Penn State's Unrest Appalling

How does a survivor of sexual abuse respond to students rioting at Penn State?
"You're not getting it. You just don't get it," said Dave Lorenz who was abused by a priest as a teen.
"It's just stupid youthfulness."
Earlier this week, legendary head football coach Joe Paterno was removed in the midst of a scandal involving sexual abuse allegations against a former defensive coordinator, Jerry Sandusky.

Penn State student explains riot

What started as an apparent celebration of Paterno turned into a riot in the Pennsylvania town of State College. The crowd tipped over a news van and decried the media in anger Wednesday night. They held signs in support of "JoePa" -- a nickname for Paterno.
Some said their frustration stemmed from the media's focus on Paterno, rather than the charges against Sandusky.
Watching footage of Penn State students rioting in the streets Wednesday night, Lorenzo shuddered, then hung his head.
What bothered Lorenz is that students "rallied around (Paterno's) house, cheering him up."
"The kids up there just don't understand what this does," he said.
"Stop thinking of the adult and start thinking of what happens to a child that goes through this. You love the adult, you may not know the kid. Start thinking of the kid and the horror they go through, because it's hell."
Paterno has been under scrutiny because of his response to allegations brought to him in 2002 by a graduate assistant. The assistant allegedly said he witnessed Sandusky, now 67, having sex with a young boy in a shower at the campus football complex, according to a grand jury indictment.
Paterno reported the allegations to his boss and Pennsylvania's attorney general said it appeared Paterno had met his obligations under state law. But critics said the coach should have reported the suspected abuse to police.
Sandusky is accused of sexual offenses, child endangerment and "corruption of a minor" involving eight boys.
Many within the Penn State community condemned the crowd's actions. In the campus newspaper The Daily Collegian, an editorial read: "Wednesday night was an embarrassment for Penn State... The way students reacted set our university two steps back."
Earlier this week, as questions about the coach's action mounted, students began swarming Paterno's home. The gatherings had the tone of a pep rally.
Kayla Garriott, a 22-year-old college student who was sexually abused as a child, said the open support for Paterno was disrespectful to survivors.
"That's the first thing people look at -- that their football team is without their head coach that's been there so many years. Nobody looks at the eight children."
The rioters are "never going to be in those children's shoes. It's not about football. It's about eight children who are never going to get back their lives back. They're going to live with this the rest of their lives. They might not get over that."
This kind of spectacle could even make abused kids more reluctant to go to the police, she said.
The Penn State scandal prompted numerous calls from sexual abuse survivors, said Barbara Dorris, the outreach director at Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests.
"I have talked to people all over the country who have dealt with their abuse," she said. "This is bringing it all back. It's so upsetting. They were crying. They were angry."
The reaction of the crowd could send an unintended message to children and teenagers who've been abused: They may feel blamed for what happened to the football team and the rioting, said Dorris, who was also abused as a child.
It's a "horrible statement that a winning football team is more important than the safety of the children. It mirrors what happened in the (Catholic) church."
Jerry Needel, a Penn State alum who graduated in 1999, watched the news unfold and felt he had to do something.
"This just shook my beliefs and a big part of my identity to the core," he said.
He started a campaign to shift the attention to supporting victims of child abuse, by raising money for RAINN, which stands for Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network.
In addition, some Penn State students are planning to dress in blue for their next football game to support the victims of child abuse worldwide.
Jennifer Marsh, the director of the National Sexual Assault Hotline said the news story is bringing awareness and facilitating a national discussion about abuse, a topic often cloaked in secrecy.
"The biggest takeaway we've seen is just the outpouring of support to victims and survivors."

