As we know, college foot- ball is in the throes of a ma- jor scandal at the University of Miami. It involves a major donor-felon admitting to pro- viding recruits some 72 in all with all manner of ille- gal inducements including hookers and cash payments. It obviously required a lot of folks to look the other way from 2002-10. Disingenuous, Nixon-era "plausible deniabil- ity" comes readily to mind. Mi- ami President Donna Shalala shouldn't skate on this one. And not that Miami, which has courted a swagger-and- rogue reputation over the years, is some anomaly. No less than 10 universities - including household names such as Michigan, Auburn, Southern California, Ohio State, North Carolina, Georgia Tech and Tennessee have been investigated or penal- ized by the NCAA in recent months. But it was institu- tionalized sleaze at Miami. These, indeed, are forebod- ing, troubling times for college football just as a new season is set to kick off with more hanging in the balance than ever before. It's about cred- ibility. But the reason it's about credibility is because of money. The implications of confer- ence affiliations and network television deals are beyond daunting and dazzling. Bil- lions are at stake. Ratings get equal billing with rankings. This is big, big business - alma maters, fight songs and tailgating notwithstanding. Schools, who routinely pay head coaches seven-figure salaries, are under the gun to give their fan base, includ- ing influential boosters, a successful, high-profile team to support, donate to, brag on and even hang out with. At Miami, donor-felon Nevin Shapiro a part-owner of a sports talent agency even had a student lounge named after him and twice led the team onto the field to start games. But he always brought his checkbook because he knew the pressure was con- tinuously ramping up: to be in a prestigious conference, to be on TV, to win, to go to a bowl game and to recruit accordingly. Therein lies the problem- atic key. The pressure was ever mounting to land prized recruits. Whether they are legitimate "student-athletes" or whether they are the ane- mically academic who don't belong on a university cam- pus. Some will be impressed with the labs, the library and post-graduate networking op- portunities. Most will want to prep for the pros and many have likely felt a sense of en- titlement since their hot-shot high school days. So if a high-living, high- rolling booster can help woo blue-chip teenagers, so be it. Chances are, there are other Nevin Shapiros out there, just none who are currently con- victs being debriefed by the feds for Ponzi-scheming. The 'Canes of blind-sided, new coach Al Golden, who might be nostalgic for Temple right now, got caught. They might have been more unlucky than atypical. Third-party infiltra- tors, including agents and agent runners, lurk around many campuses. In the aftermath of Shapir- oGate, we're seeing the usual furrowed brows and scratched chins by the NCAA and ESPN types on what to do about col- lege football. Here's a suggestion. For- get about the pay-the-players (above room, board and schol- arship) arguments. Too many scenarios ranging from Title IX and non-revenue sports to the slippery slope of assessing relative player contributions - to factor in. But tackle this first: SClean house of all the parasites. Giving ultimate access to talent scouts who write checks is pimping your school. It speaks volumes that a university needs to have that pointed out. But when they're caught, hammer them hard, even SMU hard. Make everybody play by the same eligibility man- dates. They can be tightened, of course, but the minimums have to be worthy of insti- tutions of higher learning. No more pure mercenar- ies. Cross-country runners and golfers don't have to be Dean's List material, but they do have to be legitimate stu- dents. Don't settle for scho- lastic-challenged Hessians on the gridiron. Those who need remedia- tion shouldn't be on a college campus at this point in their life. That's why there are com- munity colleges and middle schools. Let's take the oxymo- ron out of "student-athlete." And that includes and, yes, I'I say it insulting, wink- and-nod minority set-asides. As if this were about diversity and not cashing in. It would send a signal to all those neither blind nor inured to the hypocrisy inherent in too many big-time, big-pres- sure, big-budget programs. And it might send a mes- sage to the Shapiroesque bot- tom feeders that this is no longer their kind of-milieu. Perhaps depending on the NCAA punishment this lat- From real estate, corporate, bankruptcy and health law to commercial and complex litigation, our clients are our most important priority, and we strive 2 'Pinions To io By Joe O'Neill Miami as a Cautionary Tale? est incident with Miami can yet become a cautionary tale of how a university devastated by a license-to-shill booster with consummate, insider ac- cess and an over-the-top re- cruiting culture regained its mission and reputation. Otherwise, this won't be the only reference to Hurri- canes becoming