Sterling’s three-ring circus doesn’t represent L.A.

I think the time has come for someone in Los Angeles to explain to the rest of the country that whatever you may think of us, we are not as kooky as the Sterling fiasco suggests.

They are anomalies.

OK, maybe that’s an exaggeration. We do have a sizable freak population here.

But my point is that Donald and Shelly Sterling -- owners of the Clippers -- and V. Stiviano, the woman to whom Donald Sterling made his racist comments, do not represent us. I think this must be clarified following national television interviews with each of the characters in our local three-ring circus.

Sterling, as you may know, ended his silence by talking to CNN’s Anderson Cooper over the weekend, telling the newsman that he had made a “terrible mistake.”

I don’t quite understand that. If you realize midday that you accidentally put on two different socks, one blue and one brown, that’s a mistake. If you tell your “archivist,” as Stiviano calls herself, that you don’t want her advertising her association with black people or bringing NBA legend Magic Johnson to your basketball games, that’s an entirely different matter.

“I don’t know why the girl had me say those things,” Sterling said of his racist remarks.

This is his idea of a mea culpa?

A word of advice to Mr. Sterling: If you decide to go on national television to argue that you’re not a racist, and to apologize and ask forgiveness, you probably shouldn’t then proceed to insult Magic Johnson yet again.

“Has he done everything he could to support minorities?” Sterling asked. “I don’t think so … I just don’t think he’s a good example for the children of Los Angeles.”

On that subject, Sterling is an expert.

When this thing first broke, I wrote that the most important takeaway was to never get involved with a friend of the opposite sex who’s 50 years younger than you are, and Sterling has finally accepted the wisdom in that.

“I thought she liked me and really cared for me,” Sterling said. “I guess being 51 years older than her, I was deluding myself.”

Ya think?

Stiviano, meanwhile, distinguished herself in an interview with Barbara Walters.

“I’m Mr. Sterling’s right-hand arm man,” she said.

I tried making sense of that, but dislocated my elbow in the process.

“I’m Mr. Sterling’s everything,” Stiviano went on. “I’m his confidant, his best friend, his silly rabbit.”

Has Elmer Fudd heard about this?

Shelly Sterling also had her moment with Barbara Walters, and let’s give the veteran newswoman credit for doing such important work. Shelly Sterling told Walters that, “For the last 20 years, I’ve been seeing attorneys for a divorce.”

That’s a long time, and it makes you wonder if V. Stiviano was not the first silly rabbit foraging in the garden.

Mrs. Sterling told Walters she wants to hold on to her half of the team, but how can that possibly work to anyone’s advantage? As long as the Sterling name is associated with the Clippers, the franchise may well be doomed.

I am hereby personally asking the Sterlings to please sell the team immediately, or to at least stop granting interviews. L.A. can’t afford to have a silly rabbit and a couple of daffy ducks on the loose, making national headlines like this. It’s about harm reduction at this point.