Not guilty.

I believe I’ve mentioned that my husband has a new job at the paper. Alan’s the Detroit News auto editor now, which comes with new responsibilities, a laptop, a BlackBerry and the special perks an automotive journalist in Detroit enjoys, or as I’ve been putting it lately:

“When are you going to bring mama a big pimpin’ Escalade?”

The car companies keep a few sets of keys circulating through the newsrooms of the dailies and the trade papers, for reporters, critics and editors to test drive. One of our neighbors works at AutoWeek, and whenever their beige Camry is replaced in the driveway by something a little less beige and Camry-like, it’s a fair bet he’s enjoying the perks of the job. So last night I was out and about, and what do I come home to? A BIG PIMPIN’ ESCALADE. IN MY DRIVEWAY:

“You remembered my birthday!” I exclaimed, squealing over more than $70,000 of an $85,099 luxury SUV like the Midwestern girl I am. Then I commenced worrying. It’s so big we didn’t dare risk putting it in the garage overnight and having one of the bikes scratch its Black Ice paint job on the way in or out, so Alan tucked it into the second-most-secure parking space on the property. I’m sure the reason I woke up before 6 a.m. today was a nagging worry that we’d find the thing sitting on bricks this morning, or gone entirely.

But it’s fine. Now all I have to worry about is him getting carjacked on the way to work. One of our neighbors leases an Escalade every couple years, and both of fates described above — wheel theft and carjacking — have befallen them. The wheel theft came at daybreak one morning, and was accomplished by a crew of professionals who worked so fast they could probably find gainful employment with NASCAR. The theft was by two teenagers so young she thought they were kidding, until one lifted his shirt and showed her the gun in his waistband. And yes, you saw it first on “The Wire.”

It’s too bad we can’t take this behemoth on a road trip. You should see the back-seat entertainment system. Kate and I would hang back there, watching DVDs.

OK, then.

This ham-fisted p.o.s. was circulating a bit yesterday, Walter Russell Mead’s j’accuse against the baby-boom generation. I expect we’ll hear about a million more iterations of this before they lay the last of us in the ground, or, more likely, sprinkle our ashes in a sylvan glade somewhere, because we’re not into having our corpses pumped full of chemicals, man. Others with more time on their hands have handily disposed of this one, but all I have to say is, whaddaya mean “we,” white man?

Boomer CEOs accelerated the trend toward unlimited greed among corporate elites, and Boomer members of corporate boards sit by and let it happen. Boomer academics created a profoundly dysfunctional system that systemically shovels resources upward from students and adjuncts to overpaid administrators and professors who by and large have not, to say the least, done an outstanding job of transmitting the cultural heritage of the past to future generations. Boomer Hollywood execs created an amoral morass of sludge — and maybe I’m missing something, but nobody spends a lot of time talking about the towering cultural accomplishments of the world historical art geniuses of the Boomer years. Boomer greens enthusiastically bet their movement on the truly idiotic drive for a global carbon treaty; they are now grieving over their failure to make any measurable progress after decades spent and hundreds of millions of dollars thrown away. On the Boomer watch the American family and the American middle class entered major crises; by the time the Boomers have finished with it the health system will be an unaffordable and dysfunctional tangle — perhaps the most complicated, expensive and poorly designed such system in the history of the world.

Oh, shut up. I guess I missed the double-secret boomer briefings at which all this was laid out, but I also expect we’ll be paying for that Who song for a long time. As far as I’m concerned, much of the model for that which he describes, the sha-na-na-na-na-let’s-live-for-today mindset, was put in place by Grampa Reagan, and he was no more a baby boomer than I am an Escalade buyer. There are many, many of us who save for what we want, raise our children right, work hard and otherwise don’t expect much in the way of handouts. Mead himself writes:

What the Boomers as a generation missed (there were, of course and thankfully, many honorable individual exceptions) was the core set of values that every generation must discover to make a successful transition to real adulthood: maturity.

“There are many honorable individual exceptions,” yes, enough that the whole essay pretty much falls apart, especially when he tries to hang Jerry Sandusky on us, considering Sandusky (d.o.b. 1944) isn’t a boomer.

Speaking of which. Can this case get any more awful? “I shouldn’t have showered with those kids,” he says now. Really? Ya think? And this lawyer of his who thought this interview was a good idea? I’m speechless. I need to stop reading about this story. It’s making me too crazy.

You’ve already read this Charles Pierce jeremiad on Penn State by now, I expect, but just in case you haven’t, you should.

And now I get to edit a bunch of city council meeting copy.

Posted at 9:32 am in Current events, Detroit life |
 

61 responses to “Not guilty.”