Golden show- ers. A Movie And A President It was recently reported that director Kathryn Bigelow, who won the 2009 Academy Award for The Hurt Locker, has begun work on a movie about the hunt for Osama bin Laden. It's scheduled for release in October 2012. Chances are President Barack Obama will look good, and the movie could give him a boost in the campaign homestretch. Naturally, there are those who are looking askance at the project. Specifically Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., chairman of the House Homeland Se- curity Committee, who thinks that the Obama Administra- tion's cooperation has secu- rity implications. He wants an investigation. The Administration, via press secretary Jay Carney, dismissed such concerns and noted that no classified infor- mation was involved. But let's put this in con- text. This has happened be- fore. There is precedent for the White House cooperating with movie directors espe- cially where a serious, con- temporary issue was involved. Recall that the Kennedy White House cooperated with John Frankenheimer, the di- rector of Seven Days In May, in 1962. President John F. Kennedy even arranged to conveniently visit Hyannis- port for the weekend when the film crew needed to shoot around the White House. He very much wanted the movie, whose screenplay was written by Rod Serling, to be complet- ed. JFK's cooperation was well motivated even though the Pentagon strongly objected. The movie's premise: a mili- tary coup. Times Ad SInteresting house ad the other day in the St. Petersburg Times comparing the Times to its daily rival, the Tampa Tri- bune. Across the top it read: "12 Reasons Why We're Tam- pa Bay's Favorite Newspaper." It then mentioned a bunch of niche writers that the Trib didn't have from full-time pop music and book critic to full-time business columnist and society writer. I get it, but there had to be a way of working in full- time "correspondent-at-large" - or some such appellation - for Susan Taylor Martin. She's the former business editor who is frequently on overseas assignment. Most recently writing out of Paki- stan. Most newspapers not named the New York Times, Wall Street Journal or. Wash- ington Post, don't have their own person trotting the globe A(Oasp ars AMERICA'S ff1iar IRST24/7 C r hoppe CIGAR LOCKERS ,-------------------,-------- Bur 5 HAiNDROM CIGARS AND (cT THE 6ITH OR FREE! Offer exp 8/31/11 CUESTA REY ARTURO FUENrE ASlTON PA)RON LA GLORi\ Horo MOcTTERRmr RoMEo Y JtuI;T PuNoC PARTAGAS H. U1MANN MoTI-rus;Cw & Mw' MORmE S' 3675 South Westshore Blvd. I Tampa, FL 33629 | 813-831-0100 LA GACETA/Friday, August 26, 2011/Page 13 backgrounding news from in- ternational trouble spots. The Wilbur Landrey legacy lives. If you can reference "soci- ety writer," you can work in Susan Taylor Martin. She's uniquely good at what she does. Speaking of the Times, how about making that (mov- ie) Critics Calls. more, well, useful. All movies from The Help to Change Up must fit into a three-category key: "Don't Miss," "Don't Hurry," "Don't Bother." Cute. Problem is, a lot of movies fall between "Don't Miss" and "Don't Hur- ry." They just do. Maybe "Do Consider." Checkbook Journalism A lot of us were appalled by reports of ABC News paying for access to Casey Anthony and her family. ABC would follow that up by paying for an interview with kidnapping victim Jaycee Lee Dugard. What is no less appalling, however, is the realization that there is a tradition for this sort of media manipula- tion. A recent New York Times piece chronicled a brief his- tory of this sordid practice. It included: Esquire magazine paying $20,000 in 1970 to Lt. Wil- liam L. Calley Jr. of My Lai (Vietnam) massacre infamy. The Hearst Newspapers paying for a high-profile at- torney for Bruno Hauptman, convicted in the 1935 Lind- bergh kidnapping case. The arrangement bought them ex- clusive access. And to its credit, the NYT underscored its own role. In 1912 it paid the surviving operator of the Titanic's wire- less communications system $1,000 for his harrowing ac- counting of escaping death. Presumption Of Guilt We tend to take our crim- inal-justice presumption-of- innocence tenet for granted until confronted with certain high-profile cases. A Casey Anthony, a .Dominique Strauss-Kahn. Pre-trial pub- licity can skew perceptions - until reined in and balanced by legal analysis. And then there's Egypt's trial of its former President Hosni Mubarak. Isn't there something inherently incon- gruous about a cage and a presumption of anything but guilt? Quoteworthy S"We have men who have divorced themselves from life and love death more than you love life, and killing is one of their wishes." Al-Qaida in Mesopotamia spokesman Abu Mohammed. "I make no apologies -for being reasonable." Presi- dent Barack Obama, in responding to Iowa voters asking him about the compro- mises he has made. "The U.S. economy is highly resilient. We believe that the U.S. economy will achieve even better develop- ment as it rises to challenges." - Chinese Vice President Xi (continued to page 14)