Catch a Flea-- Miss an Elephant

The revelations of sexual child abuse at Penn State University raises a bitter question about oversight of college athletics by the NCAA.   They take in huge amounts of money, an organization dominated by males, and conspicuous for their own exploitation of college athletes- who generally work for room, board, and tuition at most while this organization rakes in $billions.  They are also known for investigations of individual athletes and institutions, deep probes that focus on even slight violations of their ever growing sets of rules on recruiting and KEEPING MONEY AWAY FROM ATHLETES.  Many people have been swept up in subsequent criminal investigations for giving money or gifts to athletes.  Now, this august body of men, has apparently missed a situation characterized by an eyewitness to rape of a child--how could this be? How could a regulatory body that can sniff out an unpaid car rental miss on a decades long pattern of rape and sexual assault by a prominent coach at one of its most famous member institutions.  Why did the public in effect pay the NCAA to watch a practicing child abuser work on the sidelines?  These questions might seem harsh or unfair--but so too does the sight of so many highly paid men overseeing so many unpaid athletes, making sure they don't get paid- that there is a 'purity' in recruiting talented young people---when all along there was something like this going on- young boys assaulted by one of the leaders of a bell weather franchise.  Is child safety at least as important as, for example : making sure the poor inner-city athlete stays poor while you make billions in TV revenue from his/her skilled performances? Here, there was a public record more than ten years before the scandal hit the news of a rape by an institution's senior coaching staff member- and that phrase from the investigations of Cam Newton, Reggie Bush, and USC forfeiting a championship--" NCAA investigators have uncovered..."  Now, it is the NCAA and its $775 million annual revenues that are being- uncovered.