What Happened?

• As many as 300 teenaged girls were abduct­ed from their school in Nigeria on April 15 by the Islamic mil­i­tant ter­ror orga­ni­za­tion Boko Haram. The group is based in Nigeria and has car­ried out attacks on schools before.
• Some girls man­aged to escape, but many are believed to have been trans­port­ed into neigh­bor­ing Cameroon or Chad.
• The leader of Boko Haram, Abubakar Shekau, has said he plans to sell the girls into mar­riages and sex slav­ery, but now says he is will­ing to exchange them for impris­oned militants

• Videos released by Boko Haram today show about 100 of the girls wear­ing hijabs and recit­ing the Koran.
• Abubakar Shekau, the group’s leader, says in the video he will­ing to exchange the girls for impris­oned Boko Haram militants.
• The video offered the first glimpse of hope for Nigerian fam­i­lies that the girls may be returned safely.

What Is the World Doing to Rescue the Girls?

• The pres­i­dent of Nigeria, Goodluck Jonathan, has received crit­i­cism for wait­ing weeks to ask for inter­na­tion­al assis­tance to recov­er the girls. He now says the gov­ern­ment is doing all it can to find them and bring them home alive.
• A team of U.S. experts is in Nigeria to assist the gov­ern­ment in try­ing to res­cue the girls. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said the team con­sist­ed of law enforce­ment, intel­li­gence and mil­i­tary experts who will use counter-ter­ror­ism efforts in Nigeria.
• Meanwhile, Nigerian peace nego­tia­tor Shehu Sani told ABC News that he has pro­posed a for­mal nego­ti­a­tion between Nigerian Islamic cler­ics and Boko Haram that would see the girls returned with­in a week in exchange for insur­gents cur­rent­ly impris­oned in Nigeria. He said the fact that Boko Haram threat­ened to sell the girls rather than kill them is a pos­i­tive sign that they are open to negotiations.

Could the Kidnapping Have Been Prevented?

• Amnesty International said that Nigerian secu­ri­ty forces failed to act on advance warn­ings about Boko Haram’s armed raid on the state-run board­ing school in Chibok.
• The Nigerian gov­ern­ment has also been crit­i­cized for its fail­ure to bat­tle Boko Haram in recent years as the ter­ror group has increased its attacks, sophis­ti­ca­tion and organization.
• The U.S. State Department and for­mer Secretary of State Hillary Clinton received crit­i­cism for not des­ig­nat­ing Boko Haram a ter­ror orga­ni­za­tion until very recent­ly, in November 2013, despite ear­li­er attacks. The State Department said it wor­ried the des­ig­na­tion would boost recruit­ing efforts for the group and was unsure whether Boko Haram posed any threat out­side of Nigeria.
• http://​news​.yahoo​.com/​k​n​o​w​-​n​o​w​-​k​i​d​n​a​p​p​e​d​-​n​i​g​e​r​i​a​n​-​g​i​r​l​s​-​1​6​0​5​3​6​890 – abc-news-topstories.html;_ylt=A0LEVxkipHNTFjwA9jJXNyoA;_ylu=X3oDMTB0ZjVhNmtyBHNlYwNzYwRjb2xvA2JmMQR2dGlk

Every United States Senator will receive $2800 increase in their salaries come January 1^st 2015. This includes the 41 Republicans who vot­ed to block an increase in the min­i­mum wage. Congress: Leadership Members’ Salary (2014)
Leaders of the House and Senate are paid a high­er salary than rank-and-file mem­bers. Majority Party Leader — .$193,400 Minority Party Leader — $193,400. Rank and file mem­bers of the Senate makes slight­ly less. Each year a cost-of-liv­ing-adjust­ment (COLA) increase takes effect unless Congress votes to not accept it. http://​usgov​in​fo​.about​.com/​o​d​/​u​s​c​o​n​g​r​e​s​s​/​a​/​c​o​n​g​r​e​s​s​p​a​y​.​htm .

