Not So Common Threads - Dr. Spanier & PSU Climate Scientists

 THE DEFENSE OF PSU SCIENTIST PROFESSORS

 AND THE DISMISSAL OF DR. GRAHAM SPANIER  

PART II of the Not So Common Threads Series. 

Part I of this "not so common threads series" exposed the bias of Louis Freeh due to his association with Opus Dei, and a burning desire to turn attention to Penn State and away from his church, the pedophile priests and fellow Opus Dei Robert Hanssen. Perceived conflicts between science and religion are well known. It is not my purpose to dismiss the importance of either or to attack religious people. I can believe in God and trust science.

The Integrity of PSU has been attacked in more ways than you likely know. Any university is a place for research and exploration of ideas. Universities should be free from ideological attack by political interests. When professors and researchers are threatened with removal by political parties a line has been crossed that should never be breached. Your opinion of research results does not alter the fact that research is an inviolable interest of the public and the university system. 

When Gov. Tom Corbitt called Dr. Graham Spanier to Harrisburg to meet with PA Republican office holders who demanded Spanier fire PSU Climate Scientists and researchers, it was a violation of everything a university is supposed to be. Your opinion concerning Anthropogenic Global Warming is not the issue. The issue is the freedom and importance of research at public institutions of higher learning and the academic integrity of your university. 

Dr. Spanier has long maintained that Gov. Corbett was behind the charges against him. It is clear that Corbett in collusion with John Surma orchestrated the ambush of Spanier and Paterno at an "emergency" meeting of the Board of Trustees.

The connections and parallels in the references below are compelling, and they are not mine. The last campaign for Governor held more than usual importance to Penn Staters since the makeup of the Board of Trustees and a potential reversal of the narrative concerning the Freeh Fiction became possible with Corbett's defeat. 

Corbett in collusion with John Surma ambushed Joe Paterno and Graham Spanier. The "emergency" meeting of 11/9/11 allowed Surma who led the meeting to dispatch the two most credible voices capable of stemming the tsunami of blame leveled at PSU. Both Joe and Graham knew the Kelley Presentment was a bald-faced lie. But Corbett had to stop Joe and Graham from speaking out against that lie.

When AG Kelley put equal sized images of Tim Curley and Gary Schultz on stage beside the poster of Jerry Sandusky the presentment lie made the Penn State Scandal out of what is still rightly 'the Sandusky Second Mile' Scandal. 

Again we know why Surma set out to destroy Joe Paterno from The Surma Vendettas Part I and Part II. But why would Tom Corbett be so bent of the defamation and dismissal of Dr. Graham Spanier?

President Graham Spanier was the 32nd member of the Board on Nov 9, 2011, and the only board member who spoke out in defense of Penn State when he urged fellow members to stand behind Coach Paterno, Tim Curley, and Gary Schultz. Thus, Graham Spanier was the only member who stood publicly for what was right; and they forced his resignation for it, in large part due to Tom Corbett's personal animosity for an imagined political opponent. Spanier's defense of his administrators has caused Mike McQueary to charge Spanier with defamation in the civil trial underway in State College this week. 


Graham Spanier with Joe Paterno

Spanier was a most effective PSU President for 16 years. The FOR THE FUTURE campaign success reminds us his 16-year tenure as President just keeps on giving. We have to wonder why it had to stop.

Penn State sets $2 billion goal for campaign to help students

4/23/2010  University Park  President Graham Spanier announced that Penn State will aim to secure $2 billion by 2014 to ensure that the University can continue to offer an outstanding education to students from every economic background while benefiting the public through research and service.

Penn State raises more than $2 billion in For the Future campaign

Previous SMSS articles gave information indicating the battle between Corbett and Spanier over funding led to Corbett's ambush that sidelined Spanier. But here it is clear that Spanier was hugely successful in fundraising outside of government. So why did Tom Corbett view Graham Spanier as a political opponent? 

Climate Change was part of the race between Wolf and Corbett.  

Climate Change Stokes Billionaire's Campaign Against Corbett.

Steyer, 56, intends to spend up to $100 million through his NextGen Climate Action super-PAC to convince voters that climate change is the most important issue in the fall elections. 

If a Governor Wolf were to take on Corbett for his conflict of interest in the 11/9 meeting that led to Joe Paterno and Graham Spanier being sidelined when they alone could have cast serious doubt on the narrative about a PSU cover-up it would put Corbett in a very difficult position. Climate Change tied to the Sandusky Scandal like this opens the possibility of another look by the Governor's office. 

Climate Change and the Sandusky Scandal are connected because Penn State has some of the most prominent climate scientists in the country. 

