Biden / Harris Focused Discussion

[Sunseeker]

Yeah I mean I don't give two flying fucks what Hunter does. Nothing has been shown that Joe was involved in any manner. Worse, all this squaking over Hunter (I'm using first names because they are very much using "Biden" to confuse people on who they're talking about) is an absolute JOKE in front of the ridiculously overt way that all of Trump's children enriched themselves directly off of him being President with his overt assistance.

[Spectral]

Can you imagine what it would be like to just have a President that didn't have a bunch of useless kids gathering millions from shady foreign actors? Ah, a man can dream. Until then, we'll all need to remember to pretend that it's really not a big deal and that people probably don't really take any interest in where their kids are getting millions of dollars from anyway. If there was actually anyone still on the board that liked Trump, they'd probably do the same, so I guess that's fair enough.

[unfilteredJW]

Can you imagine what it would be like to just have a President that didn't have a bunch of useless kids gathering millions from shady foreign actors? Ah, a man can dream. Until then, we'll all need to remember to pretend that it's really not a big deal and that people probably don't really take any interest in where their kids are getting millions of dollars from anyway.

Clutch harder.

[Breccia]

Boy, golly, I don't know. I'm sure it's nothing.

Republican admits hyped Biden witness “didn’t know anything” about alleged bribe

Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., acknowledged that the Republicans' widely-hyped witness in their probe of the Biden family's business dealings "didn't know anything" about unverified allegations that President Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden had accepted millions in bribes.

House Oversight Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., and fellow Republicans had hyped a closed-door session with former Hunter Biden business partner Devon Archer as part of their growing Biden probe that has yielded no actual proof.

Archer during the nearly five-hour testimony said that President Biden was not party to any of his son's business deals and that Hunter had merely tried to sell the illusion that he was providing access to his father, Democrats on the panel said according to The New York Times.

Archer also said President Biden met and spoke with his son's international business associates several times as Hunter Biden tried to boost his business but did not discuss any business. He said Hunter Biden put his father on speakerphone to talk to business partners about 20 times over a decade, members of the panel told the Times.

Archer "was unequivocal and stated very clearly that they never discussed any business on that phone conversations that were niceties. And there was a hello. And there was talk about the weather or whatever it was, but it was never any business," Rep. Dan Goldman, D-N.Y., told reporters.

Goldman added that Archer testified that Biden spoke to his son frequently after his other son Beau died in 2015.

Also known as "not Vice President"

"The witness describes in vivid detail about how devastating that was to both Hunter Biden and to Joe Biden, and how their communications picked up dramatically in the aftermath," he said. "Because Joe Biden was calling his son to check on him and Hunter Biden was calling his dad to check on him. It had nothing to do with business. And that is the sum and substance of what the testimony was."

Goldman also said that Archer "categorically" denied the Republicans' bribe allegation.

Biggs, who is pushing for an impeachment inquiry, also acknowledged to reporters that Archer had no information on the unverified claims from an anonymous informant that the Bidens accepted bribes.

"He didn't know anything about it," Biggs told reporters after the session.

So, yeah, I'm inclined to agree with you. It sure does look like nothing. Even the star witness has nothing on anything.

[Edge-]

Can you imagine what it would be like to just have a President that didn't have a bunch of useless kids gathering millions from shady foreign actors? Ah, a man can dream. Until then, we'll all need to remember to pretend that it's really not a big deal and that people probably don't really take any interest in where their kids are getting millions of dollars from anyway. If there was actually anyone still on the board that liked Trump, they'd probably do the same, so I guess that's fair enough.

I love that you're just vaguely whinging instead of responding to anyone seriously responding to you to try to figure out what your actual concern is beyond clutching some pearls.

[Edge-]

Republican admits hyped Biden witness “didn’t know anything” about alleged bribe



Also known as "not Vice President"



So, yeah, I'm inclined to agree with you. It sure does look like nothing. Even the star witness has nothing on anything.

Oh boy, this would be disastrous to the narrative of some folks if they could read or cared about reading information that contradicted their narrative!

[Spectral]

Does Joe still do Hunter's taxes? My son is 18 and my daughter is 21, they both live at home, and I don't know their finances. Cause I respect that it's their fucking business.

What do you think, would you notice if someone gave one of them a few million dollars, or probably not?

[unfilteredJW]

Only if they tell me. I don't get my son's paystubs nor look at his bank account.

You don't control and hawk over every aspect of your children's lives?

The horror!1

[Spectral]

Only if they tell me. I don't get my son's paystubs nor look at his bank account.

Fair enough. I think most people would be likely to have some awareness of who their kids work for and that very few people have a studied indifference to who their kids work for. I suppose if your kid was doing something ordinary, but being massively paid for no apparent reason, it would be possible to miss that if they didn't live extravagantly. Certainly an edge case, but not impossible.

Open question for all - do your parents know your finances? If they do, how do they know?

Not with any precision, but with some reasonable degree of estimation. My work isn't particularly uncommon, so anyone with basic knowledge of the profession has a guess. Likewise, my house has a value that's easy enough to guess within $100K or so. We're not exactly digging into whether I have more money in S&P funds or REITs, but if you asked them to guess my net worth, I don't think they'd miss by an order of magnitude or anything.

