Every day, some news item stuns me, because it is either outrageous or ludicrous.
Among those reports, a large number properly land in the “outrageous” category. Numerous media outlets have reported, for example, that armed troops deployed by Texas Governor Greg Abbott prevented federal border agents from saving a woman and two children from drowning. (Abbott has been challenging Ron DeSantis for the title of worst psuedo-human to be Governor of a state, so his efforts to deny the accuracy of that report are–shall we say–unconvincing.)
Between them, Texas and Florida have largely dominated the “outrageous” category. Meanwhile, however, the Congressional Oversight Committee’s “investigation” of Hunter Biden wins the “ludicrous” category in a walk.
I’ve ignored the continued focus on Hunter Biden, because it’s the rare family that doesn’t have at least one member who struggles. Some drink, some do drugs, some battle mental illness…some just never grow up. In many families, the parents of troubled children wash their hands of them; I find it admirable that Joe Biden has consistently put loving, supportive parenthood above political considerations.
Hunter is clearly a flawed person. But he is and has been a private citizen. He has held no government office, and despite months of efforts, investigators have found zero involvement by his father with any of his business dealings. Lawyer friends who represent clients facing similar charges tell me that if his name wasn’t Biden, a reasonable plea deal would have dispensed with his legal troubles months ago.
But only the word “ludicrous” properly describes the recent confrontation between Hunter Biden and the GOP members of the Oversight Committee who angrily rejected his offer to testify publicly. Instead, they insist that the Committee should only accept testimony offered behind closed doors.
Hunter Biden showed up unexpectedly Wednesday on Capitol Hill, with a brief but dramatic appearance at a committee hearing as Republicans began the process of holding him in contempt of Congress for violating a subpoena seeking his closed-door testimony…
The committee hearing quickly devolved into a shouting match among committee members, with Republicans railing against Biden and accusing him of performing “a political stunt” as Democrats yelled back that it was Republicans who were playing politics, given that Biden had shown up and was willing to answer questions under oath in a public setting.
Think about that. The target of an investigation appears at a meeting of the Oversight Committee and says, in effect: “okay. I’ll answer your questions, but only in public, because members of this committee have been caught in numerous misrepresentations of testimony given behind closed doors. I will testify in public so that my testimony cannot be twisted and mischaracterized.”
The GOP members of the committee went berserk.
“You are the epitome of White privilege coming into the Oversight Committee, spitting in our face, ignoring a congressional subpoena to be deposed,” said Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.), addressing Biden directly. “What are you afraid of?”
Mace is White, and what “White privilege” has to do with this situation utterly escapes me, but Hunter Biden was very clear about what he was “afraid of.” He was afraid that people like Mace and Comer–the Committee chair– would lie about “closed door” testimony. It is an eminently justifiable fear based upon past performance.
Lowell told reporters outside the hearing room that his client was willing to testify in a public setting. The president’s son has refused to answer Republican House members’ questions behind closed doors, citing a concern that they would selectively leak his remarks to make him look bad.
“Hunter Biden was and is a private citizen,” Lowell said. “Despite this, Republicans have sought to use him as a surrogate to attack his father. And, despite their improper partisan motives, on six different occasions since February of 2023, we have offered to work with the House committees to see what and how relevant information to any legitimate inquiry could be provided.” …
His attendance at the hearing came one month after he made another surprise appearance, this one outside the Capitol to deliver remarks to reporters about the ongoing Republican attacks on him.
“For six years, I have been the target of the unrelenting Trump attack machine, shouting, ‘Where’s Hunter?’” he said on Dec. 13. “Well, here’s my answer: I am here.”
If this episode had played out in a television show or film, critics would pan it as over the top unbelievable– a clumsy effort to paint the GOP Committee members as dishonest idiots.
Whatever Hunter Biden’s personal deficits, they pale in comparison to the GOP’s effort to shield their dishonest game-playing and clumsy partisanship from public view.
I’d say he called their bluff.
Score 1 for Hunter.
HB: I will testify and answer all your questions, in a public hearing.
Right wing nuts: What are you trying to hide?!?
Talk about batsh*t crazy.
The Trump owned and operated GOP began using Hunter Biden as a battering ram against Joe Biden during Trump’s impeachment hearing. That issue has been resolved repeatedly only to be reopened by Republicans because there are no real issues to impeach President Joe Biden.
The courts blamed me for my sons’ drug problems at a time when information was not available to help parents trying to understand what had happened to their child…or children. I share President Biden’s heartbreak about Hunter’s many problems which have been resurrected repeatedly. I share his lasting deeper heartbreak over the death of his son Beau to brain cancer; I lost my oldest son to brain cancer and my second son to cancer only 16 months later. Accepting their problems and that we can do little but support them as their parent, which does not mean condoning their actions, is a situation only those living it can understand. Hunter Biden would be a bigger fool to accept the Republican Oversight Committee’s order for a closed door hearing on any issue.