To a strug­gling fam­i­ly earn­ing min­i­mum wage, $2800 is a large sum of mon­ey. In addi­tion to Senators prince­ly salaries, this addi­tion­al increase is just anoth­er perk of office, paid for by the very tax-pay­ers they vot­ed should not receive an increase. Senators salaries come from the pock­ets of the peo­ple. An increase in the min­i­mum wage does not come from the pock­et of Senators. This is Government at it’s worst. An increase in the min­i­mum wage will not force one legit­i­mate busi­ness to close,It should not be a bur­den to any busi­ness oper­at­ing in sol­ven­cy to pay a liv­ing wage to their employ­ees. Paying a liv­ing wage to hard work­ing Americans is the right thing to do , it is the moral thing to do.

Forty one Republicans vot­ed to deny poor peo­ple a liv­ing wage. The annu­al increase to the salaries of Senators and Congressmen are designed to off­set cost of liv­ing increas­es. Where do the poor turn to get a cost of liv­ing offset?

There are 30 Teams in the National Basket-ball Association (NBA. Thus far only 2 own­ers are report­ed to have voiced an opin­ion on the out­ra­geous racist dia­tribe of LA Clippers own­er, Donald Sterling. In that exchange Sterling berat­ed his close con­fi­dant V. Stiviano about her rela­tion­ships with Black peo­ple. He told her he did not want her bring­ing Black peo­ple to his games.

Since then the League has banned mis­ter Sterling from the league for life and is report­ed­ly active­ly engaged in try­ing to have an ear­ly vote by the League’s Board Of Governors (the oth­er own­ers} to force Sterling to sell the Clippers.

In 2011 rough­ly 78% of the NBA play­ers were African Americans. The NBA has the high­est per­cent­age of Black play­ers of any pro­fes­sion­al Sports League in the United States and Canada. Simply put Basketball is a black man’s game accord­ing to Pacers President Larry Bird. “It is a black man’s game, and it will be for­ev­er. I mean, the great­est ath­letes in the world are African-Americans,” said Bird. The NBA has no oth­er com­mod­i­ty except it’s play­ers. Any indi­vid­ual or Corporation doing busi­ness must have a vest­ed inter­est in it’s com­mod­i­ty. Most Companies will fight to the last dol­lar to pro­tect that which it deals or trades in. After all that’s the com­pa­ny’s life-blood. No com­mod­i­ty, no Company. NBA Players are well paid, that how­ev­er is not the point. They bring to the pub­lic, a very sought-after form of enter­tain­ment which the pub­lic is will­ing to pay hand­some­ly to see. Subsequently NBA team own­ers are rolling in the wealth these play­ers cre­ate for them. 

Most play­ers are Millionaires, Many own­ers are Billionaires. NBA play­ers are a great com­mod­i­ty for the Billionaire team own­ers. It is dis­grace­ful yet not sur­pris­ing that there is no league-wide out­cry from these wealthy white men who own the oth­ers fran­chis­es except those two, who by the way are still anony­mous. This begs the ques­tion whether more of these own­ers are them­selves clos­et­ed big­ots, who even if they vote to oust Sterling, will sim­ply be going along to get along? If NBA own­ers can­not denounce ran­cid big­otry out of moral con­vic­tion, should­n’t they be able to do so since their chat­tel the play­ers, make them wealthy?

Clippers leg­end and for­mer gen­er­al man­ag­er Elgin Baylor accused Sterling of hav­ing a “plan­ta­tion men­tal­i­ty” in a law­suit against Sterling in 2003. Maybe the Plantation men­tal­i­ty runs deep­er than just Donald Sterling. Maybe the new cot­ton fields are the NBA courts.

“Why are you tak­ing pic­tures with minori­ties,” Sterling alleged­ly said on the tape, among many oth­er things. “It both­ers me a lot that you want to broad­cast that you’re asso­ci­at­ing with black peo­ple. Do you have to?” “You can sleep with [black peo­ple],” Sterling con­tin­ued. “You can bring them in, you can do what­ev­er you want. The lit­tle I ask you is not to pro­mote it on that … and not to bring them to my games.”

