And no, I do not mean the weather.

The bitchfest about whether or not Renton/Seattle/somewhere in Western Washington should fund an arena for the Sonics/Storm is already shrill. Now, the news about the owners’ political pet causes has really riled people up, as seen at the PI’s “Sound Off” section. Read at your own peril, as there’s a bit of nonsensical bitching.

Elsewhere, I see that the Americans United to Preserve Marriage site has been taken down. What a pity. See my tears? They’re genuine, I swear. As webwrangler of Q-Seattle notes:

Perhaps this isn’t the kind of publicity Bauer or Ward and McClendon wanted, eh? Aside from the obvious problems for NBA/WNBA owners like Ward and McClendon, it doesn’t do Bauer much good to have it revealed that just two guys paid for one one of his operations.

And lastly, Erica pointed me to this article, where Seth points out the sad truth:

But what’s worse is the unconscionable betrayal of thousands of gay basketball fans–and especially gay Storm fans, who attended games in droves, organized events in the gay community, helped propel the team toward a championship. Schultz took their money, then turned around and sold the team they’d cheered to a group of people who consider homosexuality grounds for sub-citizenship.

To explain it to you coffee-folks, it’s like selling Starbucks to Folgers. If Folgers was owned by Nazis.

Folger Nazis. Heh.

As I said in my last post about this issue, I really hate to punish the team and the staff. But I really can’t stomach the thought of giving money to Bennett and co, and I wasn’t keen on doing so even before this became public. From the minute they bought the teams, I had a sinking feeling that the end result would be bad. Then the “negotiations” began, and it seems clear that the ownership wants Seattle (or Renton, or whomever) to pay through the nose to keep the teams. And that’s really the heart of the only question that matters:

How bad do we want to keep pro basketball in Washington? Judging by the comments all over hell and back, the desire to keep the teams lessens by the minute.

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