Charles Blow of the NY Times manages to type opinion columns with both fingers in his ears - he is worried about under-reporting of the sexual abuse of children but apparently not worried about Obama's Safe Schools Czar, who has a disturbing record on that very topic. It looks like Clark Hoyt's promise that the Times will be au courant on the stories bubbling on the right remains aspirational.
From Mr. Blow:
Coming on the heels of the arrest of Roman Polanski for his 1977 crime of plying a 13-year-old girl with Champagne and Quaaludes before raping and sodomizing her, and the revelation from Mackenzie Phillips that she had had a 10-year “consensual incestuous” relationship with her own father that she believes began when she was a teenager, it raises the question: How pervasive is child sexual abuse and how often do these crimes go unreported?
The statistics are sobering.
According to a 2000 report by the Bureau of Justice Statistics, nearly 70 percent of all sexual assaults are committed against children. While the age with the greatest proportion of assaults reported was 14, more than half of all child victims were under 12. And of those under 12, 4-year-olds were at the greatest risk.
...
The good news: Reports of sexual abuse in the United States seem to be sliding. The not-so-good news: Reports and prevalence are not the same, and it’s not conclusive that they move in concert. The bad news: If up to 3 in 10 girls and 3 in 20 boys are still being assaulted, these are epidemic proportions. And, if most cases are never reported, it’s a silent epidemic.
Like Perry, most child victims — scared, confused and ashamed — tell no one. Instead, they shunt the unsavory secret into a dark corner of the mind, where they try, alone, for years to make sense of it.
We must do a better job of helping these children realize that they are not alone, not at fault and not powerless, that there is hope and help and healing.
Let's see - Roman Polanski was a long time ago. Mackenzie Phillips was a long time ago. I am casting about for other examples from a few years back. Hey, how about Kevin Jennings, our new Safe Schools Czar? Back in 1988, while a schoolteacher, Jennings chatted with a male student he believed to be fifteen years old who seemingly reported having unprotected sex with a man he met at a bus station.
Let's see - there was AIDS risk, there was the possibility of under-age sex (the man has since said he was 16 at the time, so he was barely legal although Jennings didn't know it), and there was the matter of a teacher's obligation to report this sort of thing to parents and authorities. Yet Jennings, now our Safe Schools Czar, reported this to no one; we can only imagine Mr. Blow's concern.
In fact, we can not do more than imagine Mr. Blow's reaction, since he has apparently never opined on the Jennings situation despite his current call for greater reporting of underage sexual abuse. Fox News has noted the Jennings story, as has ABC News (and do see their UPDATE in which the man claims to have been sixteen and not sexually active, which does not mitigate Jennings failure to report what he understood to be a fifteen year old having sex.) The Times website even carried an AP story and noted it at their Caucus blog.
Well. If this is all news to Mr. Blow then everything is normal in TimesWorld. Or if Mr. Blow is well aware of the Jennings controversy he might try to square his call for greater reporting of underage sexual abuse with his unwillingness to describe our Safe School Czar's prior laissez-faire approach to this subject.
Or he could talk about Roman Polanski and Mackenzie Phillips. They aren't Safe School czars, but their stories are surely interesting and familiar to Times readers. And less threatening.
I lead a sheltered life, even more sheltered than the denizens of TIMESWORLD. Is it possible to beat someone so "strips of skin" are coming off the victim's back? That sounds more like burns. Or is it the beating was severe enough to sever strips of flesh from the victim? That sounds like a whip was used. In which case it would be hard to do inside a house, there isn't enough room inside. Perry was raised in the city streets of New Orleans according to his website bio.
In brief, more creative writing as applied to biography. Whatever happend to Perry, and it likely was awful, he needed to read such literature as A CHILD NAMED DAVE before he could write this. I'd like Mr. Blow's telephone so I could pitch my investment strategies to him. One born every minute.
Posted by: Gregory Koster | October 10, 2009 at 05:31 PM
I really must have overstayed my time on earth because I never imagined I'd see people like this in the WH. never. Inconceivable and I think I have a rather good imagination.
Posted by: clarice | October 10, 2009 at 06:04 PM
On in Bizarro world, clarice, but a look at his recent offerings, shows Chuck couldn't be more trite and cliched if he tried
Posted by: narciso | October 10, 2009 at 06:09 PM
Maybe Krauthammer will take up Cloward-Pliven next, Clarice. He seems to have thrown the gauntlet down this week.
