Remember When Martin Luther King Was Arrested? Because Jonathan Turley Sure Doesn't! - Above the LawAbove the Law
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Via: steve-ott • 2 years ago • 13 commentsBy: Joe Patrice (Above the Law)
Fox News legal analyst Jonathan Turley, on Canada PM Justin Trudeau invoking emergency powers to deal with the "Freedom Convoy" blockade: "By this rationale, they could have cracked down on the Civil Rights movement. They could have arrested Martin Luther King."
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
George Washington University Law School students watch the value of their degree continue to plummet.
ByJoe PatriceonFebruary 16, 2022 at 11:44 AMFebruary 16, 2022 at 4:39 PM
(Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
Jonathan Turley transcended his own meticulously cultivated clown status with an epic performance yesterday. In recent years, the George Washington University Law School professor embraced the role of national joke by contradicting his own scholarship and wildly misstating basic principles of law, all in service of getting one more sweet, sweet five-minute cable news hit.
It's a lot easier to get on TV when you're giving voice to utter nonsense people want to hear than when you're constrained by legal reality. But Turley upped the game like Michael Jordan playing through the flu yesterday. And, like Jordan, it was all avoidable with a vaccine.
Turley went on Fox News to talk about the Canadian truckers running an impromptu blockade of the nation's capital because they don't want to get vaccinated. After days of letting the toddlers cry about it, the Canadian government invoked emergency powers to clear the streets.
Fox wanted to talk to a Canadian legal expert ABOOT the decision. So they brought on… Turley?
Turley's credentials to opine on the Canadian legal landscape run no further than mine and mine are limited to the value of tag up offsides. Can Fox News not recruit at least one Canadian professor to prostrate their academic reputation at the altar of anti-vaccination nonsense? Isn't Jordan Peterson available? Eh?
Anyway, here's what Turley offered by way of "cogent legal analysis":
Fox News legal analyst Jonathan Turley, on Canada PM Justin Trudeau invoking emergency powers to deal with the "Freedom Convoy" blockade:
"By this rationale, they could have cracked down on the Civil Rights movement. They could have arrested Martin Luther King." pic.twitter.com/s9dwkcvihQ
— Justin Baragona (@justinbaragona) February 15, 2022
Wow! Imagine if overzealous law enforcement had tried to crack down the Civil Rights movement or arrested Martin Luther King? Would we even have literary classics like "Letter From Birmingham Day Spa"?
Actually, that was a popular joke construction and social media quickly flooded with references to "Birmingham Summer Camp" or "Birmingham Starbucks." Others just wondered if Turley thought the letter was written from the visiting room.
Martin Luther King Jr was arrested 29 times. Many of those times, he entered the situation anticipating an arrest, knowing that civil disobedience would be met with charges. Southern law enforcement engaged in a lot of abuses — like arresting King for "loitering" when he would show up at a courthouse to monitor another injustice — but other times the whole point was to take actions reasonably expected to end in arrests. News of the arrests was part of the strategy to wake up the rest of the country.
But Turley and Fox want their precious anti-vaxxers to enjoy the benefits of escalating protests to the point of technical illegality with none of the costs. It's like "Diet Protest," to compare it to a substance that's certainly way more dangerous than the vaccines they're complaining about.
While it's easy to misspeak on television, Turley can't wipe away this error as an off-the-cuff mistake. The entire frame for his commentary involves drawing parallels to the civil rights movement. This bonkers analysis stems from his prepared remarks on the subject. His rhetorical strategy from jump is to tie anti-vax hosers to the iconography of anti-segregationism.
Or more specifically to the whitewashed iconography of "Martin Luther King,TM" the fictionalized construct of the civil rights leader based on a children's book mythologizing where King led a march without incident and then delivered a couple cherry-picked lines about having a dream. This revisionist King is central to Fox's editorial mission as the ever-shifting signifier that they can whip out to brand quarterbacks kneeling as "too extreme" and truckers blockading all access to a national capital as "heroic."
But don't mistake his willing contribution to this cynical agenda for some sort of intentional action on his part. He's soaking up and spitting out talking points with little regard for their actual truth or falsity — he just knows it's what the bookers on these shows want to hear and he's more than happy to give it to them for another hit. There's nothing calculated about Turley's latest public depantsing.
He's just an idiot.
Joe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you're interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.
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Anti-Vaxxers, Canada, COVID-19, Jonathan Turley, Law Schools, Television
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So now anti-vaxxers, and the candian truckers in particular, are the new civil rights movement? Please, give me a break.
Turley used to be respected, but his trumpian turn has turned his brain to mush.
Seems Turley has reached a new level of ignorance.
MAGA is a social disorder. Perhaps he became infected?
From what I can tell, anything touched by a Murdoch will do that to you.
Age affects us all differently...Turley is getting up there and his priorities are changing.
It's all about perspective. Turley changed his perspective by shoving his head up Trumps ass and now he can't even see how fucking moronic his attempts to reason logically have become. In the alt-right universe that exists in Trumps colon where millions of right wing conservative heads reside white conservative Christians see themselves as the new 'victimized minority' that needs civil rights protections to protect their imagined 'white culture' and perceived right to discriminate against people they consider inferior. From such a perspective of course one might see a vaccine mandate to save lives and battle a pandemic as legalized forced racial segregation and they see themselves as the new civil rights heroes standing up for their right to infect others and ignore basic safety measures like masks. Mot of them seem to be claiming that it's not so much the masks or vaccines but "the principle" of the issue, but that's all clearly bullshit, they're just scared little babies frightened of needles hiding out in the alt-right conservative universe in Trumps ass.
Conservatism hasn't any memory, honor or soul.
Some say Turley used to be respected. Suppose so, but that would wholly depend upon one's interpretation of respect.
It is the money. Trump brought it and the GOP bought it. And it is dirty. Ah well, Maria Butina is doing well in good old 'Mother Russia' thanks to the NRA.
6 or 7 years ago Turley had a good reputation. He has pissed it away on Fox News, much like Dershowitz.
I wonder why. What happened to him? Does Trump have some sort of kompromat on him?
Dershowitz is another good example. Perhaps they both turned because they were afraid of becoming irrelevant.
Rudy? Another old expert lawyer like Dershowitz and Turley, who tied their wagons to the Trump train.
Eastman and Sekalow have no excuses, not even greed because they know Trump rarely pays lawyers.
And oh how the allegedly once mighty have fallen! Why anyone would tie their wagons to the trumpturd train is totally beyond me. Anyone with any sense knows he's been a lifelong thug, gangster, thief, grifter, conman.
Serves 'em right. They should all be disbarred!
He's just an idiot.
... and to top it off a fan favorite.