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(Continued from page 24)
Racist views, not actions, are costing Donald Sterling his NBA life
• Donald Sterling is being exiled for racist views shared in private.
• America cherishes its freedom of thought and speech. But Sterling's comments were so nakedly bigoted that demands intensified for the Los Angeles Clippers owner to pay a heavy price for his views, even though they were taped during a private conversation with his girlfriend.
• NBA Commissioner Adam Silver heeded the demands and delivered one of the harshest penalties in the history of U.S. sports: a lifetime ban from the league and a $2.5 million fine. Despite Sterling's donations to black causes and the rich contract he gave the game's top black coach, Silver also promised to convince owners to force a sale of the Clippers over the 80-year-old Sterling's "hateful" demands for his 31-year-old girlfriend not to broadcast her association with black people.
• "He has a right to his beliefs, to his thoughts. He has a right to free speech. He doesn't have a right to be an owner of an NBA franchise," said Dr. Harry Edwards, a scholar of race and sports who has worked as a consultant for several professional teams.
• "We can't remove racism from American society any more than we can remove murder," Edwards said. "But just because we can't remove it, that doesn't mean we shouldn't fight it."
• ___
Iraq holds key parliament elections as it slides deeper into strife; bombs kill 2 women voters
• BAGHDAD (AP) -- Unshaken by the latest surge in violence, Iraqis braved the threat of bombs and attacks to vote Wednesday in key elections for a new parliament amid a massive security operation as the country slides deeper into sectarian strife.
• Hundreds of thousands of troops and police have fanned out to guard voting centers in what is also the first nationwide balloting since the 2011 American pullout. Polls across the energy-rich nation opened at 7 a.m. local time and will close at 6 p.m. Iraq's 22 million voters are electing a 328-seat parliament.
• A roadside bomb killed two women as they walked to a polling station in the small Iraqi town of Dibis near Kirkuk, a turbulent city some 290 kilometers (180 (Continued on page 26)
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