SELF-DESCRIBED CONSERVATIVE REPUBLICAN DR. RICHARD ALLEY

Penn Stater's should be proud of Dr. Richard Alley, who received the Nobel Prize for work on climate change. Dr.Alley is an environmental scientist, PBS host, book author, polar ice expert, bicycle enthusiast, geologist, Nobel Prize winner, Johnny Cash impersonator, former oil company employee, and—according to The New York Times’ Andy Revkin—a “cross between Woody Allen and Carl Sagan.” (without Woody's baggage) 

Dr. Alley is an Evan Pugh Professor of Geosciences in PSU's College of Earth and Mineral Sciences. His research interests focus on glaciology, sea level change, and abrupt climate change, and he frequently discusses earth sciences on major media outlets, including NPR, BBC, and PBS. Alley is widely credited with showing that the earth has experienced abrupt climate change in the past—and likely will again, based on his meticulous study of ice cores from Greenland and West Antarctica.

Graham Spanier defended PSU climate scientists to legislators

who threatened to reduce funding for PSU if they were not removed.

 It is quite likely that Dr. Spanier’s defense of Penn State Climate Scientists played a part in what led to his dismissal - I learned in Sept 2016. Then attorney general of Virginia, Ken Cuccinelli, who had sought to indict Dr. Mann  was a friend and political ally of former Attorney General then Governor Tom Corbett. Mann was under attack in the bogus "Climategate - hockey stick" flap making headline news at the time. 

A Spanier led Penn State hired Dr. Mann for the Department of Meteorology and PA Republicans led by Corbett and invested in coal and fracking wanted Spanier to fire climate scientists whose research was perceived as a threat to their interests. Dr. Spanier gave a solid defense and refused to fire the noted scientists and professors.
  
What effect did this have on Corbett's plan that removed Dr. Spanier as PSU President? Corbett's fight with Spanier over PSU funding was tied to the defense of PSU scientists by the Republican state legislators. Corbett thought Spanier was supporting climate change action and Corbett was the beneficiary of fossil fuel industry support along with The Second Mile support. The demand to dismiss PSU scientists from Republicans was motivated by the financial interests of their fossil fuel industry supporters.   

CLIMATE SCIENCE AND THE SANDUSKY SCANDAL

This American Thinker article is evidence of what the Spanier defense of the faculty at PSU did to incur the wrath of Corbett and fossil fuel funded legislators who wanted to de-fund PSU if Mann et. al were not fired.

CLIMATEGATE & the SANDUSKY SCANDALS -COMMON THREADS  In this American Thinker article the bogus "Climategate" attack compares favorably with Spanier's defense of Dr. Mann and the Freeh Fiction on Spanier's non-existent "cover-up" for Sandusky. Identical tactics are used.

Reading the text below leaves no doubt. The author claims Spanier chose PSU employees as "investigators" but you can read below how Dr. Pell initiated the RA-10 process

UNPRECEDENTED ATTACKS ON ACADEMIC RESEARCH AT PSU

The Climategate and Jerry Sandusky Scandals: A Common Thread

By T.S. Weidler July 31, 2012

America, it's time to meet your newest top-secret government employee: a professional cover-up artist with a radical agenda.
Graham Spanier is the former PSU president who was fired during the Jerry Sandusky investigation for failing to properly investigate Sandusky when the pedophilia allegations first surfaced.
Spanier's "investigation" of Jerry Sandusky was so thoroughly inept that it got him fired.  When it was completed, Spanier stated that he had "complete confidence in how they have handled the allegations against Sandusky," and he was fired very shortly thereafter. 
The recent Freeh report indicates that the investigation was conducted for the purpose of finding nothing.  In other words,it was a cover-up.
It wasn't the only time Spanier rigged an inept investigation for the purpose of finding nothing.  In 2010, his investigators found that Penn State climatologist Michael Mann had done nothing wrong when he invented his "hockey stick trick," to "hide the decline" and lend false credibility to climate change theory.
The difference between the Mann investigation and the Sandusky investigation is that one covered up a sex offender and the other covered up a fraud.
The Climategate "Investigation"
The methodology, however, was equally bad. The "Climategate" investigation was conducted by five Penn State employees. The five internal investigators were given a list of four specific allegations of academic fraud, and they proceeded to dismiss the three most significant allegations outright, without investigating them at all. (this is an offensive lie against PSU)

These attacks on PSU should cause every Penn State alumnus great concern. These are attacks on the academic integrity of your Alma Mater. You should know beyond doubt that 16-year President Graham Spanier has complete integrity. PSU's inquiry into Dr. Mann appears to be unprecedented since this type of inquiry is typically initiated from within an academic institution - not from allegations by email and telephone from elements outside the university. Read the Final Investigation Report Involving Dr. Michael Mann:

On Nov. 24, 2009, two days after receipt of numerous outside allegations, Dr. Pell initiated the process articulated in RA-1O by scheduling a meeting with the Dean of the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences (Dr. William Easterling), the Associate Dean for Graduate Education and Research of the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences (Dr. Alan Scaroni), the Director of the Office for Research Protections (Ms. Candice Yekel), and the Head of the Department of Meteorology (Dr. William Brune).

