Dr. Conrad Murray a fall guy in Michael Jackson’s death?

I am the worst, making a 'sun tea' joke in a blog post about Michael Jackson's tragic death. But that episode of '30 Rock' was pretty funny.

Reflecting on Dr. Conrad Murray’s involuntary manslaughter charge on Monday afternoon, I argued that it was pretty clear that the bad doctor was nothing more than a fall guy in the death of the king of pop. And now Joe Jackson and his daughter LaToya are saying the same thing:

“To me, he’s just a fall guy” Jackson said. “There’s other people, I think, involved with this whole thing. But I think that he’s interrogated — he would come clean and tell everything he knows.”

[...]

La Toya Jackson later issued a statement through a publicist.

“Michael was murdered and although he died at the hands of Dr. Conrad Murray, I believe Dr. Murray was a part of a much larger plan,” her statement said. “There are other individuals involved and I will not rest and I will continue to fight until all of the proper individuals are brought forth and justice is served.”

via Joe Jackson: Dr. Murray ‘a fall guy’ in Michael’s death – CNN.com.

Man….when you’re starting to sound like the craziest living members of the Jackson family, maybe it’s time to take a break. Of course, I won’t go as far as to suggest that there was a ‘plan’ to kill MJ or that Dr. Murray is in need of ‘interrogation.’ But I have to admit that I’m feeling a little too close to Joe Jackson for comfort.

Still, the more you read, the more you see how much drugs like propofol and oxygen tanks had become normal things in Jacko’s life. The King of Pop had a lot of problems and a lot of people happy to tell him that his troubled life was normal.

Take TMZ’s report today that “a closed bottle of urine” was found in the bedroom where Jackson perished. “That’s how he peed” one-time doctor Arnold Klein had told the gossip-mongers. If you’re surrounded by people who will look the other way and fail to tell you at age 50 that there’s something out of sorts with you pissing in a bottle, you’re probably also surrounded by people who will go to extreme lengths to get you drugs you shouldn’t be taking and doctors who are willing to administer them.

And with a canny eye, I think I could see the lengths these people will go to in order to make Murray into their scapegoat. TMZ showed live video of the scenes outside the courtroom in Los Angeles where Dr. Murray was formally charged with involuntary manslaughter. Not only were there protesters holding up all manner of signs accusing Murray of being a murderer. There were also people who could be seen making new signs on the spot. So it’s not like some fans just randomly came down to the courthouse in order to express their sorrow over the king of pop’s death. Someone was ‘astroturfing’, enabling the appearance of grassroots outrage where none truly existed.

There’s a lot of money to be made in Jacko’s memory, and some of those king of pop profiteers want to make sure that all the downside goes to Murray so they can bring in the bucks. Sadly, Joe and LaToya Jackson may be the loudest voices in harping on the point that the bad medicine wasn’t just coming from Murray.