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JuicyLesson 202: Fear and Loathing … More on Sterling Including Sanctions Imposed on him by the National B’ball Association ..

Our featured photo above shows Sterling and his estranged wife, Rochelle, not looking too happy. Fortunately, I only have a very primitive notion about what they must be going through, given their expressions in this photograph. Too bad. Tough.

“A powerful day indeed in the annals of American sport” as Sterling is banned for life, which means that he will not be permitted to be around NBA teams, arenas, etc. for the rest of his life.
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Above: Adam Silver, NBA Commissioner, on Tuesday banned Sterling from associating with the NBA and with any of its franchises for life.

Thanks to my bud, Mark Altman, for providing me with the following article which among other things contains the sanctions imposed on Clippers’ owner Donald Sterling. According to Adam Silver, NBA Commish, Sterling has admitted to Silver, himself, that it is indeed his, i.e. Sterling’s, voice heard on the tape making disparaging remarks about minorities, most particularly about African-Americans which were recorded surreptitiously and then released to TMZ by his then- gf, V. Stiviano.

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Above: V. Stiviano pictured posing on one of the opulent gifts with which she was showered by the 81 year-old Sterling. Ms. Stiviano is 38 and gold-digging (see below) doesn’t seem to be that much of a stretch after all. Nice … nose there V.S.

WHAT’S WITH THE NAME
Stiviano was born Maria Vanessa Perez in October 1982 in Los Angeles, but successfully petitioned to change her name to V. Stiviano in 2010. There’s no explanation for what the name means, but her stated reason in the court filing was, “Born from a rape case and having yet been fully accepted because of my race.”

As my friend Mylene would say: HO-OH-LEE!

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Sterling seen here with his estranged wife, Rochelle (Shelly), who has initiated a law suit naming Sterling’s then friend, Ms. Stiviano, as a gold- digger, who is using her wiles, looks and even wit to charm Sterling out of an expensive apartment, cars, etc.

Here are some other key details about Stiviano:

In the recorded conversation purported to be with Sterling, the woman identified by TMZ as Stiviano said she was of Black and Mexican descent.
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LEGAL TROUBLES

In March, Sterling’s wife, Rochelle, sued Stiviano, claiming she had received more than $2.5 million in lavish gifts from the Clippers owner and they needed to be returned. A big piece of the suit involves a duplex Stiviano purchased in December for nearly $1.8 million with money that Rochelle Sterling claims Stiviano received from her husband. Stiviano’s name appears on the deed, and Rochelle Sterling is asking a judge to transfer the property to her husband and herself.

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In the filing, Rochelle Sterling accuses Stiviano of engaging “in conduct designed to target, befriend, seduce, and then entice, cajole, borrow from, cheat and/or receive as gifts transfers of wealth from wealthy older men whom she targets for such purpose.”

Stiviano’s attorney has filed documents to dismiss many of the lawsuit’s accusations and denies that Donald Sterling was taken advantage of. “Nowhere in the complaint is it alleged that defendant so acted nor that the feminine wiles of Ms. Stiviano overpowered the iron will of Donald T. Sterling who is well known as one of the most shrewd businessmen in the world.”

HOW SHE MAY HAVE MET STERLING

Rochelle Sterling’s lawsuit claims Stiviano met Sterling at the 2010 Super Bowl.

Since then, the pair have been in a relationship and Stiviano has received a Ferrari, two Bentleys and a Range Rover from the Clippers’ owner, the lawsuit alleges. The vehicles are worth more than $500,000 according to the suit.
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PHOTO SHARING STARTED SCANDAL

Sterling and Stiviano’s alleged fight was apparently sparked by the businessman’s displeasure with Stiviano posting pictures of herself online with Lakers Hall of Famer Magic Johnson and Dodgers outfielder Matt Kemp.

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Above: Pictured with Magic Johnson, Stiviano, on the right poses with an unidentified woman.

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Stiviano pictured with Matt Kemp.

UPDATE 3-NBA bans Clippers owner from game for life over racist comments
2:29 PM Eastern Daylight Time Apr 29, 2014
(Rewrites throughout with NBA commissioner banning Clippers owner from game)

By Scott Malone and Larry Fine

NEW YORK, April 29 (Reuters) – The National Basketball Association banned Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling from the game for life and fined him $2.5 million for racist comments made public over the weekend, the league’s commissioner said on Tuesday.

Sterling, the longest-tenured owner of any of the 30 NBA teams, will not be allowed any role in the operations of his team or be able to serve as one of the league’s governors, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver announced at a news conference in New York.

