Will the Real Penn State Please Stand Up?

I've heard lots of snide comments about my home town and alma mater over the last several months thanks to the Jerry Sandusky case ("We are...Penn rape" - ah, yes, very classy). One of the most recent had to do with the composition of the jury, drawn from the State College area and by default having lots of ties to Penn State.

Displaying a lack of empathy akin to the one they attribute to senior administrators who apparently shielded Sandusky for years, many have openly opined that the people in and around State College are so blinded by love of Penn State football that a jury composed of locals was almost certain to acquit Sandusky because of his history with the team. Now that this jury has come back with guilty verdicts on all but a few charges, I wonder what those critics will say next. While I'd like to believe they'll rethink that initial assessment, I suspect it's more likely that many will simply double down and suggest that the fact that a few of the charges came back "not guilty" proves their warped point.

Alternatively, the storyline may become that of a jury more concerned with taking revenge on Sandusky for Joe Paterno's downfall than in justice for Sandusky's victims. On one level, of course, the jury's motives are irrelevant as long as justice has been done, but I am sick of hearing these blowhards disparage tens of thousands of people because of the sins of a few. If said blowhards are actually concerned with the truth, the story should be that a jury that many believed would be sympathetic to the defendant heard both sides of the case and concluded that the defendant was a monster. Success with honor, some might say.

We Are...Tone Deaf

As a member of the Penn State faithful, I'd be lying if I claimed I could be totally objective about the trial of Jerry Sandusky and the events that have preceded it over the past several months. Perhaps the one good thing about the trial is that it puts the focus squarely on the figure who seemed to be strangely in the background while the late Joe Paterno was being vilified, the monster who is Jerry Sandusky. In short, I'm not an advocate of blaming the masses for the sins of the few. That said, the e-mail I received from Penn State today, touting the start of a new era in Penn State football, coming on the heels of another day of harrowing testimony in the Sandusky trial makes it hard not to wonder if my alma mater isn't truly as rotten to the core as critics would suggest.

A Bumpy Ride on The Yellow Brick Road

It would probably be in poor taste to refer to the past several days' celebrations of the Queen jubilee as London's biggest event since the Battle of Britain. The upcoming Summer Olympics may end up being a bigger global event, but they probably won't surpass recent festivities for overall spectacle. One part of that spectacle calls attention to itself for the wrong reasons, the pop concert held at Buckingham Palace Monday from which highlights were shown on ABC last night.

I was tempted to put the term highlights in quotation marks, but that would be unfair because there were some genuinely good performances. Paul McCartney doesn't seem as ageless as he once did but still gives a good show, while Stevie Wonder and Tom Jones also delivered engaging performances. Beyond that trio, though, things got a bit questionable.

Madness were pretty good, but I couldn't shake the feeling that they were picked to appear because Prince Charles had a vague recollection that Princess Diana liked them (or perhaps Spandau Ballet was busy). It's equally hard to envision why anyone thought that Kylie Minogue in shorts and high-heels was in tune with the message of "celebrating an enduring royal legacy." It's also possible she was lip-synching, but at least she was in tune - something not everyone performing could claim.

Some may have been critical of the Queen wearing ear plugs during the concert in her honor, however, it was truly the only rational response to how awful Elton John sounded. At first I hoped that he was just having trouble with the uptempo numbers, as some artists do at his age, but I'm Still Standing was not an anomaly. Your Song was if anything even worse, and if I hadn't wanted to see Paul McCartney I would have changed the channel.

I'm glad I didn't because on reflection I realized that what "Sir Elton" was doing was truly visionary. Rather than let cover versions by inferior artists destroy his songs, he decided to destroy them himself. On a night celebrating legacy, there's something to be said for that.