Archive for October 12th, 2012

Never again.

Friday, October 12th, 2012

“Never again”, in this case, will the NCAA apply the “death penalty” to a college athletic program.

Not because they didn’t do it to Penn State. Because they didn’t do it to Texas Southern University.

I had not been following the saga of the TSU athletic program closely, until I ran across a nice summary post on the TM Daily Post site.

Investigators said the Tigers’ athletic department from 2004 through 2011 was guilty of improper recruiting tactics, academic impropriety and financial aid and eligibility violations that, based on a review of NCAA records, could be of unprecedented scope, totaling 129 student-athletes in 13 sports.

The phrase “unprecedented scope” is never a good one, especially when the NCAA is using it. In addition, the NCAA also invoked the dreaded “lack of institutional control”.

Plus, TSU has “been on probation or engaged in rules violations for 16 of the last 20 years”. The NCAA refers to them as a “double repeat violator”. In addition, the NCAA claims that “the university reported to the committee it was taking certain remedial actions when it actually was not”.

But what, exactly, have they done? I like the ESPN blogger who says they’ve “pretty much willfully broken every NCAA rule under the sun for the past two decades”; that seems like a good summary. Boosters. Recruiting violations. Players getting financial aid and travel expenses they weren’t eligible for. Lying to the NCAA. Ignoring limits on scholarships imposed by the NCAA previously.

In a particularly original twist, the basketball team was accused of stashing two of its players on the football team and granting them scholarships, though they did not actually play football.

And what did they get? Five years probation, apparently because the NCAA thinks the current TSU administration is committed to reform. (And the school is going to be subject to “stringent” outside supervision.)

Sanctions, both self-imposed by TSU and imposed by the NCAA, include postseason bans for football through 2014 and men’s basketball through 2012-13, football scheduling and scholarship restrictions and an order vacating won-loss records and championships from 2006 through 2010 in all sports and through 2011 in women’s soccer and football.
That penalty wipes out the Tigers’ 2010 Southwestern Athletic Conference football title, their first since 1968.

And the former football and basketball coaches are under three year “show cause” orders, “making them effectively unemployable in college sports during that period, as they are banned from all recruiting, and any school attempting to hire them would be subject to NCAA scrutiny.”

Cheese louise, if they won’t pull the trigger on a school that is that far out of control, who will they pull the trigger on?

Posted in Clippings, Sports | 1 Comment »

A history of violence.

Friday, October 12th, 2012

Daniel Bissman admitted liaisons with prostitutes. When he applied for the job, he was still on probation for punching a man unconscious. Then there was his drug use, dishonesty and involvement in what he estimated to be as many as 100 domestic violence incidents, according to confidential sheriff’s employment records reviewed by The Times.

The job he applied for was “courthouse security guard”. Apparently, Mr. Bissman would not be carrying a gun in this position (which makes me wonder what the point is). And anybody can apply for any job, of course.

Despite an extensive background investigation detailing Bissman’s misdeeds, he was hired for the $25,944-a-year job in November 2009. After a reporter’s inquiry, Bissman, 36, was placed on leave and an internal sheriff’s investigation was launched into the circumstances of the hiring, including whether Bissman received special treatment, according to a department spokesman.

By the way, Mr. Bissman’s mother “is the longtime personal secretary for Undersheriff Paul Tanaka”.

Posted in California Über Alles, Clippings, Cops, Law | Comments Closed

Torah watch.

Friday, October 12th, 2012

Way back in January of 2010, I noted in passing a WP article about Rabbi Menachem Youlus and his “Save a Torah” foundation. Rabbi Youlus claimed to have traveled to Europe repeatedly in order to rescue Torahs that had been misplaced or lost during the Holocaust; the WP suggested that his claims were more than a little exaggerated.

There’s an update:

A federal judge in Manhattan on Thursday sentenced Youlus to 51 months in prison, plus three years probation, for defrauding contributors to his Save a Torah Foundation and peddling scrolls with bogus Holocaust provenance. He also was ordered to pay $990,366.05 in restitution to his victims.

Posted in Clippings, Law | 1 Comment »

Two from the Times: October 12, 2012.

Friday, October 12th, 2012

Wyclef Jean, a musician, had a charity called Yéle devoted to helping the people of Hati.

The key word there is “had”.

But on his book tour for “Purpose: An Immigrant’s Story,” Mr. Jean, who made an aborted bid for the presidency of Haiti after the earthquake, neglects to mention two key facts: a continuing New York attorney general’s investigation has already found financial improprieties at Yéle, and the charity effectively went out of business last month, leaving a trail of debts, unfinished projects and broken promises.

More:

In 2010, Yéle spent $9 million and half went to travel, to salaries and consultants’ fees and to expenses related to their offices and warehouse. In contrast, another celebrity charity, Sean Penn’s J/P Haitian Relief Organization, spent $13 million with only 10 percent going to those costs.

How much does your charity have to suck to make Sean Penn look good?

And more:

Though Mr. Penn’s group spent $43,000 on office-related expenses, Yéle spent $1.4 million, including $375,000 for “landscaping” and $37,000 for rent to Mr. Jean’s Manhattan recording studio. Yéle spent $470,440 on its own food and beverages.

Some of Yéle’s programming money went to projects that never came to fruition: temporary homes for which it prepaid $93,000; a medical center to have been housed in geodesic domes for which it paid $146,000; the revitalization of a plaza in the Cité Soleil slum, where supposed improvements that cost $230,000 are nowhere to be seen.

But the NYT isn’t all politics and scams and fraud all the time. Sometimes, they let people loose to have a little fun. Or, sometimes, the editors step out for the day, and the children get to play unsupervised. I can’t decide which one applies here:

Buffalo mozzarella is the Great White Whale of American cheesemaking: a dream so exotic and powerful that it drives otherwise sensible people into ruinous monomaniacal quests. Despite all the recent triumphs of our country’s foodie movement (heirloom-turkey-sausage saffron Popsicles; cardamom paprika mayonnaise foam), no one in the United States has, as of yet, figured out how to recreate precisely this relatively simple Old World delicacy — a food with essentially one ingredient (buffalo milk) that is made every day in Italy. Over the last 15 years, in fact, the attempt to make authentic buffalo mozzarella — to nail both its taste and texture — has destroyed businesses from Vermont to Los Angeles. It seems truly doomed. “A Polar wind blows through it,” Melville might have written about it, if he had been a food writer, “and birds of prey hover over it.”

Posted in Clippings, Food, Law | Comments Closed