Steve McIntyre writes about what many of us have been thinking about Penn State’s failures at investigating its own, such as the appearance of a whitewash investigation done about Dr. Michael Mann and Climategate. He writes:
On the same day that Nature published yet another editorial repudiating public examination of the conduct of academic institutions, Penn State President Graham Spanier was fired from his $813,000/year job for failing to ensure that a proper investigation was carried out in respect to pedophilia allegations in Penn State’s hugely profitable football program. The story is receiving massive coverage in North America because the iconic Penn State football coach, Joe Paterno, was also fired today.
CA readers are aware of Spanier’s failure to ensure proper investigation of Climategate emails and his untrue puffs about the ineffective Penn State Inquiry Committee, reported at CA here and by the the Penn State Collegian as follows:
…
Spanier was fired not because of any personal role in the Sandusky football scandal, but because of negligence on his part in ensuring that the allegations were properly investigated. This was not the only case in which Spanier failed to ensure proper investigation of misconduct allegations. As noted above, Spanier had falsely reported to the Penn State trustees and the public that the Penn State Inquiry Committee had properly interviewed critics and had examined the Climategate documents and issues “from all sides”.
Full story here
Pamela Gray, under normal circumstances I’d be inclined to agree with you. However Penn State is rotten to the core is this is hardly normal. Corrupt in small things, corrupt in large things.
An organization that thinks nothing of concealing the destruction of the lives of children would not hesitate in covering up for data fudger and egomaniac like Michael Mann.
I say 10 billion in damages for each child raped on that campus!
Little has been said in comments in this thread about the Editorial in Nature regarding the email FOI saga. Is it not worth its own post?
I posted this at Nature a few minutes ago, in fact at the eleventh second of the eleventh minute of the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month of the eleventh year of this century, presumably Eastern Standard Time. If only because of the coincidence of the time of posting, which was truly coincidental and not an attempt at trickery, as could be argued was the subject matter being investigated in the emails, I hope that Nature will not delete my posting.
“• 2011-11-11 11:11 AM
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Colin Porter said:
One would have thought that a publication of such very high repute like Nature would have welcomed and encouraged a spirit of openness and honesty, and would have supported the publication of these emails, if for no other reasons than to enhance Michael Mann’s reputation and with it his palaeontology reconstructions, which Nature has hitherto so enthusiastically promoted.
Perhaps the phrase “Mike’s Nature Trick” is inhibiting or worrying the editors of Nature. Could it be that the conduct of other organisations with whom Mann had dealings would also be exposed, were the emails ever to be published?
And in the spirit of integrity and openness, I fully hope and expect that my post will not be moderated.”
The sleazy activities throughout big bucks football programs at our universities is the usual stuff. Sadly in contrast we have climate science being so corrupt that it is now difficult to trust any of the sciences through association. The more money, the more corruption creeps into the program.
Other examples abound.For example: NASA has produced a bundle of great achievements, yet what can be trusted coming from their production, especially around climate?
Another example is the pharmaceuticals. A science that is unethically killing people under the premise medical treatment.. The quackery is rampant. If one does a little digging, you’ll discover that the heart attack rates having been increasing per capita directly to the dispensing of statins, an anti-inflammatory liver toxin.
Now we have to have watch dogs combing all science journals for garbage, when those journals used to be reliable to weed out junk science.
So the Penn State fiasco is inline with many of our higher education corruption that is out of control. The appointed board of directors are mandated to promote a standard of excellence, but the only excellence is fraud.
Tucci78 says:
November 11, 2011 at 8:40 am
Tucci, Tucci, Tucci,
Wow! Has NAAMBLA weighed into the debate? “The ‘tucci’ doth protest too much, me thinks”, to slightly misquote the venerable bard.
Or perhaps Richard Dawkins? “Regarding the accusations of sexual abuse of children by Catholic priests, deplorable and disgusting as those abuses are, they are not so harmful to the children as the grievous mental harm in bringing up the child Catholic in the first place.” — http://www.thedubliner.ie/the_dubliner_magazine/2007/04/the_god_shaped_.html
pbh
I hired a Penn State grad exec and his education was supperb. I also know Penn State has some fine schools and preferred donors. Donors didn’t really fade with Mann but this damage is cummulative. i suspect more donors will shift elswhere. This the first concern for the trustees.
On low class firing?
