Regarding the Hunter Biden pardon — I can’t criticize Joe for this, and those throwing fits need to calm down and consider what sort of lower life forms are about to take over the Justice Department. It’s a sweeping pardon to protect Hunter from future political harassment and worse from the humanoid MAGA worms, or whatever they are. See also Paul Campos at Lawyers, Guns and Money and also Jasmine Crockett Has Blistering Message For GOP Pearl-Clutching Over Hunter Biden Pardon by Ben Blanchet at Huffpost.
Speaking of humanoid MAGA worm Pete Hegseth, Jane Mayer reports at the New Yorker that
Hegseth’s record before becoming a full-time Fox News TV host, in 2017, raises additional questions about his suitability to run the world’s largest and most lethal military force. A trail of documents, corroborated by the accounts of former colleagues, indicates that Hegseth was forced to step down by both of the two nonprofit advocacy groups that he ran—Veterans for Freedom and Concerned Veterans for America—in the face of serious allegations of financial mismanagement, sexual impropriety, and personal misconduct.
A previously undisclosed whistle-blower report on Hegseth’s tenure as the president of Concerned Veterans for America, from 2013 until 2016, describes him as being repeatedly intoxicated while acting in his official capacity—to the point of needing to be carried out of the organization’s events.
Yes, this is just the guy we need in charge of the Department of Defense. See also David Kurtz at TPM.
Many are still hyperventilating at the thought of Kash Patel as head of FBI. And it’s also a scandal that Trump intends to fire Christopher Wray just to replace him with a loyalist. As explained by David Frum at the Atlantic,
For more than four decades before Donald Trump assumed the presidency, the FBI director was a position above politics. A new president might choose a political ally as attorney general, but the FBI director was different. An FBI director appointed by Richard Nixon also served under Presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter. Carter’s choice remained on the job deep into Reagan’s second term, when Reagan moved him to head the CIA. Reagan’s FBI appointee served through the George H. W. Bush presidency and into the Bill Clinton administration. Clinton fired the inherited official—the first time a president ever fired an FBI director—only because the outgoing Bush administration had left behind a Department of Justice report accusing the director of ethical lapses. (Clinton tried to coax the tainted director into resigning of his own volition. Only after the coaxing failed did Clinton act.)
And so it continued into the 21st century. Except in a single case of serious scandal, Senate-confirmed FBI directors stayed in their post until they quit or until their 10-year term expired. Never, never, never was a Senate-confirmed FBI director fired so that the president could replace him with a loyalist. Republicans and Democrats alike agreed that there must be no return to the days when J. Edgar Hoover did special favors for presidents who perpetuated his power.
Trump fired James Comey to try to shut down the investigation into his ties to Russia, but he was persuaded there would be blowback. So his people gave the excuse that Comey was being fired because he mishandled Hillary Clinton’s investigation. Not that anyone bellieved that was why he was fired, of course. But now Trump isn’t even bothering with an excuse. Wray has two years to go in his ten-year term.
Also note that the same party that has been using “defund the police” against Democratics for way too long are about to completely gut the criminal justice system at the federal level.
And do read Tom Nichols, The Kash Patel Principle, at The Atlantic. No paywall.
"Also note that the same party that has been using “defund the police” against Democrats for way too long are about to completely gut the criminal justice system at the federal level."
I am convinced that Stump is a Russian asset and has been for quite some time. His sole purpose (besides staying out of jail) of getting back in the WH is to completely debase the executive branch and all the agency's under it's control. The GOP (many of them are working for the Kremlin as well) has already destroyed what little credibility was left in the house and senate, now Stump intends to finish off the country once and for all by taking down the DOJ, Defense department, and every agency under his control. I don't know how anyone can look at the incompetent dullards he is appointing to his cabinet and come to any other conclusion. Each pick is intended to bring federal government to it's knees. As far as Hunter Biden goes who gives a rats ass. Stump pardoned hundreds of miscreants on his last days in 2021 though no one really knows about most of them because the potted plants in our media really didn't report on most of them and the Harris campaign never bothered to bring any of them up during the last election. We're fucked.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0J6q42zLH0
Greg Seargent was silly enough to write a piece for the NYT critical of Biden's pardon of his son. I read quite a few of the more recommended comments almost all of which were highly critical of Seargent. One even counseled silly Greg to take an ethics course. His competency sure took a dive in my rating system. He is no Krugman, no Dowd or Goldman. I think he slipped under David Brooks for that one, though Brooks rates as a more consistent disappointment for sure.
