The NCAA has "vacated" Coach Joe Paterno's victories at Penn State from 1998-2011. What exactly could that mean? It means, in a spectacular display of pretzel logic and revisionist history, these "officials" (just what makes someone an "official, anyway) have declared that Penn State's football wins—112 victories by that team over a 14 year period just... never happened. That'll put some extra misery in convicted pedophile Sandusky's jail time and deliver a kidney punch to Joe Paterno's cadaver.
What of all the student athletes who were a part - the BIGGEST PART mind you, of those victories - kids who had no knowledge of their coaches' depravity - are they to now return their treasured trophies, cleats and jerseys? Shall the NCAA amass a team of "official vacators," armed with white-out, erasers and hard-drive wiping electro-magnets as they attempt to remove all traces of the facts that have been declared to no longer exist? Maybe they'll also have those men-in-black flashing pen thingys that erase chunks of brain memory, too. What about every push up, bench press, dawn-practice, body slam and broken rib those kids endured in attaining those 112 victories - are those "vacated," too? The mere name of the school they attended is a sick punch line for all time. Now, their efforts and athletic achievements never existed?
Erasing Joe Paterno's victories is not unlike that old Soviet group photograph which had a politician air-brushed away after he lost favor with his fellow thugs. The photo manipulator erased the politician, but left his empty shoes quite visible on the floor.
Remember that really, really, really stupid 3rd grade teacher who said, "all right class, whoever threw that spitball better come forward right now, or else you ALL are going to stay here until 6 O'clock. "
It seems that teacher is now running the NCAA.
History is history. Those who try to alter it need to be called on it - for the intrinsic deceit, for the insufferable hubris and the outrageous stupidity of their actions.