  1. coozledad said on November 15, 2011 at 9:48 am

    Bobo Brooks et. al. have been putting in long hours trying to spin the Penn State meltdown as anything other than what it clearly was. A republican childfucker caught in flagrante, and the subsequent coverup by a bunch of wastes of breathable air.
    Righties like to subordinate people they fuck, as much they like fucking subordinates. Children seem to be a special weakness for them.
    Fer instance, their savior, Rongo, aged thirty nine, inserting himself in an eighteen year old girl:
    http://gawker.com/5859493/reagan-to-bored-virgin-during-sex-you-should-have-had-many-orgasms-by-now
    As ol’ Rush himself would say, Sandusky was just using a dog-eared, sticky copy of the Reagan playbook.

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  2. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 9:56 am

    I could not possibly care less what anybody says about Boomers, having never felt anything like enough phony camraderie to consider myself part of a “generation”, whatever the hell that is supposed to mean. It seems to me that Boomers certainly were responsible for forcing a reconsideration of the sort of idiotic thinking that caused the Southeast Asia debacle, and were certainly a driving force in whatever progress the USA has made in the area of race relations. As for Vietnam, while my so-called “generation” was blamed for shabby treatment of vets, it was actually the “greatest generation” assholes that were responsible for the misadventure that failed the vets completely and divided the country into two armed camps by instituting cultural and clas warfare. Whatever advances toward a more effective social contract Boomers have made, has been adamantly opposed and walked back by the, ahem, “greatest generation”. Does that dickhead want to claim the Koch heads are Boomers?So screw that crap.

    Have any of y’all switched to the new Google mail format. Oh I hate it when somebody changes something that works perfectly and tells me it’s for my benefit. It’s not horrible, but what was wrong with the original?

    And Charles Pierce certainly has the jeremiad as an arrow in his quiver. He excels at righteous indignation.

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  3. Deborah said on November 15, 2011 at 10:18 am

    I hear that about boomers every once in awhile at work, from my much younger colleagues. They always say “present company excluded” when I’m there but it always makes me uncomfortable.

    I read the fantastic Charles Pierce piece from Jolene’s link from the previous thread, very early this morning and now I’m considering buying his book “Idiot America”, my sentiments exactly.

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  4. Dexter said on November 15, 2011 at 10:24 am

    A ‘scalade. In nancy Nall’s driveway. We hardly knew ye.

    Out west a few years back, demonstrators were throwing paint on SUVs and their drivers. At least you won’t have to worry about that.

    The carriage will soon turn into a pumpkin. I am hoping Alan’s next tester will be one of those cutie-pie tiny Fiats which has my curiosity aroused by those commercials which feature a beautiful lady driver. (It’s JLo)
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=Zxggu-0YLrQ

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  5. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on November 15, 2011 at 10:27 am

    Brooks does not speak “cultural conservative” as a native language, or at all fluently. When he tries, it’s like Dad at a French restaurant trying to order “au naturel.” Very, very awkward. He could just as well have turned this into a lament for the decline of the Greatest Generation that could never quite live up to its press clippings in the Brokaw file, since Paterno was a commander-in-chief in the Eisenhowerian mode, he who famously edged around Joe McCarthy yelling at kids from Ike’s own front porch while creeping out to pick up the morning paper. “Hey, Joe, not so loud.” Ducks back in to read and drink some more Sanka.

    Whatever you want to say about the Boomers of which I may or may not be a part (depending on the chart used), you can’t lay this one on their doorstep.

    For what it’s worth, the Boy Scouts have had a no exceptions ban on adults & youth showering together since the early 80’s. It’s not a new concept. Originally, it was “camps must post and follow a schedule for adult & youth showering” and by the last decade, there are separate shower facilities at every summer camp property in the BSA. The Sandusky case also makes my long-standing point that background checks are ludicrously useless, spending $40 to find out that Mr. Jerry S. has no outstanding charges or convictions, which is what you would have gotten for the last twenty years. But a mandate to require and to contact three references to be a serving volunteer with youth: his interview is yet another proof of that point — molesters don’t quite see their world right in so many ways, and they will invariably give you a name that when you call, and say “This is a routine background check for our organization (church camp, Scouts, whatever), we’ve been given your name by BLANK. Would you be comfortable with BLANK working closely with your children?” — you’ll hear a long silence, and then a “Um, personally, no, and I’m surprised BLANK gave you my name. We dismissed them from our youth activity years ago.” I’ve had that conversation many times. References work, background checks just profit the companies that run them in bulk for you.

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  6. Peter said on November 15, 2011 at 10:30 am

    Jerry, Jerry, Jerry. You keep repeating that nonsense about horseplay and sooner or later you’re going to start to believe it.

    I’m sure the lawyer thought it was a good idea because if they can get just one person on the jury to believe it, he’s home free. The truly sick part is that if the trial is held anywhere near Happy Valley they’ll have no problem getting a jury of their peers, so why bother with the sympathy pub tour.

