Runningback. My disciplinary decision led to the public to question our sincerity, and our commitment and whether we understood the toll that Domestic Violence inflicts on so many families and i take responsibility for both the decision and for ensuring that our actions in the future properly reflect our values. I didnt get it right. Simply put, we have to do better and we will. Goodell announced certain new penalties for Domestic Violence offenders in the league. A first time Domestic Violence or Sexual Assault offender will be subject to a sixweek suspension. A second offense will result in banishment from the nfl. Theyd be thrown out of the league. Players would be allowed to petition for reinstatement after one year, but there is no guarantee it would be issued. At the the end of goodells letter he wrote a message to all nfl personnel saying Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault are wrong. They are illegal. They are Never Acceptable and have no place in the nfl under any circumstances. Roger goodell is no doubt making the right choice, the right decision and setting a good example for everyone. It is much tougher than it was before. Things certainly are changing. For more, i am joined by Terence Moore and National Sports columnist from Ohio University and goldie taylor, msnbc contributor and columnist for the gri and mark papantonio. This is really very interesting and a very important move by the nfl, but i want to go to the incident that sparked this change. Mike, you first. If there had not been any videotape of this most recent incident that was high profile with this runningback of the ravens, do you think that goodell and the nfl would have done what they did today . Ultimately, they would have, ed. This will definitely be known as the ray rice bill because of what happened here, but the weakest part of what i see so far is understanding what kinds of due process avenues are available for the player who is accused of Domestic Violence. That bothers me just a little bit. If the consequences for a player only attach after a criminal plea or conviction and there is due process and this may have positive and if it digresses to a he said she said administrative hearing and it has potential for disaster and we dont have the answer for that right now, but the nfl is a setting where highly paid players have agents and by investors and interestingly enough, exceptional cases and females who see the possibility of what we call the love lottery. I prosecuted enough to know that every now and then in very rare instances an individual might use that as an opportunity to convert to big money. Sometimes it ends up looking an awful lot like extortion. On the other hand, most Domestic Violence claims are very real, very brutal and the men when use their fifties to get their way are general repeat offenders and it almost always is a trend with the offender. Statistics, 41 of the United States are repeat offenders and 8 are rearrested before they go to trial. The in the nfl its 2 to 3 of rostered nfl players are charged with domestic players and maybe three out of a thousand. We dont have an epidemic of of domestic vealence in the nfl when compared to the, and if he pounds on his wife or girlfriend its one too many. Its a pedestal that theyre on and the fish bowl they operate in. Everybody sees it. Goldie taylor, this is about curbing behavior. Whats your reaction tonight . I do believe that the plan that commissioner goodell put out today was comprehensive. I think it it starts on the front end with having the support necessary for the players and their families and their sig give kant others that surround them. There are support in fact of therapeutic avenues of approach that are necessary and i think well is the hard hammer of sanctions that come down. Sixgame suspension for a firsttime offense, but that doesnt include for all those agitating circumstances that surround it including having a child present or whether the woman involve side pregnant and those things will exacerbate what that penalty could be, but having a lifetime ban after a second incident, i believe, with no guarantee that youre petitioned after a year will be heard, i believe its one of those things that could be a curb to this kind of behavior. Let me correct something here. There is an over incidents of Domestic Violence within the nfl. There absolutely is. Its underreported in the nfl just as Sexual Assault was underreported in the military. It was underreported because we did about playing the quick pick lotto. It is about real women, real people in danger for their real lives and so i have to correct that from mr. Papantonio today. There will also be underreporting, but we have to be aware of the fact, and having done this, having prosecuted, its very rare, but you do see an instance when somebody these are highly paid players. Having been on the other end, i also know that those are rarer instances than the instances of valid reports. So i think thats where we ought to be focused today. Terence, your thoughts on this . I mean, this runningback incident that unfolded that brought this under the spotlight, but it will be a benchmark incident that well be looking at for a long time and this clearly made the league move, but the league by admission, moved late and they werent Strong Enough and did they misjudge it . And can they afford to misjudge it again . First of all, goldie is right because the Huffington Post reported recently that 21 of the 32 nfl teams had at least one player charged with Domestic Violence incident over the the past year. To answer your question, this is huge because Roger Goodell made history and never ever can i remember a commissioner making a decision and coming back this quickly, roughly a month later saying i blew it and he did blow it and he did get it right because when you are giving a fourgame suspension for a guy for a drug offense and just two games to a ray rice for knocking out his girlfriend and dragging her out of an elevator . He had to do something and he knew he had to do something dramatic and what he did was pretty much dramatic and the other thing to take note is one of the reasons you have the fourgame suspension involving drugs and thats a collective bargaining thing and the nfl has no control over that. This is the decision that the commissioner has control over because of personal conduct. So hes got control over saying whatever the penalty. Hes like the judge and jury in this particular case and thats why this is huge. The fact that he came and said that i made a mistake and the fact that it came down with the hard penalties. He deserves a lot of credit for this. The suspension to the athlete in question right now stands. What do you make of that, goldie some. Well, it does stand, unfortunately. There is no grandfathering of this penalty and ray rice understands that he lives in a new world now. That if he has a second incident that he can be subject to a life time ban from the nfl and he has to repetition the league and no guarantee that that petition will be heard and his career is on the line now unless he finds a way to reform his behavior that im confident if he can if he gets the right support and its true that the nfl is about providing the support that he needs. I think they want him to be a better player both on and off the peeled and thats why the supports are in place and so people like ray rice will have to live up to a brand new standard. The nfl does have an awful lot of women fans and i happen to be one of them. I control my television set, not just six days a week and seven days on sunday and i decide what game gets watched and they have to look at us female fans as well. We are buying the hot dogs. Were buying the jerseys and were buying tickets and showing up on game day just like men are and this kind of response by Roger Goodell shows that he