Some of you took exception with a comment we made on Saturday regarding the question of whether a group of 32 white owners who have had to be forced by the league office to interview minority candidates for key jobs will welcome a non-white owner into the club for the first time in the 90-plus year history of the NFL.
But it’s a real concern, and if the cause of political correctness has gone so far off the rails that we can’t acknowledge the obvious issues that will unite or divide us as a people, then count me among those who no longer aspire to be politically correct.
The fact that the man to whom Chip Rosenbloom and Lucia Rodriguez hope to sell their 60-percent stake in the Rams was born in Pakistan and spent the first 16 years of his life there should not be a factor -- good or bad -- in the question of whether Shahid Khan prevails in his effort to become an NFL owner. The other owners should not, consciously or otherwise, hold it against him and they should not, consciously or otherwise, give his proposal the benefit of the doubt in the interests of being able to claim that the league is championing the cause of diversity.
Our friend Bernie Miklasz of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch takes up the issue in a Sunday column, and we agree with everything Miklasz says.
In the end, the challenge for the NFL will be to treat Khan’s situation the same as it would if his name were Smith, if he were white, black, or any other color, or if he worships one God or a collection of them. None of that stuff should matter -- in a negative way or a positive way -- in connection with the scrutiny of Khan’s bid.
The best interests of the league mandate such an outcome. Whether it happens remains to be seen.