{"id":186130,"date":"2014-04-29T18:28:00","date_gmt":"2014-04-29T23:28:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2014\/04\/29\/this-should-have-happened-years-ago\/"},"modified":"2014-04-29T18:28:00","modified_gmt":"2014-04-29T23:28:00","slug":"this-should-have-happened-years-ago","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2014\/04\/29\/this-should-have-happened-years-ago\/","title":{"rendered":"This Should Have Happened Years Ago"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Donald Sterling has been <a href=\"http:\/\/www.latimes.com\/sports\/sportsnow\/la-sp-sn-donald-sterling-nba-lifetime-ban-20140429,0,3465134.story#axzz30Kt8Hruv\">banned from the NBA for life and must sell the LA Clippers<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>I do not know whether this will survive the inevitable court challenge (If the NBA were smart, they would make an above market value offer to get this sh%$ off the table).<\/p>\n<p>Still, I think that the big point was made by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, that <a href=\"http:\/\/time.com\/79590\/donald-sterling-kareem-abdul-jabbar-racism\/\">we have known that Sterling was a racist dirtbag for years<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><span style=\"color: blue;\">Yes, I\u2019m angry, too, but not just about the sins of Donald Sterling.  I\u2019ve got a list. But let\u2019s start with Sterling. I used to work for him,  back in 2000 when I coached for the Clippers for three months. He was  congenial, even inviting me to his daughter\u2019s wedding. Nothing happened  or was said to indicate he suffered from IPMS (Irritable Plantation  Master Syndrome). Since then, a lot has been revealed about Sterling\u2019s  business practices:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: blue;\">2006: U.S. Dept. of Justice sued Sterling for housing  discrimination. Allegedly, he said, \u201cBlack tenants smell and attract  vermin.\u201d<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: blue;\">2009: He reportedly paid $2.73 million in a Justice Dept. suit  alleging he discriminated against blacks, Hispanics, and families with  children in his rentals. (He also had to pay an additional nearly $5  million in attorneys fees and costs due to his counsel\u2019s \u201csometimes  outrageous conduct.\u201d)<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: blue;\">2009: Clippers executive (and one of the greatest NBA players in  history) sued for employment discrimination based on age and race.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"color: blue;\">\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: blue;\">What bothers me about this whole Donald Sterling affair isn\u2019t just  his racism. I\u2019m bothered that everyone acts as if it\u2019s a huge surprise.  Now there\u2019s all this dramatic and very public rending of clothing about  whether they should keep their expensive Clippers season tickets.  Really? All this other stuff I listed above has been going on for years  and this ridiculous conversation with his girlfriend is what puts you  over the edge? <i>That\u2019s<\/i> the smoking gun?<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: blue;\"><br \/><\/span> <span style=\"color: blue;\">He was discriminating against black and Hispanic families for years,  preventing them from getting housing. It was public record. We did  nothing. Suddenly he says he doesn\u2019t want his girlfriend posing with  Magic Johnson on Instagram and we bring out the torches and rope.  Shouldn\u2019t we have all called for his resignation back then?<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: blue;\"><br \/><\/span> <span style=\"color: blue;\">\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: blue;\"><br \/><\/span> <span style=\"color: blue;\">Make no mistake: Donald Sterling is the villain of this story. <b><span style=\"font-size: 100%; font-variant: small-caps;\">But he\u2019s just a handmaiden to the bigger evil. In our quest for social justice,  we shouldn\u2019t lose sight that racism is the true enemy<\/span><\/b>. He\u2019s just another  jerk with more money than brains. <\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>I got nothing to add, really.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Donald Sterling has been banned from the NBA for life and must sell the LA Clippers. I do not know whether this will survive the inevitable court challenge (If the NBA were smart, they would make an above market value offer to get this sh%$ off the table). Still, I think that the big point &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[967,1002,1001,1057],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-186130","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bigotry","category-good-writing","category-racism","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186130"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=186130"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186130\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=186130"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=186130"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=186130"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}