Yep. Reporters surrounded Paternos house and firing by phone was a least worst option. Paterno hustled to do a departure press conference to leave on “his terms” The trustees took control and fired him on their terms and cancelled the conference. Just in time.
The coverups are expressed in secrets and lack of accountibility.
My daughter was into the NCAA national championsjips in track. Her coaches were males since middle school. There is a lot of adult responsibility that must be respected and guarded. One of her coaches I had in college.
I disagree, Pamela. While the scandals are wildly divergent in their detail, what they share in common is state employees (paid by taxes) deciding they have the power to choose who they are accountable to, and who they are not accountable to. The folks who actually pay their salaries are to date, unfortunately, in the latter group.
Hey let’s investigate Michael Mann for molesting young temperature data!
In a senseless non-response to my post of 8:40 AM on 11 November, at 9:07 AM on the same date Paul Hull stupidly spews:
Nope. Have you any experience in the medical management of either child, adolescent, or adult survivors of child abuse of any kind?
Heck, do you have anything remotely resembling a reasoned argument to counter the observations I’d posted in the comment to which you’re not responding?
Tighten your sphincters, Hull. You’re seeping.
Tucci, I have such knowledge and you are full of something else entirely. Utter destruction from such abuse can be as hidden as a failing heart till you end up on the floor. That people walk around seemingly well on the outside with such dreadful secrets inside is NOT a testemonial to the resiliance of humans to withstand and overcome such events.
Dave Springer says:
November 11, 2011 at 8:39 am
@Combs
You need to qualify who owns the media. It’s true it’s owned and controlled by the wealthy but it’s wealthy liberals for the most part. Wealthy conservatives own the military industrial complex. I’m not sure which has the greater influence.>>>
The pen is mightier than the sword.
REP…
The innuendo is that Michael Mann (should he be asked and I suggest that he should be directly asked) has no option but to declare that a full disclosure of all information regarding the child sex rape cover up be made. The innuendo is that given this obvious, yet unstated position, Mann is faced with the inconsistency of a philosophical and practical contradiction. He and the rest of the academics who form the college.
In the case of his own cover-up, he is on record claiming that information needs to be held secret even though it serves enormous social impact. On the other hand, it is undeniable that in the case of this crime against children, where it appears that a Penn State cover-up also took place, Mann is lothe to attempt to defend Penn State’s actions.
The innuendo is hypocrisy and intellectual dishonesty. I ask you directly Dr Michael Mann: To what extent is it permissible for Penn State to conceal the crimes against children. I also ask you directly: To what extent is it permissible for Penn State to conceal the crimes against society.
The need for secrecy is only in service to criminal behavior.
[REPLY: Much better. -REP]
It is definitely over the top to make an analogy between the overlooking of a heinous crime like paedophile rape and the distorted workings of a disreputable ‘scientist’.
Agreed – at the level of the perpetrators. However, the issue here is with the supposed upholder of integrity for the whole university, Spanier. It b****y well is Spanier’s business to put two and two together to see the global effects of one piece of f***d science. IMHO. That is what true management ought to be about.
And the same goes for University of East Anglia and the corrupt whitewashes there.
And Scott Mandia’s little outfit as you note Peter
Institutions like Penn State always protect their own, especially when money is involved. PSU now has an established pattern of institutional denial.
Nature has a lovely way of compensating for the misdeeds of men.
Almost makes you think there is a Gaia!
I am sure that google is making a HUGE effort to stifle any link between Graham Spanier and MIchael Mann, climate, climategate, etc… just try, results = 0
At 9:44 AM on 11 November, Pamela Gray addresses me to claim:
Ms. Gray, if your “knowledge” of child abuse derives from your personal individual experience as a victim of such – emotional, sexual, and/or physical – and is not supported by a broader and more dispassionate appreciation of the phenomena (such as those of us in the health care racket get, along with didactic and clinical training), then you’re speaking on the basis of information as abjectly inadequate as is your blithering about “as hidden as a failing heart” (which actually presents with symptoms and signs that tend reliably to be pretty friggin’ obvious).
If you have your knowledge as the subject of childhood abuse – of any kind – you have my sympathies.
Not my respect, mind you. But my sympathies.
With that and about a buck, you can get yourself a cup of coffee at the local donut shop.
To get my respect – and the respect of anybody else who has actually been professionally responsible for helping real people survive the experience of child abuse – try coming up with reasoned argument on the subject. Otherwise, please join Mr. Hull and Jeremy in the “time out” corner.
