Has anyone been following the great Donald Sterling bigotry controversy?

For those of you who don’t keep up with sports, Mr. Sterling, owner of the LA Clippers basketball club, was secretly recorded in a private phone conversation with one of his mistresses in which he made some pretty sleazy racist remarks.

The response, from commentators, fans, players and NBA officials has been swift and to the point. Today, just a few days after this story broke, the League has banned Sterling from having anything to do with the day-to-day operation of the business he owns–forever, or at least, any which involve his use of League facilities. One gets the impression that they would have taken it away from him altogether if they had any legal means to do so. They have officially declared their intention of attempting to persuade him to sell the club. He can’t even go watch a game, even if he’s a season’s ticket holder.

OK, Sterling is a scumbag, an old and ugly one-percenter who feels compelled to go shopping for sex among the same ethnic groups he despises. But forbidding a man normal access to his business without due process or any legal justification whatsoever is a slippery slope situation if I ever heard one, not to mention the circumstances under which that telephone call were recorded stink to high heaven. To begin with, isn’t unauthorized recording of telephone communications illegal?

The liberal media are patting themselves on the back in an orgy of self-congratulation, while the League is, not surprisingly, merely acting in a self-serving way calculated to minimize the PR damage and keep ticket sales and TV and merchandising revenues maxed out.

Conservatives everywhere are also perfectly willing to throw Mr Sterling under the bus, just like they did Paula Deen and Cliven Bundy. But like them, Sterling is legally and constitutionally entitled to Neanderthal opinions, especially those expressed in a non-public venue, and particularly those harvested almost certainly as part of some shakedown scheme.

I have a very bad feeling about this.