Posted by: Extraneus | October 10, 2009 at 06:41 PM
And right on cue...
U.S. Blocks Oil Drilling at 60 Sites in Utah
Posted by: Extraneus | October 10, 2009 at 06:44 PM
I saw that on Pamela Geller's site,
Extraneous, WTH are we doing, for lack of a better word.
Posted by: narciso | October 10, 2009 at 06:56 PM
In my opinion, Obama should get some one who hasn't promoted student sex with adults to be Safe Schools Czar.
I know Dems will say that makes me a terrorist or a racist, but I can't help it. I'm a victim of my own bigotry.
Posted by: Original MikeS | October 10, 2009 at 07:54 PM
No, n, it's what the Hell is Obama and his deranged crew doing. I know WTH we are doing; we are gathering our wrath.
=============================
Posted by: He's mad, I tell you, as a hatter. | October 10, 2009 at 07:59 PM
Feds stop Utah oil and gas drilling at 60 sites: The BS coming out of this WH means shovel ready jobs! Bandini is *so* jealous.
As for the Safe School czar, my Orwell-meter has blown (as in Charles of the NYT)a gasket. I think the czar wants to make the schools safe for *his* agenda. Will America's teachers really accommodate him?
Posted by: Frau Mistgabel | October 10, 2009 at 09:33 PM
Why wouldn't they, frau, Bill ayers is an official in the leading organization that designs school curricula?
Posted by: clarice | October 10, 2009 at 09:41 PM
I have been in the anteroom to 'the belly of the beast' it really is as bad as you suspect, Frau
Posted by: narciso | October 10, 2009 at 09:49 PM
It's potentially worse than that, Clarice. Ayers has influenced U.S. teacher education with social justice carp. Steve Diamond has addressed this and everyone has not yet signed on. Ayers needs to be exposed to the general public.I don't think he would relish being Alinsky-ized.
You wrote, "I really must have overstayed my time on earth because I never imagined I'd see people like this in the WH. never." The safe sex czar (who czuks as Caro noted), should fear those of us who have been around for a while. You have not overstayed your time; you are needed. Welcome your potential crone, as in wise one', revered elder of the circle.
Posted by: Frau Mistgabel | October 10, 2009 at 10:01 PM
He's being targetted, mein Frau; see the blogger's pix and verbix.
========================================
Posted by: Keep asking him. | October 10, 2009 at 10:05 PM
GK -
I think a cat o' nine tails would do the trick
Posted by: flodigarry | October 10, 2009 at 11:18 PM
Zero really needs an intervention.
Posted by: glasater | October 11, 2009 at 12:46 AM
Well TM,
I think we can all surmise what Child Pedarist Woody Allen thinks about devastating OP-Eds from the New York Times about Child Pedarists like Woody Allen...Or Roman Polanski, or our Secretay of Education for that matter.
From Annie Hall: (with slight editing of 1 word)
"ISSAC: has anybody read that the PEDARISTS are gonna march in new jersey? i read this in the newspaper. we should go down there, get some guys together, you know, get some bricks and baseball bats and really explain things to ’em.
JERRY: there was this devastating satirical piece on the op-ed page of the times. it was devastating.
ISSAC: well a satirical piece in the times is one things but bricks and baseball bats really gets right to point down there.
HELEN: oh, but really biting satire is always better than physical force.
ISSAC: but true physical force is always better with PEDARISTS because it’s hard to satirize a guy with shiny boots on.
DENNIS (interrupting): excuse me we were talking about orgasms.
MARY: oh, no, please wait no. give me a break dennis.
DENNIS: well we were.
MARY: no, i’m from philadelphia. we never talk about things like that in public"
For those who don't remember the film, Woody Allen played Issac, the guy calling for using baseball bats. It was Nazi's, not Pedarists, but seriously, what's the difference?
Anyhow, I'd recommend the Spalding Bat-Five for Issac (Woody Allen). Made by Spalding in 1820's England, and highly recommended for cracking skulls by Charles Darwin---even better than the full beer bottles recomended by this years Nobel Peace Prize winner. err, make that ignoble Peace Prize Winner. But don't worry, this year it's not hard to make our Peace Prize Winner ignoble. Why he almost does it all by himself---with a litle help from some committee chicks in Copenhagen of course.
Posted by: daddy | October 11, 2009 at 02:46 AM