    EDIT: Jeff TMMO – you’re right about the scouts. I’m part of a camp inspection team for National, and a big part of the inspection is checking that showers and toilets have the hours posted and firmly secured to the building, as well as verifying that the state has done background checks on all employees.

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  7. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 10:31 am

    Sorry, this link is to a fundraising site. But the Mittens Romney video is just too perfect. Whited sepulchre.

    Escalade? Check. Viper? Back in my childhood Bloomfield Hills Pultevision, everybody’s dad worked for Big Auto or for J. Walter Thompson, so the latest hot cars were always on display in the neighbors’ driveways. And Dexter, everybody from Detroit knows that Fiat is an acronym.

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  8. 4dbirds said on November 15, 2011 at 10:36 am

    Well this boomer took her first job at 13, served in the army, raised 4 (5 if you include the years my step-daughter lived with us) children, paid taxes, paid my mortgage, voted in every election even when serving overseas and I give to charity. I think everything went downhill with Lord Raygun too. He made government service a dirty word and busted the unions. He paved the way for crappy wages and our journey into second world status.

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  9. jcburns said on November 15, 2011 at 10:38 am

    That picture is disturbing in so many ways. That’s right where we park our Prius when we come to visit!

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  10. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 10:56 am

    Raygun in a nutshell. Greatest generation, my ass. Of course, the Gumby Geezer did liberate Dachau, according to him.

    Somehow I grew up as an altarboy and an Eagle Scout without ever drawing the attention of any sexual predators. Although, I could tell something was up with the Youth Ministers, even at age ten, at the Babdiss Day Camp in Memphis.

    What conceivable logic could possibly be offered to support FLA’s bullshit pursuit of a waiver, with regard to the ACA requirement that insurance companies spend 80% of premiums on actual health care? Here’s what the lying bastards claim:

    Officials in Florida, where one in five people is uninsured, say the waiver is essential to keep insurers from packing up and moving their business out of state.

    Not if all states enforce the ACA requirement, you nitwits. Seems that if FLA gets this waiver, all the insurance companies would pack up and move to FLA. The logical fallacy is stunningly obvious. Just another attack on Obama’s success.

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  11. Joe Kobiela said on November 15, 2011 at 11:39 am

    F-fix
    I-it
    A-again
    T-tony
    Cheers from rainy Lexington KY
    Pilot Joe

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  12. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 12:00 pm

    Partisanship over Consumer Protection.

    With the Consumer Product Safety Commission split along party lines, the partisan paralysis that has crippled Washington’s ability to balance its budget and fix the economy now threatens to spread to the more prosaic business of government: assuring that roughly 15,000 products are reasonably safe to use.

    Democratic and Republican commissioners alike say they are seeking to protect consumers, millions of whom are injured each year by items under the agency’s purview. But Democrats say the GOP commissioners consistently put the financial interest of business ahead of consumer safety, while Republicans say the Democrats often rush to regulate without assessing whether the safety benefits outweigh the costs.

    For GOPers, childrens’ safety is a matter of cost/benefit analysis.

    This is incredibly weird shit from a weekly NFL column by Peter King in SI:

    In April 2005, Centre County (Pa.) district attorney Ray Gricar, who decided not to bring child-assault charges against Jerry Sandusky after an incident with a young boy in 1998, disappeared without a trace in Pennsylvania and has never been heard from since. His car was found in Lewisburg, Pa., near the Susquehanna River, and his laptop computer was found in the river.

    In May 1996, Gricar’s brother Roy, who lived in southwest Ohio, disappeared not long after being fired from his job in Dayton. His body was found days later in the Great Miami River. His car was found parked near the Great Miami River, and authorities ruled his death a suicide.

    I don’t know what that means. I just find it a horribly bizarre coincidence — I think.

    Is that kosher attribution? Even without quotation marks?

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  13. Julie Robinson said on November 15, 2011 at 12:15 pm

    Is anyone else flabbergasted that a car can cost $85K? Who buys these things, and why? (Rhetorical question.)

    It’s impossible to lump the entire boomer generation together. Early boomers came of age in a more prosperous economy than those of us born a little later. The late 70’s and early 80’s were not unlike today’s economy. Interest rates and unemployment were high, and inflation was out of control. Remember Ford’s Whip Inflation Now buttons?

    Boomers are facing social security cuts. Houses as investments for retirement? Ha-ha-ha. Finding a new job if you lose yours after the age of 50? Nope, no respect for older workers, as was the norm when we boomers were young.

    Jefftmmo, if blanket solutions don’t work for screening out predators, why do the Boy Scouts prohibit gay leaders?

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  14. nancy said on November 15, 2011 at 12:36 pm

    I’d imagine most people who have Escalades lease them, but yes, that price is jaw-dropping. Mine did, anyway.