 At the time of initiation of the inquiry, no formal allegations accusing Dr. Mann of research misconduct had been submitted to any University official. Therefore, the emails and other communications were reviewed by Dr. Pell, and from these she synthesized four formal allegations. To be clear, these were not allegations that Dr. Pell put forth but rather her best effort to reduce to reviewable allegations the many different accusations that were received from parties outside of the University. The four synthesized allegations were as follows:

Did you engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly,

• any actions with the intent to suppress or falsify data?
• any actions with the intent to delete, conceal or otherwise destroy emails, information and/or data, related to AR4,as suggested by Phil Jones?
• any misuse of privileged or confidential information available to you in your capacity as an academic scholar?
• any actions that seriously deviated from accepted practices within the academic community for proposing, conducting, or reporting research, or other scholarly activities?

Here we have an unprecedented attack on a Penn State professor and scientist undoubtedly initiated by the same deniers who spawned the CEI and National Review attacks coming from those associated with the fossil fuel industry funded groups. Like Corbett and Freeh going after Joe, Tim, Gary, and Graham with a few email snippets, the "Climategate" fiction based on a few out of context email snippets put PSU and Dr. Mann in this unprecedented position of a formal inquiry. This report on the Inquiry is 19 pages in length and goes into great detail concerning the methods and documentation used to arrive at this unanimous conclusion:

Conclusion of the Investigatory Committee as to whether research misconduct occurred:

The Investigatory Committee, after careful review of all available evidence, determined that there is no substance to the allegations against Dr. Michael E. Mann, Professor, Department of Meteorology, The Pennsylvania State University. More specifically, the Investigatory Committee determined that Dr. Michael E. Mann did not engage in, nor did he participate in, directly or indirectly, any actions that seriously deviated from accepted practices within the academic community for proposing, conducting, or reporting research, or other scholarly activities. The decision of the Investigatory Committee was unanimous.

If you reject this unanimous conclusion by the academic panel, you are saying that the academic integrity of your alma mater is questionable, and the academic officers who did this inquiry are not to be trusted. 

My belief is that my University of Tennessee exhibits the highest possible academic integrity. I believe that is the same with Penn State. The panel of distinguished professors who reviewed the complaints from outside Penn State did not have to do this. There was obviously some significant outside pressure coming from political elements in PA who wanted to see Dr. Mann discredited. Dr. Mann was unanimously cleared and vindicated.

See Appendix B below for the record of 1073 email files that were used by the Deniers who invented the "Climategate" FRAUD.

The National Review called Dr. Mann "the Sandusky of Climate Science" and that makes the connection clear. Dr. Mann's defamation lawsuits continue as dismissal motions fail. After the PSU investigation cleared Dr. Mann of charges that he misused grant money and falsified data, the fossil fuel funded deniers continued to harass PSU Climate Scientists.

Disinformers step up efforts to intimidate, harass,

and attack Mann, Alley, & PSU

The well funded Deniers go beyond slander to outright harassment -see CEI to sue RealClimate blogger over moderation policy and HERE  where NASA’s James Hansen, explains the strategy. - And this quote from Dr. Mann.

• “I am now inundated with broad FOIA requests for my correspondence, with substantial impact on my time and on others in my office. I believe these to be fishing expeditions, aimed at finding some statement(s), likely to be taken out of context, which they would attempt to use to discredit climate science. The input data for global temperature analyses are widely available, on our web site and elsewhere. If those input data could be made to yield a significantly different global temperature change, contrarians would certainly have done that — but they have not.” Dr. Mann

 Delingpole actually brags about the latest intimidation strategy: 

"I am glad to report that Michael Mann   is about to get a very nasty shock. On Monday, Mann will find that all 27 of his colleagues at the Earth System Science Center at PSU received a tempting email inviting them to blow the whistle on anyone fraudulently misusing federal grant funds for climate research. Under US law whistleblowers stand to make very large sums of money: based on a percentage of misued government funds - in this case perhaps as much as $50 million." - Mr. Delingpole

There was no “very nasty shock” to Dr. Mann or his colleagues, including PSU's Richard Alley, since they are all already more than aware of the inane tactics of the disinformers (see Alley explains “The Biggest Control Knob: Carbon Dioxide in Earth’s Climate History”). And no, there aren’t any “whistleblowers” who will make a nickel off this intimidation strategy, but then that isn’t really the point of Delingpole's email.  Of course, the "whistleblower" letter with an invitation to monetary reward got no takers at Penn State.

READ the entire piece linked above to comprehend the scope and effect of these unprecedented attacks on PSU Climate Scientists. Climate Deniers funded by Exxon and KOCH Industries care nothing about the depth and accuracy of the research. They have only 2 combined goals - cast doubt and cause inaction.

SEE: MERCHANTS OF DOUBT for free on Youtube  - Dr. Mann is in this documentary reading the emails generated in the attacks on Penn State's integrity. The content of the email read by Dr. Mann is obscene and threatning. 