Wondering if the Federal investigation will searching Spanier’s computers and emails?
If so, won’t this put Spanier’s emails outside of Penn States control?
He surely, mentions the Mann investigation within emails?
Tucci78 says:
November 11, 2011 at 10:22 am
I am sorry, your incessant blathering is just that until you cite actual studies and so forth. I would be happy to read anything you will cite. I would also appreciate if you take your attitude and shove it. No one appreciates it and it just makes you look like a bigger [snip]. Also, I have the feeling that your respect is as useless as your sympathies, so please, find bigger carrots.
Patern’s being fired over the phone has some people’s panties in a wad? Really? Maybe Gloria Allred can redress this insult!
Joe Paterno will be lucky to escape criminal charges. The board acted properly in firing him. I don’t give a rat’s @ur momisugly$$ if they sent armed guards to his office and bodily threw him off the campus.
University of Pennsylvania, Class of ’76 says:
November 11, 2011 at 4:04 am
Chuck Nolan, this happened at PENN STATE, not UNIV OF PENNSYLVANIA!
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My apologies. I knew that and then lost it while thinking and typing.
David Falkner says:
November 11, 2011 at 10:41 am
Tucci78 says:
November 11, 2011 at 10:22 am
I am sorry, your incessant blathering is just that until you cite actual studies and so forth. I would be happy to read anything you will cite. I would also appreciate if you take your attitude and shove it. No one appreciates it and it just makes you look like a bigger [snip]. Also, I have the feeling that your respect is as useless as your sympathies, so please, find bigger carrots.
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WELL SAID!!!
Tucci, your displayed anger demonstated throughout is palpable and suggestvely pathological. Perhaps its you who would benefit from the timeout. Sincerely, with that amount of barely restrained anger, I hope you have nothing to do with any disturbed indviduals.
As to the issues on the table here for WUWT, the allegations of pedophillia are moot. The issue is the fiduciary response of the President and by extension, the board, in both this and the Mann file. Both situations are but branches of the same tree. I would argue that its all an extension of and consistent with the moral ambiguity the liberal left has become famous for, but I won’t; no time for the “moral outrage”…;)
Academia is proving to be as insular and arrogant as the Catholic Church.paterno and Sanier acted like Bishops covering up for a corrupt priest.
Their is the obvious cyncial cover-up that was the faux invesitgation of Mann. The fabricated rights of academics to avoid normal reviews of their publicly funded work at U Virginia. The UEA and its sorry transparent violations of legitimate FOI requests. Academics shows themselvesto be a spolied group that seems to think of themselves inerrant, seperate from society and accountable to no one they do not approve of.
Paterno and his involvement in what is turning into an organized pedophile conspiracy, even if he simply declined to do the right moral thing, is just another academic as far as I can tell.
The exceptional ones are those who are daring to stand against the consensus of their peers, to call out those they know are doing dubious work or worse.
As always, there are far too few of the exceptional ones.
Who is condemning Chris Mooney for his trash book? is the AGU going to fire him?
Who is condemning Mann and his obvious evasion?
Who is willing to stand up Hansen as he yet again makes phony claims about the weather and for his past support of xenocidal terrorism?
Who is going to stand clearly against the IPCC and their rejection of even the most basic conflicts of interest policies and their being used by NGO’s to push junk science?
Paterno’s failure is just a disgusting example of what is typical for academia today.
Tucci,
As to reasoned argument, do you or do you not agree with the thrust of the Richard Dawkins piece found here? http://www.thedubliner.ie/the_dubliner_magazine/2007/04/the_god_shaped_.html
We are attempting to find out the basis for your diatribe. So far it is not discernible. And your rant without knowledge about who has or has not dealt directly with child abuse is equally obscure. Are you claiming some kind of clairvoyance or other super natural power as you assume that which you do not know?
While I might agree with your apparent protest against ‘professional victims’ and their handlers, your over-the-top over reaction is rather curious. It seems as if you are claiming that there is no lasting harm for victims of abuse. My FAMILY experience tells me “unto the second and third generation”.
And by the way, I just love your “I’m the adult. Sit down and listen to me persona.” Just a wee bit full of yourself, I’d venture.
@kim2ooo says: November 11, 2011 at 10:58 am
Ditto!