6175

It’s scummy but it’s run of the mill scummy crap that the rich and powerful are always up to. It only becomes an issue if Biden became president and did favors for Burisma. I’m pretty sure Hunter said he would resign (or maybe already did?) if it came down to that, which is what should happen.

6176

My favorite part was where they had the token GOP woman up there talking about how Hunter Biden was being paid $80k/month by the company, while the hard-working average American family was only making $50k in a whole year. How about we do some math on every Senator and member of the Trump administration so we can see how their income compares to the average American family?

6177

Seeing Trump call anything with Ukrain shady while instilling his children into our government like it was royalty, continuing to enrich himself by pushing people who want access to him into the process is incredibly ridiculous. Then again, the GOP has become a party of laws are important… to control everyone else since they have no intention of following them themselves.

6178

So if they demand that Hunter Biden’s position is a case of corruption, what do they do with the fact that Ivanka’s multi million dollar clothing contract with China was made exempt from Trump’s tariffs? Will they investigate that? Drag that mess into court and address the issues of presidential nepotism, a clear abuse of the office?

6179

They need to bring these up though. Democrats need to not dance around pinning the tail on the Elephant - for too long they play this asymmetric game.

6180
6181

How do you square the idea that Hunter Biden was there to shield Burisma when the corrupt prosecutor general, Shokin, failied to investigate Burisma (in fact pulling all resources from the investigation that was launched in 2015), was fired from his job under pressure from the US and the international community and replaced by Lutsenko, who relaunched the investigation and successfully pursued it?

Are the Bidens just really bad at corruption?

6182

I mean, we probably only hear about the people who are bad at corruption. If they were good at it, no one would ever know about it.

6183

Hunh. I tuned into c-span to see what was going on, and they were just adjourning. So I guess the president’s lawyers only took an hour today?

6184

Not like anyone cares about their case, and there’s too much risk of incriminating evidence emerging while they waste time making it.

6185

I mean so bad at it that they did the opposite of corruption and ensured there would be a prosecutor general in place that WOULD investigate burisma…

6186

Conversation successfully pivoted to “Is Biden Corrupt?” We’re so dumb and predictable.

6187

Yes, this.

6188

I think we are heading for another Kavanaugh gambit. The Republicans will eventually offer some kind of minimal concession on witnesses, a concession which rejects calling any witness for whom Trump might threaten privilege. No Bolton, no Pompeo, no Mulvaney. Then they will listen to the testimony of a token witness or two, and then they will decide that the witnesses can’t be believed and vote to acquit. The at-risk Senators will be the ones who push this ‘compromise’ and they will take a bow for having done their duty despite the extreme partisanship of the Democrats.

It will be like Flake insisting that, in good conscience, we must hear from Dr. Blasey Ford and then, after we have heard from her, choosing to disbelieve her.

6189

I don’t actually know exactly what Burisma expected to get out of its partnership with Biden, so I can’t really speak to exactly what the plan was.

But I can say that since Biden had no expertise in that industry at all, that I’m pretty damn sure the reason they were paying him a million bucks a year was entirely based on his last name being Biden.

Again, this is entirely immaterial to Trump’s corruption. But I think it’s a mistake to try and defend it, because it doesn’t look defensible. I mean, it’s not actually anything illegal. I’d just consider it unethical. But Hunter Biden isn’t even an elected official, so whatever.

6190

My most fervent hope is that one of my Virginia Senators asks a Trump attorney about the qualifications of Andrew Harold Giuliani.

6191

This is pretty much how corporate boards work everywhere, as well as nonprofit boards, etc. It’s heavily about reputation, networking, influence (often political), and clout. Pretending that this is any different is just crazy.

6192

Wow if the Democrats lose Feinstein that will be bad bad PR.

6193

As far as we know, what Joe Biden did was perfectly ethical, though. He told Hunter that taking the board position would look bad, and intervened with the Ukrainian government to toughen the investigation of Burisma.

Since Hunter Biden’s legal-but-unseemly private behavior is certainly of no legitimate concern of the President, and is likely to be beneath the concern of even a low-level investigator in the Justice Department, the only point of mentioning it at all is to tarnish Joe Biden by association.

6194

The allegation the republicans are making is that Biden pressured for Shokin’s removal to prevent investigation of Burisma.

Being in a board of directors does not require industry knowledge btw.