See key deniers like - Ultra Conservative Republican Congressman from South Carolina Bob Inglis -someone those who distrust the scientists can trust OR  

THE SKEPTIC magazine publisher, Michael Shermer. One of 6 prominent conservative or libertarian deniers who studied the science in depth.  Shermer read all of the complete email chains used by perpetrators of the 'CLIMATEGATE" fraud. Prior to that experience he was a staunch libertarian climate change Denier himself.   

When Dr. Spanier stood up for the academic integrity represented by these scientists and Penn State cleared them of the bogus charges made up from email snippets taken out of context - the parallels to what Freeh did to Penn State, Spanier, and Paterno are clear. 

Mann sued the people responsible for his defamation and Spanier has gone on the attack suing Louis Freeh for defamation. 

Mann has lawsuits in progress against the Competitive Enterprise Institute - a fossil fuel funded political "think-tank", and The National Review. 

Professor Mann cleared by PSU of any violations in the bogus "Climategate" blowup. 

Another Win for Michael Mann June 13, 2016, Case drags on for years as the defendant defamers continue to stall with dismissal motions to no avail. 

Steyn’s request that the suit be dismissed was itself dismissed, as a similar request was in 2014. The judge’s patience with Steyn’s antics seems to be wearing thin, as the ruling notes that “Only one thing has changed since the court last considered this issue on April 11, 2014 – the date.”

A Win for the Climate Scientist Who Skeptics Compared to Jerry Sandusky

In 2012 writers for The National Review and fossil fuel funded think tank CEI accused Mann of fraud comparing him to Jerry Sandusky—Mann files a defamation suit. The defendants moved to have the case thrown out, but DC Superior Court Judge Weisberg rejected the motion, opening the way for a trial. Public figures like Mann & Spanier have to clear a high bar to prove defamation, Weisberg argued that Mann's complaint may pass the test, and brushed aside the defendants' claims that the fraud allegations were "pure opinion".

THIS IS THE KEY ELEMENT IN MANN'S CASE: Judge Weisberg Superior Court

Accusing a scientist of conducting fraudulent research, manipulating data to achieve a predetermined or political outcome, or purposefully distorting the scientific truth are factual allegations. They go to the heart of scientific integrity. They can be proven true or false. If false, they are defamatory. If made with actual malice, they are actionable. 

Steptoe & Johnson LLC, representing National Review writer Mark Steyn, withdrew as his counsel, and also plan to drop TNR as a client.

Parallels between the Freeh attack on PSU and attacks on PSU's climate scientists were drawn by The National Review and the fossil fuel industry-funded "think tank" Competitive Enterprise Institute when they called Mann "the Sandusky of Climate Science."  

These charlatans and deniers fraudulently produced false "evidence" just like Freeh, taking email fragments out of context from 5 of 480 scientists to claim temperature measurements were manipulated. 

Freeh used a few email fragments out of 3.5 million documents to accuse Joe Paterno, Graham Spanier, Tim Curley, and Gary Schultz of a cover up. 

The tactics are too similar to ignore.

FOLLOW THE MONEY

Claiming scientists 'cook the books' to keep research and grant money flowing?  
Here's a question to consider: Use your own Occam’s Razor. What is more likely?

1) A diverse multi-national group of Climate Scientists across the globe have conspired to manufacture a non-existent threat to the planet using data available to everyone in order to keep research grants that certainly do not make them wealthy. 

OR

2) Well paid "experts" with little or no scientific background, from think tanks funded by the wealthiest and most powerful industry in history, do the job their fossil fuel paymasters pay them handsomely to do. They use deceptive practices attacking the scientists and the science with false information to create doubt and thwart action so the fossil fuel industry can continue to make billions of dollars without interference.

257 Billion Profit in 2014 with obscene subsidies is sufficient reason for fraud. 

So far the evidence is clear in the case of Penn State's own Michael Mann. "Climategate" has been exposed as a fraud and defamation cases move forward. CEI and The National Review used the deceptive practice of taking out of context email snippets to create "Climategate" casting doubt on Dr. Mann's credibility and his research just at the time of the Copenhagen Conference. Read the entire timeline  

DR. MANN'S ORIGINAL HOCKEY STICK DATA WAS GROUND-BREAKING IN 1998

As time passes the "CLIMATEGATE" fraud becomes more and more evident. Since 1998 temperatures have continued to rise rapidly.  As evidence accumulates it becomes difficult to believe anyone still thinks the hockey stick is an inaccurate picture of the reality. 

At this very date, 16 consecutive hottest months on record should be clear and convincing but we still suffer from doubt spawned by fossil fuel industry paid deniers who pretend the data stopped in 1998. 

Setting the Record Straight on Misleading Claims about Michael Mann 

There are many elements in the deniers inquisition of selected climate scientists. Their tactics are confusion and misrepresentation. If there are 20 studies that offer the same conclusion the deniers pick the one with the least certainty and ignore the continued observations and measurements that further strengthen the model. It's obnoxious and misleading. The point is to confuse and mislead - rather than inform and enlighten. 

