"Believe deep down in your heart that you're destined to do great things." Joe Paterno

It has been interesting to follow the byplay online after this weekend's debut of the HBO film "Paterno." Not that anyone expected it to change any minds, but it did resurrect the arguments that flared when the real Joe Paterno was forced out of his longtime job as head football coach at Penn State University when his former assistant Jerry Sandusky was revealed to have been charged with multiple counts of child sexual abuse so disgusting that even the most vile person on earth would shudder.

There seems little doubt that Paterno was alerted to what Sandusky was doing with all these young boys he had hanging around with him. He even set up a charitable foundation to guarantee a continuous flow of young men from which to choose to satiate his bizarre desires. An assistant saw Sandusky in the shower with a boy and told Paterno, who said he thought his duty in the matter was completed when he reported the matter to higher-ups.

Jerry and Joe.  Football first!

So when years went by and no action was taken against Sandusky, did Joe wonder why, or see if he could do something to help bring justice to the boys? He did not. He played the "I'm just a dumb old football coach; I don't know nothing about no men horsing around with each other or nothin' " card. He concentrated solely on football, winning 409 games, 111 of which were vacated in the aftermath of the scandal, only to be restored when the university paid $60,000,000 in fines to be used to be used to combat the horrible specter of sexual abuse of children.

People who support Paterno and still lionize the head Nittany Lion say they are only trying to honor his legacy. His detractors say PSU football and the university itself and the culture centering around the football team bear the blame for not stopping Sandusky.  That was, after all, the conclusion of the report of the Freeh commission, the independent commission organized to look into the whole sickening affair.

Keith Olbermann said, “This is Joe Paterno’s legacy. This is Penn State’s legacy. Football was more important to them than saving children.”

It's sad any way you look at it. For decades, everyone - students, ballplayers, fans, everyone involved with PSU football except for those poor young men being repeatedly violated by Sandusky - called Joe Paterno "Joe Pa."  How nice, how homey, how...paternal.

Did you ever stop to think that "Paterno" is an Italian word meaning "fatherly"?

Fatherly people protect even the weakest, those least able to help themselves.