"One's" in a lifetime :)

In the middle of cake and presents last year, Lynsie Schuman had a revelation about her twins. They were destined to celebrate their golden birthday on a special day -- "ones" in a lifetime, so to speak.
Kyra and Tyler are turning 11 on 11/11/11.
"It's pretty cool," said Kyra, who will be leaving her native Wisconsin for Cancun, Mexico, with her family for a special celebration. Not just because she will probably not see another 11/11/11 in her lifetime, but because of her grandpa, Philip Schuman, who served in Vietnam.
"It's Veterans Day," Kyra said.
People around the world have made special plans for Friday. Think of when the clock strikes 11:11:11 on 11/11/11. A perfect palindrome -- the time and date reading the same backwards and forwards -- and the only double-figure palindromic date.
And 11/11/11 won't come around again for another 100 years.
Wake Forest University Physicist Eric Carlson, who studies numbers as a hobby, said the date has no significance other than its numeric perfection, marred only by the use of all four numbers of the year 2011. Consider the uniqueness of the day in 1111.
The way Carlson looks at it, people can take whatever they want from the date.
"I have no problem with Americans celebrating the day," he said. Just like he did on the day he turned 1 billion -- seconds, that is. Only a numbers guru would do something like that.
If some folks consider 11 lucky, so be it. Just as 13 (the number of people present at the Last Supper before Jesus' death) is thought of as unlucky. But it's still just a number. You might not want to sit on the 13th row in an airplane, but would you turn down the 13th roll in a baker's dozen?
Carlson said part of the reason times and dates are heightened in people's minds is because of the digital age -- phone numbers, passwords, PINS. So many numbers to remember.
"Such phenomena involving numbers have become much more prominent," he said.
And human brains are naturally inclined to look for patterns. If you look at an analog clock, you might not notice 11:11 as much as you would on a digital one with four lighted numerals, all the same, staring at you.
"These patterns stick in our minds," Carlson said. "But I don't think there is any mystical significance to it."
Maybe not.
But if you ask Daniel Hardt, president of Life Path Numerology Center in Indianapolis, 11/11/11 is sure to be different.
"It's going to be a powerful day. No question about it," said Hardt, a numerologist who deals with numbers as symbols of energy of the universe. "Any time you add intensity of the same number, it's going to have some effect."
So, on Friday, your dreams could be more vivid or you could be more on edge, Hardt said.
"People will experience their emotions more," he said.
Those who are happy, well, they'll be more happy, he said. And those who are having a pity party will have a doozy. That's the world according to Hardt.
So, if you are visiting the grave of a loved one on Veteran's Day or attending an emotional war remembrance ceremony, take extra tissues, he said.
Conversely, it's a good day for love, and Las Vegas chapels will be busting at the seams with couples wanting to tie the knot on 11/11/11.
Chapel of the Flowers on average marries 20 to 30 couples a day. But Friday, it has about 80 planned, said Aimee Stephens, the marketing director.
Every ceremony is a half-hour process, so the two chapels, their ministers and staff will be going full steam all day Friday.
"We have been prepared for this," Stephens said. "People seem to love these numeric occurrences."
Although, she said, she's not sure whether it's the romance of the date or a matter of making sure that a husband never forgets an anniversary. Kinda hard not to remember 11/11/11.
Tiffany Masters, known as the queen of nightlife in Sin City, is planning what she billed as the world's largest reception Friday night to mark all the 11/11/11 weddings in Vegas.
She's opening the doors at the Tropicana for the couples who have nowhere special to go after saying, "I do."
She said her research showed that about 75,000 people were getting married in America on Friday, many of them in Vegas. As of Wednesday, 3,400 couples had signed up.
The Viva Las Vegas Wedding Chapel, which specializes in Elvis Presley ministers, anticipates performing more than 300 weddings Friday.
"A few years ago, the lucky number was 7/7/7," the chapel said on its website. "Throwing a 7 or an 11 is considered to be lucky in Las Vegas. 2007's 7/7/7 was a huge day for Viva Las Vegas weddings, with a record 160 weddings performed that day. Numeric configurations have only become more popular. 2010 brought us 205 happy couples for 10-10-10 weddings and this year, we already have a whopping 170 ceremonies in progress for 11/11/11. By the time the day is over, we anticipate performing over 300 wedding ceremonies for 11/11/11!"
But 11/11/11 has not always been a day of luck.
The last time there was such a date, in 1911, a Great Blue Norther cold front swept the central United States, plunging temperatures in some states from record highs to record lows, and even blizzard conditions in some areas.
Springfield, Missouri, recorded a high of 80°F before the cold front. By midnight, the temperature plunged to a record low of 13°F.
The drastic change in weather led some to believe supernatural powers had taken hold on 11/11/11.
Darren Bousman's new film "11-11-11," being released Friday, is about an American author plagued by strange happenings and constant sightings of the number 11. Joseph soon realizes that 11/11/11 is more than just a date, says the director's website. It's a warning.
Others see the day as one of harmony.
A group of friends were inspired to celebrate the extraordinary date like New Year's Eve. It morphed into something much bigger. The "Ones in a Lifetime" event is linking people and organizations online to promote peace and unity.
Other things happening Friday:
Verizon Wireless is launching its new Droid Razr at 11:11 a.m. 11/11/11.
Daniel Ortega, freshly re-elected president of Nicaragua, will celebrate his 66th birthday. Others born on this day include actors Demi Moore and Leonardo DiCaprio, author Kurt Vonnegut Jr. and cult killer Charles Manson.
So there you have it. You can make what you want of 11/11/11.
But perhaps Masters, the Vegas socialite, said it best: "One is such a lonely number. It's nice when you have two ones together."
Even better, perhaps, when you have six.