The Hockey Stick and Climate Wars by Michael Mann

The global warming denial machine's predatory "Serengeti strategy" of singling out individual scientists and scientific findings for attack has been applied relentlessly to several leading climate scientists, none more so than Mann and the iconic "hockey stick" graph from paleoclimate research published in 1998. That path-breaking work found that warming in the late 20th century was unprecedented over the last millennium. Since then, a growing and diverse body of painstaking paleoclimate research has produced multiple studies that confirm and strengthen that early finding.   

Below the fold you can learn how to make the calculations that prove AGW for yourself. The data is open source online available to all and the tools allow you to look at any data set you choose from over 6000 measurement sites. 

So who still wants to argue that "CLIMATEGATE" was real and that Dr. Mann's hockey stick is a misrepresentation of the reality - just like the "midieval warming perior was warmer than today" argument or "sea ice expanse increase around Antarctica proves we are not warming" - the deniers bunk is still bunk. 

The sharpest critic of Michael Mann relied on plagiarized material.   
CONTINUE BELOW

Not So Common Threads- Freeh's Religious Obsession

by Barry Bozeman

PART 1 of Not So Common Threads Series

Politics & Religion are touchy subjects when it comes to attempts at unity. That is why I have waited some time to publish this entry. At this point, it has become difficult to see any downside in discussing the connections involved in this series. 

The following "Not So Common Threads" essays consider connections that have not been explored. These connections may be evident to some and less obvious to others. Did certain political interests see Graham Spanier and Penn State climate scientists as an impediment to their plans?  What role did religion play with Louis Freeh when he was hired to do harm to the credibility of your university using the accusations against its football coach, President, and culture? 

OPUS DEI - A SPOTLIGHT ON MEA MAXIMUM CULPA 

Back in Nov of 2011 there was an overwhelming amount of information about the "Penn State" Scandal that led to the naming of this website as The "Second Mile Sandusky" Scandal, and it seems I missed something very important in understanding Louis Freeh along with additional reasons for Corbett to seek the ouster of Dr. Graham Spanier. 

We all know how this came to be known as the "PENN STATE" Scandal. The 'Board of Traitors' led by John Surma as arranged by Tom Corbett sold Penn State in the persons of Joe Paterno, Graham Spanier, Tim Curley and Gary Schultz down the proverbial river. The Surma co-opted BOT accepted a Presentment by AG Linda Kelley, now known to be a bald-faced lie, as unassailable truth. There are other acts of treason in history that rival 11/9/11, but few so clear cut and egregious as the BOARD OF TRAITORS breach of fiduciary duty represented by that decision. 

We came to learn why John Surma did it: THE SURMA VENDETTA and THE SURMA VENDETTA PART II. None among us can find a valid reason why Surma should not have recused himself from that decision instead of leading the drive to dismiss Joe Paterno after learning of this clear conflict of interest. 

We know about Tom Corbett's UNCOMMONLY COMPLETE CONFLICTS OF INTEREST and why Corbett and his appointees should have recused themselves or supported Spanier and Paterno as the two individuals who could have commanded enough respect to make the media and the public aware of the facts in the face of AG Kelley's sensationally erroneous presentment and the media tsunami that engulfed Penn State.  

We were even made fully aware of how Louis Freeh was inflicted on Penn State in just one week after that Nov 9, 2011 disaster. A mere 4 hours of interviews of only 2 candidates by the CORBETT, SURMA, FRAZIER, TOMALIS & BALDWIN team were revealed on SMSS. 

        WHAT I MISSED IN NOV. 2011.  

But I missed an article in ESQUIRE that wondered:  
What the choice of former FBI director, Opus Dei running buddy, and cutthroat careerist Louis Freeh to lead Penn State's investigation into itself as regards the Sandusky scandal would come to mean to the people involved. 
It all depends on two factors the writer mused:

1) How often Freeh's finely rehearsed performance-art public morality comes into play; and 
2) What result will be best for Louis Freeh, secular saint, and avenging angel?

As it has turned out Freeh based his entire finding on his self-serving moral superiority. He now admittedly, had no evidence to support his conclusions. It was the "failed culture at Penn State" and an "omnipotent head football coach" indicted and skewered in the court of public opinion over a mere 2 email fragments mentioning "coach". 

The Esquire writer now seems downright prophetic with his observations. Freeh pocketed 8.2 million Penn State dollars for trashing the university as a failed culture without ever having to interview the key witnesses to the charges he made or any requirement to justify his results. Freeh was all moral outrage hat with no evidence cattle. 
As Esquire points out: 

"Freeh has a long history of Opus Dei morality. He was the cilice around Bill Clinton's upper thigh because Freeh disapproved of a president having non-Vatican-endorsed sexy time with a young woman. Freeh's FBI railroaded Wen Ho Lee because Freeh was convinced that the Clintons played loose with national security secrets because of Chinese political contributions. Another charge with no basis in fact. 

