Fox News Channel’s Jessica Tarlov is once again under fire for horrible comments she made, this time having to do with comments she made about Joey Jones, a military analyst for the network who lost both of his legs to an Improvised Explosive Device during the war on terror in Afghanistan. Commenters online were horrified by what she said about him, and chimed in to call for her firing.
As background, Tarlov’s comments came as she and the more conservative personalities on “The Five” argued about the shooting at a Catholic church in Minneapolis, MN, that saw two children slain and 18 wounded. Jones argued Democrats use such shootings to incorrectly scapegoat certain types of guns, and Tarlov responded with a horrible remark.
Jones kicked off that part of the conversation by noting that mental health appears to be the problem with these shootings, not the desire of many ordinary Americans to own a useful firearm. He said, “You want me to prove I’m not evil to own a gun, but I’m a bigot ’cause I want you to prove you’re not crazy because you want to change your identity? I don’t get that.”
Continuing, Jones noted that there are only about 20 million AR-15-style rifles in America out of about 400 million firearms total, and very few rifles are used in crime at all, making the attacks on that type of rifle nonsensical. He said, “Only four percent of guns used in homicides are rifles, and that’s a much bigger category than ARs. So what you’re saying is you want me to ban five percent of the guns in this country that are used in four percent of the homicides.”
Building on that, Jones then argued that, in their AR-focused responses to such tragedies as the anti-Christian shooting in Minneapolis, Democrats are showing they’d rather raise money by creating fear than actually do what is needed to help prevent such tragedies. He said, “Is it gonna stop Democrats from using instances like this to find some lynchpin to raise money and create fear and maybe win elections? Nope, they’re not gonna stop either.”
Tarlov, angered by his cool and collected reasoning, freaked out and angrily snapped, “If your kid was one of that four percent, I think you’d be singing a different tune.” Jones, replying, started to tell her, “Yeah, but my kid isn’t–” Then, slamming her hand on the table, Tarlov said, “Oh, so lucky you!”
Jones, looking at the camera, noted that he is, of course, immensely grateful that his children are alive and well, saying, “I’ll go to bed tonight and thank God on my knees that don’t exist anymore that my child is still alive.” Tarlov, chiming in with a snide reference about his amputations, said, “Well, now you’ve played the leg card, and I can say no more.”
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Watch her here:
That last comment from Tarlov set the internet off. One such furious commenter noted, “She’s reprehensible. Fox will never get rid of her. I need to watch the entire episode. I’m curious how the other hosts responded to her hateful comment.” Similarly, another commenter on the same post said, “Tarlov should be fired. An apology and/or suspension will not suffice. I rarely watch The Five these days due in large part to Tarlov.”
Still other commenters on the same post left angry remarks like “Jessica Tarlov needs to be fired for this. She’s mocking a disabled veteran who she can’t defeat in legitimate debate. Unacceptable” and “Jessica Tarlov needs to make an on air apology to Joey or get fired. She is beneath contempt.”
Featured image credit: screengrab from the embedded video