Up until very recently, Clippers owner Donald Sterling was slated to receive a lifetime achievement award from the NAACP. That isn’t happening now but Jimmy Kimmel’s crew went out onto the street in front of the Staples Center to ask people if they wanted to send their congratulations anyway. You might well guess how people feel about the award for Sterling; but we learn they will never speak ill of the deceased.
As it happens, no one in Sterling’s acquaintance is professing shock over his racist remarks. Although he was honored by the NAACP with a Lifetime Achievement Award in 2009, and an NAACP President’s Award in 2008 – at the time he was embroiled in a lawsuit with former general manager Elgin Baylor. Baylor accused him of embracing “a vision of a Southern plantation-type structure.” Surprised much?
In other crazy semi-related news: Former Florida congressman and Tea Party darling Allen West appeared on Fox News Radio with Brian Kilmeade on Wednesday, and sagely pronounced the outrage at Sterling to be misdirected. After proclaiming Sterling’s comments to be despicable, West clued us in on what’s really going on with Sterling and the publicity surrounding his recorded comments. “But what is really concerning,” West continued, “as I listen to the sound-bite montage that you played — where is the outrage of the public? The outrage of the public seems to be totally focused on Mr. Sterling but, you know, you’ve got this thing with Benghazi and we have an even bigger lie, an even bigger deceit, which is even more impactful on the country that no one is really caring about.”
There ya have it. Sterling presumably would have continued to slide under the media radar, despite past lawsuits for racist tomfoolery, but for the desperation of the Obama administration to sweep Benghazi under the rug. Stay tuned! Doocy and Kilmeade promise to have West back to pursue the allegations!