Personal Opinion 7: Up up and Away!

Republicans don't seem do understand that an all-cuts budget doesn't work. You only get so little money from it, depending on the specific programs, and many of the things they wish to cut are still relied on tens of millions of Americans to live. Not only does cutting these things destroy millions of peoples lives, but it removes hundreds of thousands of people from the workforce, resulting in a weaker consumer base and an overall collapse in American manufacturing.

The US needs a tax increase, the proposed tax increase on the rich is a good idea because they're doing better than ever now, anyone making less than a million (very likely you) will see literally no increase or direct change in your finances due to this. You complain over things that don't effect your life which you KNOW will help bandage this bleeding economy. Destroying education, peoples rights to marry, and removing birth control isn't going to create jobs. defunding community programs for the poor, sick, and disabled won't create jobs.

You vote for people who will smile, ask politely for you to shoot yourself in the foot with a large smile, and you say "yes" without hesitance. You put no research into what these people will actually do and put partisanship ahead of strategies which have historically been successful in dire situations such as the times we're in now.

Feel Like Paying More Taxes?

Love it or hate it, the debt-reduction plan put forth by Republican Senator Pat Toomey has opened the door to tax increases in the negotiations of the Congressional debt committee.
Many top Democrats rejected it, saying that the door isn't open nearly wide enough.
But the Senate's No. 2 Democrat -- Dick Durbin -- took a broader view. Without endorsing the Toomey plan, Durbin said it could be the "breakthrough" needed to end the deadlock.
That's because it's the first time a Republican member of the debt committee has proposed that tax increases be part of the plan to achieve at least $1.2 trillion in debt reduction. That's the minimum target the committee must meet by Nov. 23. If it fails to, the law calls for automatic spending cuts in 2013.
And importantly, Republican leaders back the Toomey plan, aides told CNN.
It comes less than a week after House and Senate Republicans were sending mixed messages about their position on tax increases.
The plan would reduce deficits by roughly $1.4 trillion over 10 years, according to a Republican aide.
Roughly $400 billion of that would come from additional tax revenue.
However, $110 billion of that is assumed to come from the "benefits" of tax reform -- namely, economic growth and greater compliance, which are difficult to forecast. So only $290 billion of the $400 billion might be considered an "increase" in terms of what taxpayers would pay.
The estimate is a far cry from the $800 billion in additional tax revenue that House Speaker John Boehner proposed during the debt ceiling negotiations this summer with President Obama .
But it's also a big shift from the near-religious stance most Republicans have adopted that tax reform be revenue neutral -- that is, raise no more revenue than the current code would.

Taxes and debt: Left and right dare to agree

Toomey's plan would reform the tax system in two big ways:
First, it would reduce all six income tax rates by roughly 20%. So the top rate would fall from 35% to 28%, and the bottom rate would fall from 10% to 8%.
Second, Toomey would impose a cap on itemized deductions so the total amount of deductions a taxpayer claimed would not exceed a certain percent of adjusted gross income.


