When Bobby Kennedy was murdered in
1968, a conservative Republican, Charles Goodell, was appointed to his Senate
seat. But Goodell was a conservative with a conscience, and that conscience
wouldn't let him support the Vietnam War, much to the displeasure of President
Richard Nixon.
So the Nixon people went after him with
a vengeance. They
ran William F. Buckley's brother James against him, and Goodell was defeated
for re-election.
He lost his Senate seat, but for the rest of his
life he had the consolation of being able to look in the mirror every morning
and seeing a man with integrity staring back.
I wish his son, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, could
do the same. Given the opportunity to do the right thing in the Ray Rice case,
he punted.
First, he interviewed the victim with her accused
attacker sitting right next to her, something all those high-priced former FBI
agents on the NFL payroll could have told him was a no-no. Then he chose to
believe Rice's self-serving story and let him off with a mere two-game
suspension, just a week after he banned Cleveland Browns wide receiver Josh
Gordon an entire year for smoking pot!
Goodell made it clear what his priority is: public
relations - or, as they put it in NFL-speak, "protecting the shield."
Now that a second video has surfaced showing Rice
delivering the actual knockout punch, he's been suspended
"indefinitely," which means he can apply for reinstatement after a
year.
But why did Goodell need to see that second video
when he'd already seen the first one showing Rice dragging her unconscious body
out of the elevator? How did he think she lost consciousness?
Domestic violence in the NFL is nothing new.
Carolina Panthers defensive end Greg Hardy has been playing for three months
after his conviction for beating his girlfriend and threatening to kill her.
49er defensive end Ray McDonald is still playing after being arrested last
month for beating up his pregnant girlfriend. And last Friday Vikings running
back Adrian Peterson was arrested for beating his 4-year-old son about the
genitals with a tree branch.
Two years ago, Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan
Belcher killed his girlfriend. In 1999 Carolina wide receiver Rae Carruth
killed a woman who was eight months pregnant with his child. And, of course,
don't forget O.J.
But Roger Goodell doesn't think violence against
women is a problem.
Well, I have news for
him: It is, and not just in the NFL. It's widespread throughout our society -
in the military, in police departments and on college campuses, where sexual
assaults are routinely covered up by the chain of command.
It's open season on women, and it has to stop. But
it won't until men stop it themselves. We all need to be like the students at
Columbia.
A few months ago, a Columbia senior named Emma
Sulkowitz was raped by another student, and the university did nothing about
it. So she's been protesting by dragging the mattress on which she was raped
around campus with her.
Last Saturday hundreds of her fellow students showed
up at an anti sexual assault rally, and all of them were toting mattresses,
along with signs reading, "Carry that weight."
And that's what we have to do, too. Carry that
weight.
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