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December 16, 2011 | | PENN STATE A judge has ordered Penn State officials Tim Curley and Gary Schultz to stand trial for perjury at the conclusion of former assistant coach Mike McQueary’s first public testimony. McQueary said he witnessed sexual abuse between Jerry Sandusky and a minor in the university locker room and that he told head coach Joe Paterno. McQueary told the jury on Friday that he saw Sandusky behind the boy, who was 10 to 12 years old, with his hands around his waist. McQueary said he couldn’t see Sandusky’s genitals, but that “it was very clear that it looked like there was intercourse going on.” He added that he had never described what he saw as anal intercourse, and did not tell Paterno explicit details. At the end of his testimony, the judge ruled that there was sufficient evidence for Curley and Schultz to stand trial for lying under oath. They testified to a grand jury that McQueary never relayed the seriousness of what he saw on campus, and are accused of failing to properly report what the assistant coach told them about the assault. GOODBYE Andrew remembers his dear friend and dedicates much of his blog today to celebrating the rich life of Christopher Hitchens, one of the great essayists of our time, who died last night at the age of 62 after a battle with esophageal cancer. From the best tributes on the web, the favorite memory of him, his finest moments on TV, to an Auden poem he once read to Andrew, follow the latest on The Dish. ILL-GOTTEN Three years after the mortgage crisis crippled the U.S. economy, the SEC is suing six former mortgage executives from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The executives are accused of misleading investors and seeking the return of “ill-gotten gains,” reports The Daily Beast’s Aram Roston. SENTENCED Barry Bonds was sentenced Friday to a month of house arrest, two years of probation, 250 hours of community service and ordered to pay a $4,000 fine for providing evasive testimony to a grand jury in 2003. The lawyers for the former San Francisco Giant, who was one of a host of athletes connected to the BALCO steroids scandal nearly ten years ago and holds the record for the most home runs ever in a single season, said that they would appeal the ruling even though the judge passed down a much softer ruling than the 15 months in prison recommended by the prosecution. PHEW Apparently President Obama’s “we can all spend Christmas here together” threat worked. With the holidays looming, the House swiftly passed a year-end $1 trillion spending bill, setting a new measure for government spending through the 2012 elections, after Congress closely averted another government shutdown on Friday. The 1,200-page bill covers the domestic budget, the Pentagon, and foreign aid, while billions more will go toward the war in Afghanistan. It’s expected to clear the Senate and be handed over for the president to sign before the end of the day. | | 
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