Capping deductions would bring in revenue to offset the loss that comes from lowering rates.
The cap would be "aggressive," the aide said.
Democrats, in memo obtained by CNN, said the plan would benefit the rich because of the lower tax rates. The aide countered that high-income households benefit the most from itemized deductions, so any curb on those deductions would also heavily affect those households.
"On average [high-income households] will pay more than they do today," the aide said.

GOP and taxes: Mixed message

Without a detailed plan and a nonpartisan third party analysis, it's impossible to referee that dispute. There are too many unknowns.
For instance, which deductions would be counted under the cap and which would be exempt? And how high would the cap be set?
Also, which benchmark would the Toomey plan be judged against?
Assuming current policies like the Bush tax cuts stay in effect, the Toomey plan would likely raise more revenue.
Against current law, which assumes the Bush tax cuts expire, the Toomey plan would be a tax cut. However, most lawmakers -- Democrats and Republicans -- consider the current-law baseline to be unrealistic.
In any case, politically and practically, the Republicans' opening bid isn't high enough, said Maya MacGuineas, president of the nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
"The revenue number is far short of what's needed to get a deal," MacGuineas said. "But that revenue is on the table is incredibly encouraging.

Personal Opinion 6: Down You Go

Why Cain's scandal will likely sink him:  Public fear of black-on-white sexual assault is embedded in the consciousness of most American whites. Why?  Read  the Department of Justice crime statistics document "Criminal Victimization in the United States, 2005.", table 42.

In the United States in 2005, 37,460 white females were sexually assaulted or raped by a black man, while between zero and ten black females were sexually assaulted or raped by a white man. What this means is that every day in the United States, over one hundred white women are raped or sexually assaulted by a black man

Releasing Everything? Common Cain

When you consider the array of public men who have been forced, in one way or another, to come clean on their bad behavior, the list is not insubstantial: a president (Bill Clinton), presidential candidates (John Edwards, Gary Hart), governors (Mark Sanford, Eliot Spitzer), senators (John Ensign, David Vitter). And that's just the top tier.
The bar has been set -- and it's awfully low.
And by the way, many of these men managed to crawl right under that bar and survive, even thrive.

Eventually, they found there was just one way out -- owning up to their own shortcomings. Sure, it may have been due to legal pressure. Or political reality. Or both. But some discovered the public can be forgiving, especially if it believes you have something important to offer to the nation. Just ask Bill Clinton, now serving as philanthropist to the world.
So now comes Herman Cain, accused of sexual harassment by four women. He calls the charges baseless and defends his integrity. His political campaign and supporters have gone into full damage-control mode, scrutinizing the women. All predictable -- and reflexive -- enough.
But here's the rub: Cain also tells us that the National Restaurant Association investigated the charges against him and found them to be "baseless." If he wants to get this behind him, how about getting the facts out? Give the association's board permission to release the results of their internal investigation, if there was a formal inquiry.
Then, as they say, the truth will out.
And there's another plus: The partisans and the interest groups will have to start dealing with the facts. And the public can decide for itself.
It's not as if this predicament is new to us. Recall back in the day when Clinton was in the middle of the Lewinsky mess. Republicans were (rightly) outraged, demanding his resignation or impeachment. Feminist groups, by and large, remained largely on the sidelines or supportive of Clinton -- because he was, um, not a sexual harasser. Oh, and yes, he was good on their issues.
Now the tables have turned. Feminist groups are outraged by the charges against Cain and lots of Republican partisans are defending him, choosing to level their scrutiny on the women instead. (We've come a long way, baby, in that some conservative women's groups are criticizing Cain's I-don't-recall defense.)
Conservative CNN contributor Bill Bennett sees the hypocrisy of those who raised the red flag about Clinton, but not Cain. "For we who led the charge against Bill Clinton on a number of related issues to continue to blame the media or other campaigns or say it simply doesn't matter makes us the hypocrites as well," he wrote. He is, of course, right.
And it is exactly what we are seeing, much of it from the Cain campaign itself.
When declarations of innocence do not seem to be enough, there's the change-the-subject tack: How about fingering a leaker, say from Rick Perry's staff? When that's denied, back off. Then take a turn, and start decrying "anonymous" charges. When the charges are on the record, take on the accuser. And when all else fails, blame the media. And the liberal "Democrat machine."
Ah, it takes me back to the days when Monica Lewinsky was whispered to be a "stalker" and Hillary Clinton was taking on the "right wing conspiracy."
But here's what we learned in that case: The fact that Monica inappropriately bared her underwear to the president did not excuse his behavior. And the fact that Hillary was right about those who were "out to get" Clinton does not mean he was in the clear. It's just not that simple.
The voters will figure it all out, as always. The bar may be set low for the politicians, but the public somehow manages to rise above it.