These are the state­ments attrib­uted to Clippers own­er Donald Sterling. Mister Sterling was speak­ing via tele­phone with his female com­pan­ion V. Stiviano, in which he told her he did­n’t want her to “bring black peo­ple to his games” includ­ing Magic Johnson. The own­er report­ed­ly went off after Stiviano post­ed an Instagram shot of her­self with Johnson at a recent game (which she lat­er deleted).

The NBA has since banned mis­ter Sterling from hav­ing any­thing to do with the League including

his own team . In addi­tion he has been fined 2.5 mil­lion the max­i­mum allowed. New Commissioner Adam Silver has asked the League’s board of Governors to vote to force Mister Sterling to sell the Clippers.

Andy Roeser, pres­i­dent of the L.A. Clippers, told E! News in a state­ment, “We have heard the tape on TMZ. We do not know if it is legit­i­mate or it has been altered. We do know that the woman on the tape — who we believe released it to TMZ — is the defen­dant in a law­suit brought by the Sterling fam­i­ly alleg­ing that she embez­zled more than $1.8 mil­lion, who told Mr. Sterling that she would “get even.”

SHOULD STERLING HAVE BEEN DISCIPLINED BEFORE

Mister Sterling was sued twice by the U.S. Department of Justice for dis­crim­i­na­to­ry rental prac­tices, pay­ing a then-record $2.73 mil­lion penal­ty to set­tle the sec­ond case. Former Clippers gen­er­al man­ag­er Elgin Baylor described Sterling as hav­ing a “plan­ta­tion men­tal­i­ty” dur­ing his unsuc­cess­ful age dis­crim­i­na­tion law­suit, recount­ing con­ver­sa­tions with his for­mer boss that were, at best, racial­ly insensitive.

Whether mis­ter Sterling will be forced to sell his team by the board of Governors we don’t know. Team own­ers are them­selves large­ly wealthy white men who may very well share some of the same views in-art­ful­ly spilled by Donald Sterling. The tough puni­tive stance tak­en by the new Commissioner will how­ev­er be a new dou­ble edged sword that will sure­ly pierce play­ers , coach­es and oth­ers in the League as it has Sterling. No one asso­ci­at­ed with the league will be allowed to berate or dis­re­spect oth­ers who are dif­fer­ent. It behooves all con­cerned to be restrained in their glee regard­ing the actions of the league against mis­ter Sterling. The same knife which sticks Sheep sticks Goats (old Jamaican saying).

Clippers own­er Donald Sterling has been banned by the NBA .

NEW YORK (AP) — Issuing about the strongest rebuke that he could, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver banned Los Angeles Clippers own­er Donald Sterling for life Tuesday for mak­ing racist com­ments in a record­ed con­ver­sa­tion, the first step toward forc­ing a sale of the club and per­ma­nent­ly remov­ing Sterling from the league.

Silver also fined Sterling $2.5 mil­lion, and again expressed outrage.

“I ful­ly expect to get the sup­port I need from the oth­er NBA own­ers to remove him,” Silver said.

Several own­ers imme­di­ate­ly chimed in with sup­port of Silver’s deci­sion. Sterling, the league’s longest-tenured own­er and some­one with an esti­mat­ed net worth of about $2 bil­lion, did not offer any imme­di­ate comment.