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  15. Sue said on November 15, 2011 at 12:48 pm

    “Finding a new job if you lose yours after the age of 50? Nope”
    Julie, the flip side of that one’s going to be that boomers are staying too long in the workforce and keeping jobs that should go to younger workers. So, you’re a loser boomer if you can’t find a job and a selfish boomer if you keep working.
    Oh, and this guy’s Wikipedia page says he was born in 1952.

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  16. Deborah said on November 15, 2011 at 12:51 pm

    Joe, BMW, Break My Window or Bad Moves in Winter. Ford, Fix Or Repair Daily. There are probably a lot more.

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  17. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 12:53 pm

    I could have bought my first house twice for what that Caddy Urban Assault Vehicle costs.

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  18. Dorothy said on November 15, 2011 at 12:59 pm

    My first house was $37,500 in 1979, a 3 bedroom Cape Cod. Another Ford I’ve heard, Deborah, is Found On Road Dead.

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  19. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 1:16 pm

    Very cool space station video. Brilliant shots of recent Aurora manifestation. Which reminds me, Nancy’s photo from Phriday evokes a berfect adjective: boreal, particularly as it applies to Brother North Wind (for John Crowley fans).

    Maybe O’Reilly was responsible for this hilarious SNAFU.

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  20. Connie said on November 15, 2011 at 1:16 pm

    My first was $35,000 in 1978.

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  21. Bitter Scribe said on November 15, 2011 at 1:37 pm

    Sandusky is unbelievable. The man still thinks he’s a respected football coach. He has no idea yet that he is, was and always will be a child molester.

    I almost feel sorry for the son of a bitch. Then I remember his victims.

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  22. Jolene said on November 15, 2011 at 1:38 pm

    A propos of nothing in particular, an interesting story re smart people trying to figure out new uses (e.g., in pharmaceuticals, in all sorts of industrial applications) for tobacco. Love reading about this sort of creativity. Among other things, it’s so outside the realm of anything I know about that the possibilities seem like magic.

    http://mobile.washingtonpost.com/c.jsp?item=http%3a%2f%2fwww.washingtonpost.com%2flifestyle%2fstyle%2fon-maryland-tobacco-farms-turning-a-tradition-into-potential-health-benefits%2f2011%2f11%2f04%2fgIQANCzHMN_mobile.mobile&cid=578815&spf=1

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  23. Sherri said on November 15, 2011 at 1:45 pm

    I’m at the end of the Boomers/beginning of Generation X, depending on which source you use. My first house was in Silicon Valley, with the price tag to match, $350,000 in 1991. That was for a 40 year old 1900 sq ft house on a 5000 sq ft lot in a neighborhood that was about half owner occupied, half rental. Nice place, but nothing fancy, but location, location, location.

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  24. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 1:54 pm

    Hitchens drinking buddy Martin Amis actually says something complimentary about someone else’s books. Sign of the Apocalypse?

    Exactly who does this idiot thinks buys his books?

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  25. beb said on November 15, 2011 at 1:59 pm

    I was once told that the really cool thing about RVs was that because they were essentially a house on wheels, you could get a 30 year loan on them, which made them very cheap. But I always wonders what happens after ten years when the RV is starting to fall part and you still have twenty years left to pay on it. That’s kind of how I feel about owning an $85,000 car. Who could afford to own something like that, something that is expected to wear out after 10 — 15 years tops. And this is the car (in Red) that Mrs. da Mayor Kilpatrick wanted the City to provide for her.

    Walter Russell Mead’s screed about the boomer generation conflates the zeitgeist of an era with the people born during some related period. Like, blaming the baby-boomers for the Gordon Gecko era of “greed is good.” The trouble is that greed, as in the Savings-and-Loan bubble that burst during the Reagan years could hardly be blames on 30-something boomers. We weren’t in positions of power to have caused that financial melt-down. And the financial melt-down this time seems as much the result of bad behavior by guys in their 30s as guys in the 60s. It’s not when you were born that molds your behavior as it is the mood of the times. When finance became more powerful than manufacturing that’s where all the grifters flocked and frankly it’s a lot easier to scam people with phony stock deals then it is with crappy manufactured good. So we have entered the age Matt Tiabbi called “Griftopia.”

    Jeff(TMMO)’s comments are @5 were interesting and informative and the kind of plain truth that ought to be pasted directly into any handbook on volunteering. In fact Jeff has written a lot of advice here about social work that ought to be bound up in a hand book about how to do things right.

    I remember the Gricar case, where a DA just disappeared without trace or motive. That he was involved in an earlier case with Sandusky is too weird for comment. And while there’s no reason tp think his disappearance had anything to do with the child-rape scandal, it’s hard not to think that there’s something there.

    I’ve seen a few Fiat 500s driving around Detroit. They make Mini Cooper’s look large. I can’t imagine anyone, let alone four anyones getting into a Fiat 500 and riding comfortable. On the other hand I used to own a Geo Metro and though it was tiny I fit into it well. As for seating four… maybe it they were small children. But as the car I drove to work it was just right (50 mpg highway!)