Attack the plans, NOT the man

The president's approval numbers have sagged again, to just about the lowest point in his presidency. He's trailed below 50% since the spring of 2010; now he's sunk to 43%.
Bad poll numbers obviously create a vulnerability for an incumbent president. They also create a dangerous temptation for opponents to overplay their hand -- as Democrats did in 2004 facing George W. Bush.
Bush's approval rating had spiked to 90% in the aftermath of 9/11. Over the course of 2002 and 2003, his numbers returned to earth. By the fall of 2003, Bush had hit 50%, the lowest approval rating to that point in his presidency. Through 2004, Bush would struggle to remain north of 50%. To the amazement and disgust of Democrats, Bush heaved himself over the magic line just in time for Election Day.
Democrats often attribute their unexpected defeat in 2004 to the negative campaign against their candidate.
That hurt for sure. Also true, however, was that the Democrats misjudged their affirmative campaign. They succumbed to their own anger and contempt for George W. Bush. As John Kerry put it in his 2004 speech accepting the nomination:
"I will be a commander in chief who will never mislead us into war. I will have a vice president who will not conduct secret meetings with polluters to rewrite our environmental laws. I will have a secretary of defense who will listen to the best advice of the military leaders. And I will appoint an attorney general who will uphold the Constitution of the United States."
That's a scorching indictment. It just happened not to be the indictment the American voter was waiting to hear in 2004 after three difficult economic years. The US economy produced 2 million new jobs in 2004 -- but even so, fewer Americans were at work on Election Day 2004 than on Election Day 2000. Almost one-half of the new jobs of 2004 were claimed by foreign-born workers, many of them illegal. Perhaps as a result, wages for non-supervisory workers actually declined in 2004 even as payrolls grew.
If the Democrats had credibly focused on that issue -- if they had nominated a candidate who spoke about wages with the same intensity and conviction that Kerry spoke about Iraq -- the election might have had a very different result.
Flash forward to 2011.
Republican partisans loathe Barack Obama even more viscerally than core Democrats despised George W. Bush. Yet as with Democrats in 2004, it's hard for Republicans to keep in mind: The typical voter does not feel as they do.
Even now, only 48% of Americans blame Barack Obama for the state of the economy, as opposed to 71% who blame George W. Bush.
Even now, Americans continue to show considerable personal support for Barack Obama, even as the Republican brand remains toxic, with 68% disapproving of the job Republicans are doing in Congress.
The message for Republicans in these polls would seem to be: Fight the plan, not the man. Americans may be persuaded that Obama is a basically decent guy, in over his head. They won't be persuaded that Obama is an anti-American radical on a jobs-destroying rampage.
And yet it is precisely that kind of implausibly angry anti-Obama talk that Republican primary voters delight to hear. Texas Gov. Rick Perry has displaced Mitt Romney as the Republican front-runner by offering Republicans a stronger anti-Obama message. As for Perry's own vulnerabilities -- vulnerabilities that get bigger every time the Texan unburdens himself of new qualms about Social Security and Medicare -- Republicans gripped by anti-Obama emotion just cannot see them, any more than Democrats could see John Kerry's disconnect from the economic concerns of middle-class voters.
Partisans love a fighter. They want a candidate who expresses strong feelings in strong language. It's very difficult for them to remember that less partisan Americans have different feelings -- and that for every American who regards Obama with anger and dislike, there are perhaps two Americans who regard him with regret.
If the Republican presidential nominee can connect with voters' feelings of disappointment in Obama, he or she may find a way back to the White House. If the nominee expresses the rage of the Republican base, he or she will only alienate the much larger number of voters to whom that rage is alien and off-putting. The challenge for Republicans in 2012: Before they can defeat Obama, they must first overcome themselves.