The shakeup at Penn State is devastating. Devastating.
And it will take years for the university to recover.
But the Board of Trustees of Penn State took the proper actions tonight. They did the right thing. They did what had to be done. They carried out their responsibility to the people of Pennsylvania and to the entire Penn State family -- faculty, staff, students, alumni and all those who are associated with Penn State in any way.
Tonight, the Board took a huge step. But this must just the first step on a long road back.
Many more actions must yet be taken to restore trust and begin to repair the university's brand and the good name of a great institution.
The child sexual abuse that occurred was an outrage -- a shocking affront to all moral sensibility. It was heinous. And our focus now must rightly be on the victims and their families.
And that must also be the focus of Penn State and all Penn Staters from today onward. That must be the focus: not the ousted officials (those ousted today and those to come); not the football program; not the athletic department; not the state of the tailgating that would or would not have taken place this weekend.
No. None of those. Those are all of little or no consequence.
Party time is over.
Never again should a sport or a coach (or coaches) be mythologized like this -- heralded beyond all reason and allowed to function in a sort of pristine vacuum, insulated and pampered like potentates.
A crisis like this puts things into perspective real fast.
And the priority here must be helping the victims and their families and beginning, however feebly, to attempt to right the wrongs -- as best as possible.
And the focus must also be on doing justice -- all who were responsible must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. Justice must be thorough and swift.
These are the priorities now.
Avanti!
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