CONSERVATIVES AND MLK. Every year when Martin Luther King Day rolls around, I have to gear up for the sickening spectacle of conservative talking heads, the ideological -- and sometimes biological -- descendants of those who opposed him in his lifetime, trying to claim King's legacy as justification for all kinds of policies he would have abhorred. Rick Perlstein gets out ahead of that story this year with an interesting piece in TNR. In addition to the damning quotes he cites from conservative lions like Bill Buckley, Ronald Reagan, and Strom Thurmond at the time of King's life and death, Perlstein demonstrates how opposition to King was a central assumption of conservatism in the 1960's. Moreover, he explains that conservatives' embrace of King today is just a logical continuation of their disdain for him years ago -- both stem from their fear of his challenge to the established order. That -- King's legacy as an activist -- is the reason the holiday commemorating him is so important.
--Ben Adler
