I would like to say right up front that I'm not a lawyer. I don't now, nor have I ever, played one on the TV set. Like anyone who works, or has ever worked, in a hospital or medical setting you can't help but learn a thing or two about the law. Such as the significance of honesty and accuracy in charting or, "defensive" charting, to the "correct" way of filling out of incident reports, to the legal importance (to the company or hospital @ least) of holding the cooperate line in matters of patient disputes, or to the requirements to just keep your DEA number, or licensure, or registry, or whatever. You really don't have a choice but to keep legal considerations in mind when you do much of anything in medicine. Eventually you tend to pick up a thing or three.
With that disclaimer made: As of 1919 CDST, 29 April, 2014, there seems to be a lot of "white guys" smarming around TV, wringing their hands in concern over poor little Donny Sterling's First Amendment Rights! But cutting through all of the media din like a brother with a switchblade, a true "Maverick" has emerged who has been unafraid to jump into the breach on behalf of poor maligned billionaires everywhere. Someone who's been one of the most outspoken defenders of the endangered civil rights of the obscenely rich and has been the long overdue cavalry riding in to save poor little Donny's defenseless wagon train. And NO! I know what you're thinking! it's not John Roberts, or Antonin Scalia, nor is it even Missouri's own sterling contribution to the SCOTUS and legal scholarship everywhere, Clarence Thomas (and proud we all are of him too.) So who is this Constitutional Scholar who's unafraid to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune in order to fight for issues important to him? Why it's none other than: a phenomenal and exciting entertainer, a truly fabulous humanitarian, and wonderfully good good friend of the show's, Mark Cuban. It's showtime!
Now I could waste your and my time waxing poetic about this modern day man of the "people". I think all of us on this site know that sticking up for minority rights won't exactly win you too many friends or influence a whole lot of people in some quarters, and who's more of a minority than the 1%, or the 0.00015% for poor Donny. But, Hey! Why should I talk for Mark when we can get the words right from the horse's ass:
"What Donald said was wrong. It was abhorrent," Cuban said. "There's no place for racism in the NBA, [or] any business I'm associated with. But at the same time, that's a decision I make. I think you've got to be very, very careful when you start making blanket statements about what people say and think, as opposed to what they do. It's a very, very slippery slope."
New York Post on line, April 29, 2014.
Well, there you have it. You read it right here Damn It! Donny was wrong! Very! Very! Wrong! Why racism has no place in
any business Mark Cuban is associated with! But... then again, let us not be to quick to judgement here! Why should everybody else have to live up to the high morals and standards that Mark Cuban sets for himself? After all, the rest of us our only mere mortals in a world with Mark Cuban in it. So why should this beleaguered owner, Sterling, recipient of a rare lifetime achievement award from the NAACP, be forced to sell his beloved Clippers? What?!?! You're telling me that just because news came to light (to those who don't follow the NBA or federal court filings) that he's an avouched raciest? I'm tellin' ya, if you could wrap Ty Cobb up in copper wire and put him in a magnetic coffin, why ol' Ty could probably generate enough electricity to light up all of L.A. on a Saturday night with all the spinning that this cat must be doing.
While we're at it here, I do have a potential buyer for Sterling's shares of the Clippers if he actually wants to sell. It's that asshole who was such an ignorant racist fuck up that he could only manage to kill three Christians when he went a huntin' down to the Greater KC Jewish Community Center over in Overland Park KS earlier this month. I think he may be available for a Kansas City ownership group for the Clippers. Think about it Mark. He is, after all, assumed innocent until proven otherwise, just like the NBA decided Sterling's earlier accusations of racism didn't count. Didn't enter into the picture at all. Plus, if you could include him in this attempt to move the Clippers to K.C., people will quit throwing all those first stones at Mr. Sterling. Hell, this raciest rectal wart dressed up in human cloths may hate black people too, but I'm guessin' that it's the Jewish folks that really gets his goat so he'd probably be OK right?. And lets face it, Words don't kill people, only minorities kill people, go ask the NRA, so what's the harm? Is that O.K. Mark? Seriously, I know there's in all likelihood many black Jews besides the late Sammy Davis Jr. out there, but I think most of them are a dusky beige color in this country so you should be golden Pony Boy. Man, I never thought racism could be so complicated. It's making my head hurt trying to keep up with who's hatin' on who!
Listen up Mark, I'm going make a personal plea to try and do you a solid here because I'm guessing that nobody in your inner circle has the proper testicular acutramons to air opposing opinions in front of you. Well, I'm certainly not in that cadre so I can confidently tell you that you don't got no bitchin' duds on bud. You're buck ass naked as the day you were born. Naked as a J-bird dude! So let me try this one out on you and see if you can follow the logic.
Unless I've missed the news, no constitutional amendment has been ratified that gives someone the right to own an NBA franchise. Now pay close attention here. I think this might be the part that's tripping you up; the NBA isn't the government. Nobody from the government, to the best of my knowledge, plans on showing up at Donny's house to escort him to the hoosegow because he's a disgusting inbred racial Neanderthal turd with a die job on his head that would give Donald Trump a boner. He isn't loosing his life or his liberty because of what he said! Therefore, there doesn't seem to be a first amendment issue here, but if you can find one, let me know. No one is immune to the court of public opinion.
I'm also gonna assume that somewhere in this whole NBA ownership thing, you, Mark Cuban, have signed legal documents stating that you agreed to follow certain bylaws. Documents that contain certain
"morals clauses" in them? You can get Charlie Sheen to explain that clause to ya. Does any of this at least sound familiar to ya Mark? By all means though, don't just take my word for any of this, there's precedence here. Why don't you go get a shovel and dig up Shoeless Joe Jackson and see if you can get him to explain to you the concepts of
the best interest of the game or
conduct detrimental to the good of the league. Better yet, see if all time MLB hits leader Pete Rose could do likewise. He may be a little more talkative. Now, I'll grant you, those examples aren't directly analogistic. For that you'd hafta go ask Marge Shotz about her experiences in professional athletic team ownership in this country, although, to tell you the truth I think she's busy talking to Shoeless Joe at the moment. Hell, if Pete were half as rich as either Don Sterling or Marge Schotz, he wouldn't have had to commit income tax fraud back in the late 1980's. Hell, at that income level income tax evasion becomes more of a hobby and less a true necessity.
So, at this point I bet your head's a swimmin'. I think you need to ask yourself one salient question Mark; did Pete Rose's betting habits sully the reputation of baseball more than Donny's comments did the NBA? Cause I'm tellin' you, if you need perspective, go on down to your locker room and see if sone of those big black basketball players of yours have an opinion on the matter. I'm bettin' they do. So don't by shy. Ask
them which one of these guys
they think is the worse offender. Now, as my memory serves me, I don't remember anyone talking about not playing the Red's because they wouldn't take the field against a team coached by a documented degenerate gambler. Maybe there
were those kind of rumblings back then, but I've gotta tell you, the late 80's were a very fun time for me. I bet
you know what I'm talking about don't cha Mark. I'll bet you do.