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  26. Joe Kobiela said on November 15, 2011 at 2:04 pm

    F-first
    O-on
    R-race
    D-day
    New Ford Focus owner
    Pilot Joe

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  27. Bill said on November 15, 2011 at 2:19 pm

    The house/Escalade calculation is not entirely accurate.

    My ’64 Plymouth cost about $5,000; my new ’63 house (3 bedrooms, one bath, attached garage, on a slab) cost $17,000 making the car worth about 30% of the house.

    My ’07 Chrysler T&C cost about $25,000. My ’04 house (12 years old then) with 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, full basement, attached garage cost about $345,000. The car was worth about 7% of the house’s cost.

    Had I purchased an $85,000 Escalade it would have been worth about 25% of the house’s cost.

    Looks to me like cars have increased less in price than homes. And their quality is much, much better.

    Just sayin’.

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  28. Judybusy said on November 15, 2011 at 2:37 pm

    Jolene, I appreciated the article on tobacco–I had no idea it was such a great plant to experiment with. I grow the very fragrant, garden variety every year, and it’s one of our favorite flowers. We plant it by the backdoor so we can catch the scent coming and going. On a related note, our paper reported today that cardiac events have decreased by 45% since our tobacco ban went into effect a few years ago. The bars didn’t appear to suffer too badly, either, and I sure enjoy visiting neighborhood joints a lot more!

    Bill, you bring up a thought-provoking point–we would also have to adjust for inflation for the comparisons to truly make sense. I would also argue that comparing the percentage ratio to the home is skewed given the effects of the housing bubble on home prices as home prices clearly outstripped the background rate of inflation.

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  29. Jeff Borden said on November 15, 2011 at 2:37 pm

    I don’t know much about psychology or psychiatry, but based on the recordings of Jerry Sandusky’s conversation with Bob Costas, I wonder if he hasn’t passed the point where his self-justification is embedded into his psyche. I’ll be he could pass a lie detector test that asked him if he were a pedophile because in his twisted, sickfuck mind, he is not.

    His comments are absolutely astonishing. What adult male talks about showering with little boys, “horseplay” and “touching their legs,” but without sexual intent? This is a very twisted man. His whole persona screams “creepy,” yet he had the keys to the castle right up to the end at Penn State. Another question: Why is this garbage not in jail? His bail should be set at $1 million minimum and he should be wearing an ankle monitor at the minimum. I guess the Happy Valley region is so thick with blue and white alums and supporters that even the judges feel compelled to let a man charged with felony sexual assaults stroll out of court with only a minimum of bail.

    I fear the Penn State story is only just starting and, like the Catholic Church abuse stories, will grow in size, scope and sickening details.

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  30. moe99 said on November 15, 2011 at 2:51 pm

    F fix
    O or
    R repair
    D daily

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  31. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 2:55 pm

    Jeff, the judge that set Sandusky’s bail at $100grand unsecured, no leg monitor, is a Second Mile vounteer.

    http://deadspin.com/5859075/judge-who-set-unsecured-bail-for-jerry-sandusky-is-a-second-mile-volunteer-%5Bupdate%5D

    This is reminiscent of that judge that was all tangled up financially with Virginia AG Cuccinelli but claimed no conflict of interest when ruling against the ACA mandate. Or the bastard Scalia that didn’t recuse himself in the case of records of Cheney’s Enron strategy meetings.

    edit:

    Why Judge Hudson was crooked as hell to not recuse himself:

    http://www.standupforhealthcare.org/blog/20-years-of-active-service-to-the-republican-party

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  32. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on November 15, 2011 at 2:57 pm

    Julie – why does Scouting ban openly gay leaders? Because our national council is pretty much entirely beholden to Southern Baptist & LDS norms, and the idea of even local council option is anathema to them. It will change. For what it’s worth, and I don’t offer this as a defense, but a clarification, Scouting never in any way, shape, or form asks about sexual orientation. If you are quoted in public settings as an advocate for anything other than traditional marriage, then the council can withdraw your registration. They also do so if an unmarried, cohabiting person is a unit (troop, pack, or crew) leader and their non-regular status becomes a public matter. Youth orientation is not grounds for de-registration, but once you turn 18, you’re an adult leader, and the rules are different. The atheism issue works the same way – no one asks “are you an atheist,” but if a youth wants to make a public issue that they won’t say the Scout Oath (beginning “On my honor, I will do my best to do my duty to God and my country . . .”), then that can be grounds for de-registration.

    Something like 70% of all registered Scouts in the country are in units that are chartered (think “licensing agreement”) to either SBC, LDS, or United Methodist Churches. So the weight of opinion on guidelines is to keep them as is; the growing request from local councils is to allow Utah councils to have their guidelines, but not to impose the principle across the US. It almost passed about ten years ago, and it will be raised again.