In 2005, Freeh wrote a book explaining how he, the righteous moralist Louis Freeh, stood alone against all enemies, foreign and domestic. He absolved the FBI of involvement in the framing not only of Lee, whom Freeh still believed to be guilty of espionage, but of Richard Jewell, the innocent man Freeh fingered as the 1996 Olympic Park bomber. 

Freeh claimed that what happened to Lee was the New York Times's fault, and that the FBI went after Jewell for the sake of thoroughness. Freeh was too busy pointing his moral finger at Jewell and Lee to keep an eye on his own FBI where US secrets were being sold to Soviets costing US billions". (Robert Hanssen below)

Freeh was perfect for the heavily Corbett influenced Special Investigation Task Force - an Opus Dei member out to eviscerate non-priest child molesters and redeem the moral standing of his Church in the wake of decades of priest pedophiles. Joe, Graham, Tim and Gary never had the chance for a fair unbiased investigation by this angry righteous Opus Dei scold. A PSU version of Tomas de Torquemada, Freeh would have preferred the rack and wheel ending with a burning stake.   

THE CLIMATE AT THE TIME 

Freeh's investigation could not be his preferred inquisition but the report would be his sermon as avenging angel striking back against the priest pedophiles who besmirched the reputation of his church. The Spotlight on pedophilia in the Roman Catholic Priesthood was focused by The Boston Globe, Mea Maximum Culpa, Deliver Us From Evil  and the tidal wave of stories across the country exposing priests who were pedophiles.                               CONTINUED BELOW

WALTER UHLER'S PURSUIT OF TRUTH CONTINUES

By Barry Bozeman

Hello again PSU friends - this will be my first post on SMSS since the Summer of 2014 and I have missed the interaction from here in East Tennessee. Some of you may recall that I started SMSS and the FREEHDOM FIGHTERS beginning in January of 2012 after 2 or 3 months of active participation on the Penn State sports site BLACK SHOE DIARIES begun with this post Outsider's View of PSU and the National Narrative on Nov 20, 2011

For a time this SMSS site joined with Walter Uhler, Mark Rubin of Tom in Paine, and John Ziegler to form the Framing Paterno group combining our efforts in the search for Truth following the addition of Ray Blehar as my partner and co-author of this website. 

Today I learned that Walter Uhler's website was hacked last August and it closed down with all content lost. Some of that excellent content remains available in the Walter Uhler archive on The Smirking Chimp. Walter's article LYNCHING JOE PATERNO IN THE COURT OF PUBLIC OPINION published Nov 9 2011 was just the beginning of a number of excellent informative pieces from this PSU graduate with 2 BAs and a Master's Degree. 

Walter writes: 

In response to shamelessly sensationalistic news articles in the mainstream media that virtually indicted Joe Paterno for supposedly ignoring a 14-year old boy in 1976, who claimed to have been molested by Jerry Sandusky, I wrote a letter to the editor of the Centre Daily Times which gave reasons why I thought the allegation was false. That letter was published on 14 July 2016. Within days, Evan Grossman, writing for the New York Daily News, wrote a column titled: "Joe Paterno apologists are blind to reality, unwilling to face facts about ex-Penn State coach." In Mr. Grossman's view, Paterno apologists live in a reprehensible fact-free bubble similar to those occupied by "9/11 truthers" and Trump-style  "birthers." Finding that my letter to the Centre Daily Times was cited by Mr. Grossman as a representative example of a  fact-denying Paterno apologist,  I felt compelled to write him the letter included below to show him the errors in his analysis.  

After his website was hacked and destroyed Walter retired from writing about the Penn State situation until the latest "testimony" by John Doe 150 alleging sexual assault in 1976 at a Summer Camp while showering with other boys compelled him to write this Letter to the Editor published in the Centre Daily Times:

TESTIMONY DOESN'T PAINT A TRUE PICTURE  

“A man testified in court in 2014 that Penn State football coach Joe Paterno ignored his complaints of a sexual assault committed by assistant coach Jerry Sandusky in 1976 when the man was a 14-year-old boy, according to new court documents unsealed Tuesday in a Philadelphia court.”
Put simply, this testimony does not ring true.
First, Joe Paterno was the type of man who attended to the smallest of details. He would not have ignored such an allegation, just like he did not ignore the allegation made by Mike McQueary, but reported it up Penn State’s chain of administrative command.
Second, Paterno was an honorable man, a man who once walked out of a restaurant in a huff, leaving his family behind, after they defended the daughter being chastised by Joe for giving part of her all-you-can eat meal to a sibling who didn’t order such an all-you could eat meal. Joe accused his daughter of ripping off the restaurant and couldn’t believe that nobody else in the family took the matter seriously.
Third, Joe Paterno’s highest priority was transforming boys into successful and responsible men, not winning football games. That’s why he turned down offers from the NFL. Thus he would not have dismissed any allegation about Sandusky with the assertion that he had a football season to worry about.
Finally, having studied memory, I know that memories are reconstructed rather than purely retrieved. Thus, a memory constructed 38 years after the fact can’t possibly be completely true.
WALTER C. UHLER, STATE COLLEGE

