or more accurately typed words on message boards, blogs, Facebook and Twitter. There is silliness and nonsense on the Internet; there is also relevant conversation which if nothing else raises the quality of the television shows which are produced and broadcast.