    I spent Monday learning all about pr0n addiction in 13 & 14 year old boys for our intervention programs — kids can end up charged with felonies if they use a parental credit card to purchase more than $500 worth of online porn. Silly me thought the internet meant equal rights for seeing all sorts of naked people doing various unclothed things for free, but apparently the pr0n industry has gotten good at triggering the limbic systems of adolescent lads and inveigling them into grabbing Mom’s purse while she’s showering to get a credit card number. Our stock answer has always been “parent, you need to file a complaint for us to help you,” but if a parent doesn’t realize how big the bill actually is, the prosecutor’s office may end up filing a charge they really don’t want to see through after the dollars are lined up. Ohio just bumped that in June to $1,000, but it turns out not to be as difficult as I’d thought to ring up a K in lookie-lookie fees. It’s just been a disgusting week all around.

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  33. John C said on November 15, 2011 at 4:37 pm

    The interview made me as angry as I’ve been in a while at the television. I haven’t read all the comments here, so forgive me if this has been said. But that appearance – in particular the lawyer’s comments about “locating several of the witnesses who are going to come forward and say this never happened” – was an overt threat. He might as well have said: Do you REALLY want to do this? It was disgusting.
    Costas, though was awesome, especially as I’ve heard he had but a few minutes to prepare.
    Lastly, I’ve coached at least 20 youth sports teams, mostly basketball and baseball. I’ve spent hundreds of hours in the last few years with 10, 11 and 12-year-old boys, including a week in a barracks at a baseball tournament. I’m an emotional guy, and a big believer in learning the joys of being on a team, sharing ups and downs, pulling for each other, etc. I feel a bond with most of the kids I’ve coached, and I can say, categorically, that anything more than a high-five, a hand-shake and maybe a pat on the back is over the line. Period. The only exception is with your own child. Period. And I don’t say this as a cynic, hardened by “today’s society” or any crap like that. It would have been weird 50 years ago. It’s weird now. And it would never, in a million gazillion years, occur to me that it was in any way okay to shower with a child not my own. That was what was so creepy about that interview.

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  34. Dexter said on November 15, 2011 at 5:09 pm

    Bill? What model Plymouth did you buy? A ‘Cuda was only $2,500. My buddy had a 1964 Valiant and I think it was $2,100.

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  35. nancy said on November 15, 2011 at 5:09 pm

    Exactly. He seemed to believe this was just the way things are in the rest of the world. Showering together? It’s like a cheap porn movie.

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  36. Dexter said on November 15, 2011 at 5:10 pm

    Moe…that’s the kiddie Kool-Aid version.

    Fucked
    On
    Race
    Day

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  37. moe99 said on November 15, 2011 at 5:18 pm

    http://movieclips.com/myoL-airplane-movie-have-you-ever-seen-a-grown-man-naked/

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  38. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 5:22 pm

    Well, Dexter, Freddie Lorenzen was from Brooklyn and one of the greatest oval drivers ever lived, and he always drove Fords. Won races, despite ganging up by the good ole boys. Does anybody want to claim there is some sort of connection between being gay and being attracted to kids? That is an invention of straight people or people of some other perverse orientation altogether. How did anybody with a working brain allow nutcases like most likely Jerry Sandusky to act like child sexual predation had anything to do with homosexuality? This is not remotely logical. Normal homosexual men are attracted to grown men, the way normal Heterosexual grown men are attracted to grown women. N’est ce Pas? Seems like even a fucking moron GOPer should find that relatively easy to understand. Did Larry Craig tend toward the callow, or was it anybody that would pound shoes at the airport men’s room?

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  39. Bill said on November 15, 2011 at 5:25 pm

    Dexter @ 34: I think it was a ’64 Belvedere DeLuxe 4 door with a push-button automatic transmission. You may be correct about a lower price. It was 47 years ago and on some days I can hardly remember my own name.

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  40. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 5:35 pm

    I presume I’m correct about this. If there are heterosexual males drawn to sex with prepubescent children, it would be reasonable to expect as many homosexuals to experience the same sort of abberrant impulse, and no more. This is nothing but logic.What I obviously mean is that pretending like homosexuality makes a person more likely to be a pedophile is spectacularly asinine and grotesquely homophobic. Obviously, this has to do with youngsters perception of childhood experiences. And as Borden says, if it’s whatever, I doan know shit about how a kid is going to rebound from some shit like this. I will say again, and y’all can repeat I don’t know. If I came upon a big adult slamming a kid. I’d beat his brains out. I’d expect to get the Death Penalty. But who cares. I’d expose his brains on the wall and not feel bad about it. This is a nobrainer. What is wrong with that puto?

    Shit Nancy. These people are full of shit. I try to be true to what you think. It’s your spot. I’m only visiting.