Read more here: http://www.centredaily.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/article89500577.html#storylink=cpy

That letter was misused in the New York Daily News by Evan Grossman in a piece titled: 

JOE PATERNO APOLOGISTS ARE BLIND TO REALITY, UNWILLING TO FACE FACTS ABOUT PENN STATE EX-COACH 

This section of that article was directed at Walter Uhler's letter to the Centre Daily Times

Another Paterno apologist penned a letter to the editor of the Centre Daily Times, stating there’s no way the beloved coach could have known about any of Sandusky’s crimes because Paterno was so honorable he once stormed out of a restaurant when his daughter was not charged for a second all-you-can-eat dinner after sharing with another girl.
“Joe accused his daughter of ripping off the restaurant and couldn’t believe that nobody else in the family took the matter seriously,” Walter Uhler, of State College, wrote.
Uhler, who claims that he studies memory, wrote: “I know that memories are reconstructed rather than purely retrieved. Thus, a memory constructed 38 years after the fact can’t possibly be completely true.”

Walter Uhler has penned a rebuttal to Mr. Grossman's accusations and mis-information and requested that I post it here on SMSS. I do so gladly 

Dear Mr. Grossman:As a writer whose work has appeared in The Nation, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Philadelphia Inquirer, San Francisco Chronicle, Defense News, Huffington Post, Journal of Military History, and the Moscow Times -- among many other newspapers, journals and scholarly periodicals -- and who served as a senior executive in the Department of Defense as well as president of a scholarly organization (the Russian-American International Studies Association), I found your article, "Joe Paterno apologists are blind to reality, unwilling to face facts about ex-Penn State coach,"  to be below the level of competence and integrity that one expects from journalists who write about sports. Your article appears to be illuminated more by righteous indignation than rigorous thought based upon facts.  

Here are two facts. One: John Doe 150 alleges that he was assaulted by Jerry Sandusky in 1976 in a shower, where other boys were showering. He alleges that he shouted out after Sandusky's assault, yet none of the other boys in the shower complained to authorities. 
Two: that allegation, weak as it is, has been contradicted by Jay Paterno, who has observed: "At Penn State’s football camps in 1976, campers showered in the dorms in individual stalls and did not shower with coaches and Penn State  players. " Thus, Sandusky could not have been there. Does Jay Paterno's assertion constitute an apology for Joe Paterno? Or the truth?

A question has been raised about how summer camper John Doe 150 gained access to a head coach known for making only cameo appearances at such summer camps. Similarly, a question has been raised about how John Doe's allegation that Sandusky assaulted him in the midst of other showering boys squares with Sandusky's well-known and very consistent practice of grooming and isolating a boy before assaulting him. Do these questions constitute apologies for Joe Paterno?

If anybody should be under suspicion, it is you, Mr. Grossman. Your treatment of my letter to the editor of the Centre Daily Times reeks of egregious incompetence, if not dishonesty. 

For example, your readers do not know -- because you conveniently failed to inform them -- about two reasons why I doubted the testimony of John Doe 150. Here's reason number one in my own words: "Joe Paterno was the type of man who attended to the smallest of details. He would not have ignored such an allegation, just like he did not ignore the allegation made by Mike McQueary, but reported it up Penn State's chain of administrative command."
Now, you might not like this piece of potentially exculpatory evidence, but it hardly constitutes an apology for Paterno. And your readers deserved to read it. In fact, the burden is on you to demonstrate that Paterno would have behaved differently in 1976.

The second reason why I questioned the allegation made by John Doe 150 concerns his specific claim that Paterno dismissed the charge of sexual assault by Sandusky because he had "a football season to worry about." This struck me as an obvious fabrication, prompting me to write: "Joe Paterno's highest priority was transforming boys into successful and responsible men, not winning football games. That's why he turned down offers from the NFL. Thus he would not have dismissed any allegation about Sandusky with the assertion that he had "a football season to worry about." 

Now, you might not like this piece of potentially exculpatory evidence, but I view it to be a red flag of fabrication by John Doe 150.  And your readers deserved to read it. Your failure to inform your readers about my total argument was compounded by your attempt to disparage and thus dismiss the two other points that I made in my letter to the Centre Daily Times. First, character matters. So it is no small matter to know that Joe Paterno was an honorable man -- .as evidenced by the big fuss he made over the sharing of an all-you-can-eat meal. People who knew Joe and who have read countless stories and critical biographies of Joe know about many instances in which he proved himself to be an honorable man. Ask any of his football players. Your blithe dismissal Joe Paterno's strong, honorable character, suggests anti-Paterno bias in an attempt to elevate the claims of specific victims you know nothing about. 

