QuakerOats;1610784 wrote:Please explain the crime committed by Sterling.
None. The only crime committed was by the mistress by recording the conversation in a two-party state. Should Sterling sue her, he will win easily.
But the NBA is a private entity. Sterling has every legal right to be an amazing asshole and say what he did, but that doesn't mean the NBA affords him the same rights. They can punish those under their umbrella for whatever the fuck they want to long as it fits into their bylaws.
In an unrelated note, way to tie Obama into something completely irrelevant again. You've like singlehandedly reinvented Godwin's Law, just substituting Obama in for Hitler. And just like in those scenarios, the person who does it automatically loses by default.
TedSheckler;1610810 wrote:This wasn't a swastika in the window. This was a private conversation. Look, the guy is a scumbag, no doubt, but if we're a country that can deprive you of your business because of a PRIVATE conversation, that's wrong. Emotion trumps logic.
It was a private conversation, but unfortunately it became public and it's really not the NBA's concern as to how it became that way. They have to act based on the fact that it is public, not based on how it became that way. As mentioned, Sterling can sue her ass and it's an open and shut case.
Sterling's business interest happens to be a member of a larger organization which has a set of bylaws to follow. No one is stopping him from owning the Clippers, they are stopping him from owning the Clippers as a member of the NBA. In theory, he could pull them out of the NBA and join another league. Sure, in practice that's not going to happen, but that is the technical argument behind it.