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  41. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 5:46 pm

    You have to admit. You saw Berl getting set up like a pincushion. And that was a very enjoyable novel. You never read John Irving, right kidd? give it a try. You have no clue
    . Well, you do, You’re smart and clever and the idea we can consider
    Little Big is way bigger than whatever. Brother North Wind? Consider. What I said about, I’ve aside

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  42. Dexter said on November 15, 2011 at 5:52 pm

    Yesterday nance offered a thought towards Chelsea Clinton: “Fuck her.”
    I was thinking of which one celebrity could evoke blurting out the same epithet…and it took one nanosecond.
    Kim Kardashian. Fuck her.

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  43. John G. Wallace said on November 15, 2011 at 6:11 pm

    That Escalade has a higher MSRP than many homes in my development are presently listing for. That being said my neighbor across the street has a nice white one but it’s presently parked at the (only in Florida) bail bonds-pawn shop-buy here pay her lot in Vero Beach, I assume based on recent events it’s collateral on a surety bond.

    Someone yesterday made a comment on Chelsea being likely to have more reporting chops than Jenna Bush. Jenna has been doing education stories for NBC and the Today Show – not “feel good” stories. either way NBC has the first daughter demographic nailed.

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  44. Jeff Borden said on November 15, 2011 at 7:13 pm

    I hate celebrity journalism hires. My wife was more open-minded last night, suggesting that maybe Chelsea Clinton would turn into a good reporter/writer. My response was that on-the-job training at one of the Big Four networks is not cool. There are literally thousands of journalists who would do a better job, but they lack the name Clinton, Bush or Russert.

    This is yet another reason why I am happy to be mostly out of the media business. The reasons increase geometrically every year.

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  45. coozledad said on November 15, 2011 at 7:58 pm

    More Republican childbangers at the West Point for inbreds. Romney was here recently flexing his putative military dick muscles, wasn’t he?
    http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/11/15/the-citadel-releases-documents-on-child-sex-abuse-allegations/

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  46. Suzanne said on November 15, 2011 at 8:27 pm

    I heard just a clip of the coach, uh, I mean, molester on the radio this morning. Horseplay in the shower??? Feeling legs???? Who in their right mind would think this is normal???? It reminds me so much of Michael Jackson, who, I don’t believe, ever considered himself a molester, just a regular Joe who enjoyed sleepovers with pre-pubescent boys. I doubt Sandusky considers himself one either.

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  47. alex said on November 15, 2011 at 8:28 pm

    There’s no sinecure that can make up for the humiliation of being Bill Clinton’s daughter or wife. I say good on Chelsea just like I said good on Hillary when she became a senator.

    ###

    $85K for that blinged-out thing? That’s what that cost? Why am I not seeing them anywhere but on the bad side of town?

    You could get a couple or three or even four cars for that kind of money that you wouldn’t be embarrassed to be seen in.

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  48. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 8:59 pm

    HOW DO WE MAKE SENSE OF WHO WE PASS CASH TO? I HAVE NO COMPUNCTION ABOUT GIVING MONEY TO DEMOCRATIC POLITICS, BECAUSE REPUBLICANS ARE EVIL. THEY BELIEVE SCHIP IS GOING TO ROB SOME newt of his health coverage. Are you people shitheels?

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  49. alex said on November 15, 2011 at 9:03 pm

    Come to think of it I parked my Tundra in that very same spot at Nance’s house. Not to protect the rims so much as the window glass, it being a non-union product.

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  50. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 9:04 pm

    It seems to me that when we all become wome sort of shitheel, we have to be making sure we are despicable assholes. Let me get this straight. You put the lime in the coconut. These people are the most asinine shitheads that ever lived. You can’t fall back on Harry Newman. You fucking morons.

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  51. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 9:08 pm

    Jesus act like you ever had some siruation. Christ, you have already made evereything idiotic, What a bunch of assholes. This is a great story and you have sullied it pretty poorly.

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  52. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 9:12 pm

    The story is excellent. The way the woman laid it it out is astounding. Could you have done better? I doubt it. I personally think the whole story was mighty wll one. Whatevever anybody else thinks. Mighty fine story. If you don’t think so, you are a dumbass

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  53. BigHank53 said on November 15, 2011 at 9:24 pm

    The reason you see the Escalade on the bad side of town is that the folks in the better parts know that it’s a tarted-up Chevrolet Suburban, and would rather keep the $40,000 difference in their pockets.

    The bizarre part is that if you were in the market for an expensive American car, you could go out and buy a Cadillac CTS-V for $30,000 less than the Suburban in a push-up bra. The CTS-V is a modest little four door sedan…with a 550 hp Corvette engine in it. More fun than a Suburban, and about a thousand times less likely to get stolen. Especially if you buy the wagon.