The penal­ties, which were announced only three days after the scan­dal broke, are the harsh­est ever issued by the league and among the stiffest pun­ish­ments ever giv­en to an own­er in pro­fes­sion­al sports. Silver said a league inves­ti­ga­tion found that Sterling was in fact the per­son on the audio­tapes that were released over the week­end and imme­di­ate­ly sent shock waves through­out the game. http://​www​.nba​.com/​2​0​1​4​/​n​e​w​s​/​0​4​/​2​9​/​n​b​a​-​b​a​n​s​-​d​o​n​a​l​d​-​s​t​e​r​l​i​n​g​.​a​p​/​i​n​d​e​x​.​h​t​m​l​?​l​s​=​i​r​e​f​:​n​b​a​h​pts

(CNN) — Longtime NBA team own­er Donald Sterling is being round­ly crit­i­cized for remarks he alleged­ly made regard­ing African-Americans that some are call­ing “repug­nant” and “rep­re­hen­si­ble.”

Sterling, who has owned the Los Angeles Clippers for near­ly three decades, made the com­ments in a 10-minute argu­ment he had with girl­friend V. Stiviano on April 9, accord­ing to TMZ, which post­ed the audio Saturday.

Multiple calls to the Clippers orga­ni­za­tion Saturday were not returned. CNN can­not inde­pen­dent­ly ver­i­fy the authen­tic­i­ty of the audio recording.

TMZ does not say who made the record­ing or how the celebri­ty-cen­tric web­site obtained it.

Attempts to reach Stiviano on Saturday also were unsuccessful.

If authen­tic, the remarks seem to reflect Sterling’s embar­rass­ment and frus­tra­tion with Stiviano over her asso­ci­at­ing with African-Americans at Clippers games and for post­ing such pic­tures on her Instagram account.

Stiviano is part African-American, accord­ing to the recording.

The man alleged to be Sterling takes par­tic­u­lar excep­tion to a pho­to she post­ed to Instagram with NBA icon Earvin “Magic” Johnson.

“In your lousy … Instagrams, you don’t have to have your­self with — walk­ing with black peo­ple,” the man says.

“If it’s white peo­ple, it’s OK?” she responds. “If it was Larry Bird, would it make a difference?”

Bird, the long­time Boston Celtics star, was Johnson’s NBA rival.

“I’ve known [Magic] well and he should be admired …. I’m just say­ing that it’s too bad you can’t admire him pri­vate­ly,” the man on the record­ing says. “Admire him, bring him here, feed him … but don’t put [Magic] on an Instagram for the world to have to see so they have to call me. And don’t bring him to my games.”

Johnson respond­ed Saturday after­noon via his ver­i­fied Twitter account.

“I feel sor­ry for my friends Coach Doc Rivers and Chris Paul that they have to work for a man that feels that way about African Americans” read a tweet from @MagicJohnson. “I will nev­er go to a Clippers game again as long as Donald Sterling is the own­er,” read anoth­er. Paul issued a state­ment, not as the star of Sterling’s team, but in his role as pres­i­dent of the player’s union. “On behalf of the National Basketball Players Association, this is a very seri­ous issue which we will address aggres­sive­ly,” he said.

The union’s response will be led by NBA play­er-turned-may­or of Sacramento Kevin Johnson. “The report­ed com­ments made by Clippers own­er Donald Sterling are rep­re­hen­si­ble and unac­cept­able,” he said in a statement.

The NBA weighed in as well.

“We are in the process of con­duct­ing a full inves­ti­ga­tion into the audio record­ing obtained by TMZ,” Mike Bass, exec­u­tive VP for com­mu­ni­ca­tions, told CNN. “The remarks heard on the record­ing are dis­turb­ing and offen­sive, but at this time we have no fur­ther information.”

On Saturday, two high-pro­file NBA alums addressed the con­tro­ver­sy dur­ing the Hawks ver­sus Pacers half­time pro­gram on TNT, which like CNN, is a divi­sion of Time Warner.

“Should this guy con­tin­ue to be an own­er?” asked Shaquille O’Neal, who also called the com­ments “repug­nant.”

“We can­not have an NBA own­er dis­crim­i­nat­ing against the league,” said Charles Barkley. “We’re a black league.”

The Clippers are set to play the Golden State Warriors in Oakland on Sunday in the fourth game in their best-of-sev­en play­off series.

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