“Whatever Hunter Biden’s personal deficits, they pale in comparison to the GOP’s effort to shield their dishonest game-playing and clumsy partisanship from public view.”
This issue is not distracting us from Trump’s mentally dysfunctional contempt of court and law breaking rants and actions but seems to be helping Trump continue unabated in stalling out any convictions on his higher level indictments. Fear is ruling at the highest levels in government and the judicial system; one man has brought this country to its knees, and not to pray but to cower in fear.
Interesting that they want to hold him in contempt for doing exactly what 5 members of their own party did with impunity when they were subpoenaed by the January 6 Committee. When is a subpoena not a subpoena? When it’s issued to a Republican.
It’s common sense that the people who want testimony to be secret have something to hide. But there are those who are blind to common sense when it comes to their support for the things they want to believe. So the Republican base will probably swallow the Republican accusations against Hunter Biden hook, line and sinker, just as they have swallowed all the other Republican lies for decades. They believed all the lies about Hillary and Obama and are just as eager to slander both Bidens and anyone else the wrong wing propagandists choose to attack. Confirmation bias is too polite a term for it.
As usual, spot on, Sheila! Loved Peggy Hannon’s comment as well. It’s all so childish, boring, tiring beyond description. And dangerous. Why don’t/won’t people see it for what it truly is!
I am curious … did any Republican ever offer a reason for not wanting Hunter to testify publically? Yes, we know the reason but I want to know if they ever gave a reason.
I would agree. Hunter has been beyond unfairly treated. MTG should be removed from congress for flashing personal pictures of Hunter. There is nothing that says investors are allowed to do something like that to witnesses of any investigation. One can understand Hunter’s reluctance to testify behind closed doors with House republicans.It is easy to see this investigation is a complete sham! They have two witnesses that could end the investigation. They are refusing to allow them to testify. Time to clean the House! We voters must vote out maga extremist! We need serious congress people in the house to work for us. Not Trump’s clowns!
A total waste of taxpayer funding! A total waste of the Republicans’ capacity to be fully human, or has that gone by the boards already? Sadly, the question “Have you no decency?” would have no traction today.
This means that Republicans believe that they can impeach you and me. Do you care? I don’t. What difference would it make? It’s symbolic. Trump is proud of his.
It’s like Jews being made to wear stars on their clothing. That could have been a display of pride in being who they are. Back in the day in Herkimer, all Catholic kids wore a St Christopher medal around their necks. Congress members wear a flag or sometimes a rifle display.
It doesn’t matter unless you are told that you have to by people in power with further plans to impose on you.
I cannot recall any time in my life when the members of the United States House of Representatives actually put the welfare of the people ahead of their own political ambitions. The legislative part of our government is in dire need of an overhaul. Really.
LUDICROUS = REPUBLICANS… at every turn. They are prisoners of Trump’s psychopathy and are emulating the symptoms of his decaying brain. So, imagine the horror show that is the Trump/Republican voter… if you can with any food in your stomach.
Partisanship? It’s what Republicans stand for because their corporate/banking sponsors insist that they behave this way in order to slake their greed. Tax cuts for billionaires? Please. I don’t think there is any socially redeeming quality among Republicans. According to past court rulings, this fact alone qualifies them as pornographic.
Then, there’s MTG…
flack, raw partisan crap from the,otherside. grasping straws where there are none. as a former inmate of the manditory federal sentencing system,(thank you Americans) for my crime of growing some high tech marijuana,and selling it to responsable adults. i see how Hunter is playing the game. (I did too and won my appeal,on my own)congress or some black hole prosecutor wanting their gold star for cutting down another citizen because they can. being its some so called big star, i see little people just screwing up another persons life for their own personal/partisan needs. again the news media has become the witchhunter,by design.. the dumbass Americans who,(mind ya im living with the reddest damn bunch in our divided America,screw TX,FL)… congress cant manage its affairs that are the American affairs,so it tries to sucker punch the presidents kid. (bully anyone?) if hes willin to speak with congress as a free citizen in the halls of our Congress,so be it. now comes the back door scams.
when Hunter come out of that so called questioning,make sure giuliani is their to counter Hunters answers by the media,we wouldnt want any one lying about what was asked,and gives factful retribution to Hunters answers. how come we just dont call it what it is.propaganda,goebbels would be proud and putin is laughing his ass off and another black eye for America brewed right at home and those elected by dumbass people..
