Don't Let The Door Hit You....

It is now time to pay tribute to the citizens of Pennsylvania.

The Associated Press reports that a Quinnipiac University poll released Friday has found that 52 percent of Pennsylvania votyers said they supported the firing of legendary Penn State head football coach Joe Paterno, with 43 percent opposing it.

Paterno was relieved of duty, under terms not fully explained, after former Assistant Coach Jerry Sandusky was arrested on child sex abuse charges which, curiously, followed by less than a week a victory by the Nittany Lions that established Paterno as the coach with the greatest number of victories in Division I-A history.

During the longest tenure of any head coach on any team in Division I, Joe Paterno gave generously of his time, and especially of his fortune, to the university. In return for his effort, money, and especially, football success, the obnoxiously nicknamed "Joe Pa" became not only inarguably the most popular, but arguably the most powerful, figure in the University. Yet, most Pennsylvanians recognize that, having apparently turned a blind eye to unconscionable acts committed by a staff member, Paterno had to go.

And many of them believe so even without having learned

Former Penn State head football coach Joe Paterno had business ties with board members of The Second Mile, the charity founded by alleged child molester and former Penn State assistant coach Jerry Sandusky, The Daily is reporting.

The Daily (http://bit.ly/vwE2vC ) reported Monday that Paterno and three fellow investors, including longtime Second Mile board chairman Robert Poole, secured financing to build a $125 million luxury retirement community around 2002, according to public records.

The publication also reported that Paterno was partnered with the same team of investors in developing a golf resort and nearby restaurant and inn. Paterno also joined with other current and former Second Mile board members on a bottled water company, a coaching website and a chain of convenience stores.

Pinnacle Development, one-half of the developer team that built The Village at Penn State, included Paterno, Poole, William Schreyer — a Penn State trustee whose daughter is a longtime board member of The Second Mile — and local developer Philip Sieg.

Each partner stood to make an estimated $590,000 in fees and 15 percent annual interest on a $125,000 initial investment if the project was successful enough to get funding for a second phase, according to The Daily. The retirement community was built in State College, which has a non-student population of about 42,000, near the university.

Joe Paterno is not an accused child molester (or child rapist). But his apathy toward horrible acts likely perpetrated at the institution with which he was nearly synonymous is stunning. It now is still stunning, but a little easier understood, and credit should go to Pennsylvanians who for whatever reason realize that his time has come and gone.

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