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  54. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 11:45 pm

    I want to thank a few of you for letting me understand why my feet fail me, Not long ago, some of you discussesed CMT. It’s not a thing anybody wants to find out about. There is no cure. Actually, what I’ve read says ride that bike,, So Good as we get. I started a couple years ago with severe drop foot. When you have spent your entire life as an athlete and you have this sort of failure, it is frightening. So my legs are failing me. . This is not something I take remotely funny. But, you know. I do. I probably deserve this. I am almost sure this is some shit I deserve for drinking. So I will assume all of the blame for everything bad thad ever happened to me. It is all my fault. Anybody understand that. No shit. It is my fault.

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  55. moe99 said on November 15, 2011 at 11:50 pm

    McQueary now saying he did stop the assault and spoke with the police:

    http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/McQueary-Says-He-Did-Tell-Police-About-Sex-Abuse-133920778.html

    JoPa transferred his share of the family house to his wife for $1 back in July:
    http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/16/sports/ncaafootball/in-july-paterno-transferred-ownership-of-home-to-his-wife-for-1.html

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  56. caliban said on November 15, 2011 at 11:55 pm

    Good lord, what a buncha cool bastards, No shit? It’s not a happy thing to find out. CMT sucks, bigtime. But at least I know what the deal is. It is poor, AND I WILL deal. Fuck you.

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  57. Dexter said on November 16, 2011 at 2:16 am

    caliban: It isn’t your fault. My wife has spent the past few months seeing various vascular, ortho, and neuro doctors , who in conjunction came to a decision as to her candidacy for knee replacement surgeries.
    Her CMT is so bad that she cannot have the surgeries at all.
    She must wear these high-technical braces for as long as she can still walk.
    The CMT runs wild in her family. Our middle daughter had a painful injection of cortisone directly into her hand yesterday.
    Our grandson sits in a barracks, unable to finish his army advanced training due to two broken bones in his feet.
    Charcot-Marie-Tooth. It’s a heartbreaker, and it is inherited.
    Now since I believe, as did Wild Bill Cody, that any damn fool can drink himself to death, maybe you’d feel better if you quit.
    However, I also know for a fact that a human being has just so many drinks reserved for him in The Book of Life. So just keep drinking until one day you’ll be just like Forrest Gump on his run…you’ll just quit forever. You’re still in command of your faculties and maybe some day you’ll prefer sobriety over intoxication. Damifino! SO until then, keep the refrigerator just right to chill that suds down jesssss’ right.

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  58. caliban said on November 16, 2011 at 2:38 am

    McQuearey, how could you not? In the moment? How would you you not intervene physically? I do not understand how you anybody would not beat this asshole to a pulp. And I do not understand how anybody connects this with homosexexuals. That is asinine. Sandusky is a heterosexual pervert, that probably liked girls as well as boys, so long as they were prepubescent. He was just a creep, and there is no getting around that,

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  59. caliban said on November 16, 2011 at 2:50 am

    Dextwr, you are a really good guy. I am perfectly willing to take my medicine, I have taken my more than liquor, and everything I’ve done to my neural system, I eill buy it. It is all my fault. I am as big an asshole as ever came around. You can not get more of an asshole than I.
    I want this actally embedded in the internet.

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  60. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on November 16, 2011 at 6:51 am

    The tragedy and horror that is these guys is that they usually have a wife and kids. Ephebophilia generally has nothing to do with homosexuality. A given variation in any normal population, a sick compulsion, or an evil choice? The clinical experts in my neck of the woods tell me the evidence covers all three options, so you pays your money and you takes your chances.

    I’m having an argument on Facebook with a friend of a friend who apparently is in soc/psych at OSU whose profs are saying sex offenders are horribly demonized by our prudish society and that once identified are better rehabilitated and non-recurring more than any other criminal behavior, and I’m taking the same study and saying the data shows that men who molest/rape unrelated boys are significant risks for recurrence and there’s no one who says they can truly treat to an assurance this condition. It’s getting testy mainly because apparently the profs are saying the clinical professionals who work with courts & corrections aren’t to be trusted because they don’t really want to help people but are protecting their jobs by keeping offenders in the system . . . grrrrrrr.

    As a general group all in a lump, sex offenders aren’t any worse than people who establish a life pattern of theft or violence to recidivate, and I agree that as a society we don’t offer much of a path to redemption. Cross a line, and you can be upright & appropriate for decades, but the mark of Cain is still upon you. It IS a problem, but so-called ephebophilia is justly, IMHO & based on no small amount of experience, a separate category.

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  61. ROGirl said on November 16, 2011 at 7:30 am

    Men who sexually prey on boys are the worst of the worst (I should qualify that: adults who prey sexually on children). I offer no excuses for them, and many who were preyed on when they were young don’t go on to do the same when they grow up. However, there is a correlation between being a victim when young and going on to victimize in adulthood. Not stopping it when it happens just increases the odds that it will be perpetuated on the next generation, and so on. It has to be reported and stopped when it happens.

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