Peggy:
thanks for the ammo. my discussion with these morbid rednecks is face to face, when the Hunted comes up again,ill be ready with that one.. best wishes..
Since the Repuglicons have no intention of ever representing the interests of the citizens in their districts they’ve been taught to rely on manufacturing crises that create fear and anger. All they need to do is fill the Repug media airwaves with lies and threats to the voters’ incomes and white privileged way of life. Their favorite subjects are taxes and illegal immigration, but occasionally they need something else to keep their devoted followers’ attention, so someone came up with the idea to attack the President’s son.
One of the most obvious examples of projection I’ve ever seen was when Rep Mace asked Hunter Biden what he was afraid of. Anyone with even a pea-sized brain knows that the crazy committee ‘investigating’ Hunter Biden has found absolutely nothing to connect his actions to his father. That committee has backed themselves into a corner and they are desperate to find a way out.
What Republicans promise is more of the same focus on wealth and power redistribution up. Some is never enough.
They know that pleasing the same people who loved slavery, using the advantages the Constitution gave the original slave states to get them in the Union, is easy to do and leads to power politicians can sell to the uber wealthy who in turn pay for the media time to keep them elected.
Simple math for those who lust for a career of serving themselves from the public trough.
Thank you, for the great comments. My thoughts exactly. Have a great weekend, friends!
Meanwhile, a sleazy, multi-millionaire with a decidedly checked past, has purchased one of the major newspapers in the DC area, the Baltimore Sun. He heads Sinclair Broadcasting Group, Inc., a syndicate with a requirement that all political content reflect his own views. He has curried the favor of tfg, attempting to influence media deregulation by the FCC.
The media messaging is the propaganda allowing the context of smear campaigns like that against Hunter Biden as a surrogate for his father. When there is no competition in the marketplace of ideas, the likelihood of autocratic rule becomes probable.
In the meantime, this morning NPR reported that tfg won the Iowa Caucus by an unprecedented “landslide”. The context was absent. See the following.
From KCCI
“A total of 110,298 Republicans showed up at more than 1,000 different caucus sites to support who they want to be president. That’s less than 15% of registered Republicans in the state and 18% of active, registered Republicans in Iowa.”
There are just over 750,000 registered Republican voters in Iowa. Tfg got just over 50% of the 110,298 who voted. Hardly a landslide. Context is critical.
In the past, there have been numerous media outlets available to all, especially in newsprint, presenting political reporting and commentary. The consolidation of wealth ownership, the rise of electronic media, and the decline of local news media make it so much easier for the propagandists to flourish.
We live in perilous times. Hunter Biden is the latest tool in their box. Who will be next?
Let’s play Whataboutism?
What about Ivanka and Jerrod’s 2 billion dollar fund that MSB gave to them? They were actually employed by the 45 administration! What about those connections? Father, daughter and SIL definitely benefited despite the emoluments clause? I swear, up is down, left is right and we are the laughing stock of the planet. I’ve nearly walked away from news anymore because it’s beyond anything I’ve ever dreamt up.
MTG showed Hunter’s naked photos like revenge porn in our House of Representatives. I loved that he walked out as she spoke last week. She lost the plot. How the F* did we get here? That’s just batsh*t craziness. I’m sure 45 snickered all the way to the bank with that scene. Vomit inducing.
I feel like all this talk about Hunter Biden is just an attempt by the Republicans to take away attention from bigger issues. For example, if Trump gets in office and has “Full Immunity” as President. Or whether a woman has bodily autonomy or not according to law. Or for that matter, how much control and influence “Corporations”and “Wealthy Individuals” have over government? How involved the “church” has become enmeshed in politics.
I was listening today to a political show with people calling in where they claim that the only way the Democrats could win the election was through a “soft coup”. As ridiculous as that sounds with the violent insurrection (though wildly disorganized) at the capital what would have happened had they succeeded? These people who would break into a capital chanting “Hang Mike Pence!” while making a gallows and calling out for “Nancy Pelosi” while they defecated in the offices and halls. These people who beat the police with flag poles… Are those the people you want running for government? The “Good Citizens’ we should listen to? Seriously? You find them capable? The people that boiled over like water on a hot stove.
Just gimme a break. Give Hunter Biden a break.
I mean, lets get to the heart of the BIG ISSUES.
It’s too bad that so few of those who stormed the Congress know enough to understand that the President CANNOT invite anyone to the Congress. In fact he can’t go without an invitation from the Speaker. I’m pretty sure that Nancy didn’t issue an invitation to tfg.
I am not going to hold my breath waiting for Ivanka & Jared to be investigated. AND they were government employees!!! Differant rules for the Rs always.