recognizes that and that were also a source of grand revenue for the nfl. Terence, in your reporting over the years in the league do you think that there have been times when theyve swept this under the rug and it has gone underreported and you think some players have been protected over time . Oh, no question about it. Ive covered the nfl pretty consistently since the late 1970s, and ill tell you, theres a lot of stuff that would make your skin crawl that ive seen that we couldnt report. Ill tell you something, this is also going to be a deterrent for two of the most horrific things that has happened in the nfl in the last five or six years. You had the ray car uthsituation who hired somebody to kill his pregnant girlfriend. You had that situation. And the situation with steve mcnair being killed by his mistress. This was sort of a deterrent, hopefully the kind of key players from saying dont even go there because were watching you and this is going to be a bad thing if you even think about it. Mike, whats the liability of teams in situations like this as they are as terence and goldie has said that it goes underreported and people are hurt and theres no restitution. Is there a legal liability here for the team . Absolutely. If theyve been put on notice that they have a player that has this history of repeat offending and they take no action. They dont try to get him counseling and they dont try to get him to interfere with his conduct there absolutely is a connection between from him to the team. Theres absolutely no question about that. Somebody were to look at the statistics as its been pointed out here. I want to be clear, i think this is a good move. My whole point is due process still matters. You still have to have in place some way to make sure that player that has been accused of this, that can lose their lively hood that they have some avenue of due process in this whole course of conduct. If they really want to solve the problem they need to start at the College Level. The College Level is where we see conduct even as bad as we see in the nfl and it it has to start with the conditioning of these players having them understand and this is not a free for all simply because theyre a College Player and simply because theyre an nfl player that theyre playing by rules that the rest of the population dont have to play by. What do you think about that, goldie . Do you think the ncaa can step in and have uniform rules on this and i dont know if they do or not. I know the University Institutions have code of conducts and athletic departments have that, as well. What about that some. I absolutely have to agree with him here that you do have to start as far back as far as college to train them how to behave on and off the field. The same issue is true within the College Arena that youre having an awful lot of underreports happening on these College Campuses and instances of, Domestic Violence or date violence as theyre calling it today and so i think that well is an underreporting there that extends itself into the the nfl. So i do think that due process is absolutely necessary. You know, i have the right to prove my side of the case. I have the right to protect my career. I have the right to let all of the facts fall where they may, and so i think that hes right that due process ought to rule the day, but im awfully happy that there are real sanctions on the other end of that process that did not exist just 24 hours ago. This incident took the grabbed the attention of several in the United States senate. One of them was senator from connecticut, Richard Blumenthal who joins us tonight via the telephone. Senator, good to have you with us tonight. I understand you had written a letter to Roger Goodell at the time that this all unfolded and you said the decision to suspend mr. Rice for a mere two games sends the inescapable message that the nfl does not take domestic or intimatepartner violence with the seriousness they deserve. We urge you to make some changes that mr. Rices suspension should more adequately reflect the seriousness of his offense. Senator, your response to what the nfl has done this afternoon . Great step forward. It puts them within reach of a really important and historic step that sets a model potentially for other sports and other professional leagues. We still have to find out whether theyll cross the knoll line. Words are fine. Actions are whats necessary and the possibility of a sixweek suspension without pay and longer punishment, a years banishment. If its a second offense all are really, very, very important signals and messages and now we have to see whether it it will be implemented and i believe very, very strongly that the commissioner is to be commended for listening and heeding, for example, my call and others that these kinds of Domestic Violence, brutality and assault have to be treated severely and seriously. Senator, do you think the league has to stay on it maybe to find out if this is going to be enough . Were talking about curbing behavior. Absolutely, the league must stay on it and many of us who are interested in fighting Domestic Violence. I started a group here in connecticut some years ago associated with one of our major Domestic Violence shelters. Its called men against Domestic Violence and men make a difference. Men have to take a stand and these athletes are paramount, principal role models for children and we know that Domestic Violence is a cycle that men who perpetrate Domestic Violence, 70 or more have seen or experienced it it in their own lives and so these athletes are role models and as important as a punishment, by the way, in my view that the education component that the commissioner is announcing, reaching out to spou spouses and reaching out on family members. Good to have you with us tonight. I appreciate your time and senator rich r Art Blumenthal and i want to go back to Terence Moore. What does this do with organizations in the league, mr. Moore . I mean, coming up on the end of Training Camp right now. I know that theres a lot of counselling that goes on with these players when theyre new into the league. When an athlete comes to you today, they bring their agent. They bring their accountant and they bring their advertising guy and the next corporate deal that theyre going to do. They come to you today as a commodity. And theyre dont just come from some school, you know, this has to be managed. So whats the responsibility of coaches and teams and the way they manage these players at this point in the wake of this . If you are a general manager or an nfl coach right now immediately you are getting all these guys in the room and telling them to cool it it, stop it, be about business because we cannot afford to lose you for six weeks, okay some besides the fact that theyll get zapped as par as pay is concerned, youre going to hurt the team. People were talking about due process earlier and one of the beautiful things about this and maybe to some, maybe not so much, when it comes to being the commissioner of these sports there is no due process and these guys are very much like Vladimir Putin in charge and whatever he decides in this c e case, Roger Goodell and thats a good thing given the veiolence and the potential problems. Great to have you with us tonight and i appreciate your time on the ed show. Still ahead, obamas economy is here and am booing. Rapid Response Panel weighs in and a lot of good signs out there, but first, well take a look at where our moral obligation lies at this point with iraq and syria, with the slauters that are taking place. President obama spoke moments ago and says no military action against russia. Were right back. Female announcer through labor day at sleep train, get 36 months interestfree financing, plus big savings of up to 400 on beautyrest and posturepedic. 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