The controversy began over the weekend when the celebrity website TMZ.com released an audio recording with a voice said to be Sterling’s criticizing his girl friend for associating with “black people.”

An investigation into the recording concluded the voice was Sterling’s Silver told reporters.

“The man whose voice is heard on the recording and on a second recording from the same conversation that was released on Sunday is Mr. Sterling,” said Silver, who is confronting his first major crisis since he was named commissioner in February. “The views expressed by Mr. Sterling are deeply offensive and harmful.”

Sterling’s comments caused a wave of outrage from fans, players and coaches of the league, which was on the forefront of racial integration in U.S. professional sports, all the way to Barack Obama, the first black U.S. president, who blasted the “incredibly offensive racist statements.”

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The move may not be enough for some critics, who called on Sterling to give up ownership of the team, though observers said the other 29 owners of NBA franchises were not likely to back any move that could set a precedent that would call on the owners to vote to force Sterling to sell the team. Such a move would require approval of three-quarters of the current owners.

The league acted after several team sponsors including auto dealer CarMax iInc, Virgin America, State Farm, Kia Motors America, music mogul P. Diddy’s water brand, AQUAHydrate, Red Bull and Yokohama Tire all announced on Monday that they were stepping back from the team.

Some advertisers have asked to move their commercials out of the national broadcast of Tuesday’s Clippers playoff game against the Golden State Warriors, a game the Clippers managed to win, definitely a tribute to the team that they could rise above all the shit going down to defeat the Warriors in a crucial fifth game at home in their best of seven preliminary playoff round.

Sterling bought Clippers in 1981 at a time when basketball was far less commercially successful than it is today, and the franchise could now be worth as much as $800 million, estimated Robert Boland, chairman of the sports management department at New York University.

I have a couple – precisely two for now – issues with the sanctions. First what is $2,5 million to a billionaire? Not even a slap on the wrist. Unfortunately that is the maximum allowable fine according to the league’s constitution which does not make the $2.5 million any less objectionable as a “meaningful” punishment meted out to the very, very rich. Nor does such a relatively minimal fine serve as a real deterrent to prevent similar behaviour in future.

Just like fining a multi-million dollar athlete like Randy Moss ten thousand dollars which Moss himself on camera even mocked at the time by describing the fine basically as nothing but chump change, the same description Earl Woods used to portray the first contract Tiger, his son, signed with Nike. This contract was for FORTY. MILLION. DOLLARS!

Second thing is this: don’cha just love everyone hopping on the anti-Sterling bandwagon when at least some of these people are racists themselves. Everyone just takes this opportunity to put Sterling and his racist remarks down when these “shame-on-you-sayers” are as guilty as Sterling is – it’s just that they haven’t been caught.

Do you think that Jewish Donald Sterling is the only owner of a professional sports franchise who has expressed racist attitudes?! Remember Marge Schott, once owner of baseball’s Cincinnati Reds, who was forced to sell the franchise by Fay Vincent, then MLB Commish, for making racist remarks about some African-Americans playing for her, describing them as “my million dollar nig…s”.

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Above: Marge Schott (1928 to 2004) pictured with steroid-fuelled liar, Cardinals’ Mark McGwire. She is supposedly wishing McGwire luck in this photo, probably confusing the Cardinals with her team, Cincinnati, because both teams wear red.

Schott, in addition, revealed a homophobic side to herself just to round off a most repulsive – for lack of a more appropriate descriptor, my vocabulary fails me – personage when she characterized men who wear earrings as, and I quote,”fruits”. A most ignorant and disgusting woman and it took an equally repulsive racist in the person of Donald Sterling, to bring Schott to mind. Another reason for me to hang with Snoop Dogg (see short clip below) and state unequvocally that Sterling is a complete pig, a total chazzar (Hebrew for pig) and he can just disappear, fuck right off, asshole.

Way to not mince words, Snoop.

At the close of this 17 second clip, is another one, about 1 minute 15 sec. in length featuring a censored version of Dogg’s comment in addition to a semi-clean version a la L’l Wayne. “If I was a Clippers’ fan, I wouldn’t be no more. If I was a Clipper player, I wouldn’t be no more”, all starting off with a “Fuck you”, it’s that simple.”

Schott went in a much different direction from Sterling, deviating completely from what was and what still is considered to be acceptable as a pattern speech when she opined the following about Adolf Hitler: “He was good at the beginning but then he went too far.” Bye bye Marge Schott.

Silver does not have the power to force Sterling to sell; it is up to at least 75% of the ownership group to show Sterling the door.

What is there left to say? Take it away Third World with their number “Slavery Days”.

In this particular situation, we need some peace and some love, too.

A demain …

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