Finally, permit me to express my surprise about your astounding ignorance concerning human memory and your dismissive, anti-intellectual attitude about what I know about it. I've read the classic study, The Working Brain: An Introduction to Neuropsychology  by A. R. Luria, as well as Religion Explained by Pascal Boyer (who was Luce Professor of Collective Memory and Individual Memory at Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri)  and the textbook, Neuropsychology of Memory edited by Larry R. Squire and Daniel L. Schacter. I also have read Professor Bart Ehrman's new book, Jesus Before the Gospels, which he wrote after spending the last two years studying precisely how memory works. Based upon these and other books, below is a brief summary (which I've written elsewhere) of what I know:  Humans are capable of sensory memory, short-term memory and long-term memory. Their long-term memory consists of explicit (or conscious memory) and implicit (or unconscious) memory. Explicit memory also is known as declarative memory, which consists of episodic memory (personal events and experiences) and semantic memory (facts and concepts). Implicit memory is also known as procedural memory (allowing skills and tasks to be performed unconsciously). According to Professor Luria, “patients with massive lesions of the lateral zones of the prefrontal region cannot form a stable and active intention to memorize incoming information even though their general orientation and ability to retain traces of visual impressions remains unimpaired.  Also, they cannot make active attempts to find ways or means of assisting memorizing” (p. 300).

But, even assuming strong, healthy, frontal neocortex, a person never retrieves a complete snapshot, but “bits and pieces” of an experience that are stored in different parts of the brain.  As Professor Bart D. Ehrman puts it, quoting from F. C. Bartlett’s book Remembering, “When we try to retrieve the memory, the bits and pieces are reassembled. The problem is that when we reassemble the pieces, there are some, often lots of them, that are missing. To complete the memory we unconsciously fill in the gaps, for example, with analogous recollections from similar experiences.” (Bart. D. Ehrman, Jesus Before the Gospels, Harper One, 2016, p. 134.)  I suspect this explains John Doe 150's "memory" about "a football season to worry about.“ What Bartlett  consistently found was that if the person was asked to reproduce the object soon after looking at it, and at frequent intervals, then however it was recalled and replicated the first time was usually how it was replicated in later recollections, even if the first recollection was in error. On the other hand, if the subject did not reproduce the object right away, but much later, if the recollections were not in relatively quick and frequent sequence, then the reproductions changed significantly, time after time, with innumerable omissions, simplifications and transformations occurring ‘almost indefinitely’”(Ehrman, p, 136). 

Then, there’s the matter of distorted memories, which one can see in the account by Professor Ehrman about Emory University psychology students and the explosion of the Challenger spacecraft on January 28, 1986. As Ehrman notes: A day after the explosion, psychologists Ulrich Neisser and Nicole Harsch “gave 106 students in a psychology class at Emory University a questionnaire asking about their personal circumstances when they heard the news. A year and a half later, in the fall of 1988, they tracked down forty-four of these students and gave them the same questionnaire.  A half year later, in spring 1989, they interviewed forty of these forty-four about the event.” (Ehrman, p. 141) 

“The findings were startling but very telling.  To begin with, 75 percent of those who took the second questionnaire were certain that they had never taken the first one. That was obviously wrong.  In terms of what was being asked, there were questions about where they were when they heard the news, what time of day it was, what they were doing at the time, whom they learned it from, and so on – seven questions altogether.  Twenty-five percent of the participants got every single answer wrong on the second questionnaire, even though their memories were vivid and they were highly confident in their answers.  Another 50 percent got only two of the seven questions correct. Only three of the forty-four got all the answers right the second times, and even in those cases there were mistakes in some of the details.” (Ehrman, p. 141)

Now, Mr. Grossman, can you still dismiss my assertion that "a memory constructed 38 years after the fact can't possibly be completely true"?

Finally, as a journalist, Mr. Grossman, you should be aware of the   indisputable axiom propagated by Walter Lippmann: 

One must first establish the true and the false of an issue before pontificating about the moral right or wrong of that issue. 

I urge you to try to do more of the former before recklessly jumping to the latter.

Sincerely,Walter C. Uhler

I am pleased to have the opportunity to publish Walter Uhler's letter to Mr. Evan Grossman of the New York Daily News since it seems likely the Daily News will not. There are a number of people who have spent a considerable amount of time seeking the TRUTH concerning the Sandusky Scandal and the part in it suffered by Joe Paterno. As a liberal Tennessean with no connection to Penn State I am not inclined to apologize for a Conservative football coach and I find Walter Uhler's statements compelling. 

The PSU Board of Trustee's and Louis Freeh have created a situation where there is a great deal of money to be made by those who would wrongly accuse Penn State and Joe Paterno for ignoring reports or covering up for Jerry Sandusky's criminal behavior. Just lodging a complaint with the help of a lawyer could result in a quick settlement when those in control of the purse strings would prefer to pay out and move on rather than support the honor and integrity of a now deceased Coach who drew the ire of John and Vic Surma. That inclination may suit the Surma's and other board members, but who speaks for the honor of a man who did his best to Honor Penn State?