So, let's all have 'the talk'. Even today our justice system is skewed up and screwed up, and equal justice under the law one of the biggest of the big lies. Unfortunately, under Trump, expect it to become even more racist and more political. I could personally write a short book of my lessons about the system, few of which evidence a system that is not more correctly named an injustice system. Biden mentioned this in his pardon, that the nature of our justice system was in motion, and the motion was toward politicization. Swatting and threats have become a favorite tactics of domestic right- wing terrorists against anyone they deem as liberal. Liberal they define as not in agreement with their pet right-wing grievances. The correct punishment allows for vigilante style enforcement. All crimes are serious offences and warrant as much punishment as they think is justified and can get away with. Lying and fabricating evidence is ethical because they have no sense of ethics or morals. They, like Greg Seargent, have a void where that education should be.
That's enough of the talk for now. Study it, as there will be pop quizzes. Things are changing so updated and recurrent learning will be necessary. The whole course takes many lessons to cover and master. Failure to learn may result in fines, jail time, duress, or yes even death. Any minority status can and will increase your risk. Of course, no course, lesson, or talk comes with any guarantee except one. I guarantee you will learn who your real friends are if you ever need to post bail. The school of hard knocks takes care of that bit of education for most.
Two things: Hunter Biden is a bit of an asshole. He cashed in on his father's position as VP with the Burisma deal. There's no evidence Joe benefited or cut any deal fto benefit Burisma. The practice of trying to buy influence by paying off the adult kids of important political figures is not limited to to Hunter – it's widespread in both parties and no one is proposing to make it illegal (that I know of.) If Hunter had half the integrity of his dad, he would not have accepted a deal when his sole qualification was being close to the VP of the US. Hunter was an idiot to mess up on federal taxes. He should have been smart enough to get a gun through a friend, which would have been totally legal. He's not the brightest candle on the birthday cake.
Second: Hunter has been a target of DJT and the GOP since 2016 to try to get at Joe. In 2022, the House seemed to abandon all attempts at legislation to "investigate" Hunter Biden and try to pin some misdeed by Hunter on Joe.(They were also full-time committed to impeaching Joe but no one could come up with anything close to "high crimes and misdemeanors.") Charging anyone named Biden with a crime was somehow supposed to clear DJT of the real crimes he was charged with.
There's a legal term "disparate treatment" that's a legitimate defense in labor disputes and (I think) criminal matters. If you can prove that someone was singled out for harassment in ways completely unlike the normal treatment of employees in the same position, the fact that some infraction was found may be set aside. (Example: when I worked for the USPS and the postmaster had it in for me, he sent a letter to every address on my route soliciting complaints about anything I had done. No other carrier was singled out in that way and the disciplinary action was set aside.) Hunter was the victim of the same kind of witch hunt. The criminal charges would NOT have been brought for the same infractions if the last name was not Biden. A pardon was totally warranted.
Compare that to taking top secret documents to your residence, ignoring requests from the federal government for the return of government property, concealing many of the documents which were never voluntarily returned, conducting an organized plan to conceal the truth – no matter WHO did it, they would be charged with a felony.
Democrats who don't like what Joe did are comfortable with Hunter being a sacrificial lamb for the purpose of posturing. (We didn't do improper pardons, but Trump did.) Sorry. The Hunter trials were legal but not appropriate when you look at how the same offenses are not charged unless the taxes are not paid or the gun is used in a crime. Joe should not have let Hunter rot in prison just so Democrats can claim the high moral ground. I've long argued that we need to play as rough and dirty as they do BUT WITHIN THE LIMITS OF THE CONSTITUTION AND THE LAW.
Yes, at this point we have to play hardball very hard, even blur the edges while staying within the law. The people trying to destroy our government instead of going after the puppet masters aren't following the rules.
Parity will only happen when neither party gets to change the rules in their favor in the middle of the game. It is quite obvious that this is not the status quo in this country.
Those republicans sure do like their poison. Rudy got caught red handed planting poison and his victims still wait for justice. Oh, how the scales favor the pale.
Meanwhile, South Korea declares martial law. Chaos is cited as the problem making this radical action needed. The claim is that North Korea has sewn a political wind and expects to reap the resulting whirlwind. Seems to be a lot of that going around lately. A political virus that has found a weak spot in Democracy? At least plausible.