[Edge-]

Fair enough. I think most people would be likely to have some awareness of who their kids work for and that very few people have a studied indifference to who their kids work for.

So it's not about the money, but who they work for now? I thought it was about the money? Is it no longer about the money?

I suppose if your kid was doing something ordinary, but being massively paid for no apparent reason, it would be possible to miss that if they didn't live extravagantly. Certainly an edge case, but not impossible.

It's funny because this is basically all back to the, "Burisma hired him to benefit off the 'Biden' name and pay him handsomely for minimal work sitting on a board." which like hello yes welcome to years ago and the discussion about how companies often hire people based off names to lend credibility and pay them handsomely for it. It's shady, but not remotely illegal, uncommon, or unique to Hunter and is part and parcel of being in "high society" or having connections.

We literally did this whole song and dance like 3 years ago and it seems that was all memory holed because it's a really convenient smoke machine to cry "FIRE" over again, to use Oversight Chair James Comer's comparison about smoke meaning there's fire. Which it very often does not, especially if you've ever been to some concerts. Lots of smoke at those, even without pyrotechnics.

Still waiting on you to respond to why it's so terrible to pick up a phone call from your child, and if you always know exactly what your child is doing when they call you? And also what Hunter discussed with his dad?

[Spectral]

So if you came across millions in a shady nepo baby way, would you tell your parents you made money off them, especially if that knowledge would potentially compromise your parents in such a public way?

I suppose it would depend on whether I expected there to be any reciprocity or not. In any case, I wouldn't be all that surprised when it didn't look great for anyone involved once it became clear that I'd been able to cash in on my connection to power.

[Edge-]

I suppose it would depend on whether I expected there to be any reciprocity or not. In any case, I wouldn't be all that surprised when it didn't look great for anyone involved once it became clear that I'd been able to cash in on my connection to power.

Why would that be any "worse" a look than it happening all the time? It's funny because this is literally basic "rich people shit" and y'all are acting like it's exclusive to Hunter and shit or something worse than it is. It's pretty hilarious that the latest clutched pearls is, "Joe Biden picks up the phone when his son rings and doesn't telepathically know exactly what his son is doing the moment he gets the call." which is big if true!

[Spectral]

Why would that be any "worse" a look than it happening all the time? It's funny because this is literally basic "rich people shit" and y'all are acting like it's exclusive to Hunter and shit or something worse than it is. It's pretty hilarious that the latest clutched pearls is, "Joe Biden picks up the phone when his son rings and doesn't telepathically know exactly what his son is doing the moment he gets the call." which is big if true!

You actually don't have to utterly debase your integrity in this fashion. It's actually entirely possible to support your preferred policy positions and thus support Biden without feeling the need to pretend that it's actually pretty normal for the President's corrupt kid to call him from meetings.

[Breccia]

the President's corrupt kid

I'm sure any minute now you're going to link when you had the same issues with Kushner and Trump's children.

Because until you do, this line comes off as partisan bias without any form of evidence, and as such, can be summarily handwaved.

[Edge-]

You actually don't have to utterly debase your integrity in this fashion. It's actually entirely possible to support your preferred policy positions and thus support Biden without feeling the need to pretend that it's actually pretty normal for the President's corrupt kid to call him from meetings.

I've been hoping you'd make a coherent point by now, but I guess it's just clutching pearls and that's it.

I guess you don't pick up the phone when your kid calls you, that's a shame.

[Endus]

You actually don't have to utterly debase your integrity in this fashion. It's actually entirely possible to support your preferred policy positions and thus support Biden without feeling the need to pretend that it's actually pretty normal for the President's corrupt kid to call him from meetings.

There's no integrity concern to be had, here. This is a set of plastic beads that you'd have to be so unthinkingly partisan as to believe are pearls worth clutching at. There's never been anything here.

Did Hunter possibly trade on his name/contacts to get executive roles within companies? Sure. Pretty much everyone on every single corporate board in the world has done that exact same thing. That's called "networking". It isn't "corruption".

Did Hunter make a lot of money? Sure. So does anyone in such positions. Not corruption.

Was Hunter unqualified for those positions? Objectively no. He was absolutely qualified. Unless you want to question the very nature of "qualifications" at the executive level in such a way that would call into question the entire corporate-capitalist executive system globally.

This is a nothingburger. The only way to put any meat between these utterly flaccid buns would be to show that Joe Biden ever made a decision in his political offices based on Hunter's request/encouragement that was otherwise unethical and indefensible on its own merits. This is a standard that's never been even suggested, and instead you all just keep whinging that a dad sometimes talks to his son. That's literally all you've got. That an adult son might talk to his dad sometimes. If you find that problematic, geez are you ever just telling on yourself and your own toxic family situation.

This is all particularly galling because it's clear none of you care about the principles behind your supposed complaints. The Trump kids all had far more contact with their father while he was in office, several were installed into his administration officially, they used those administrative roles for personal gain, and this is all publicly understood, and none of you gave a single shit. You don't care about that stuff. All you care about is using whatever means you can manufacture, no matter how intentionally and blatantly dishonest, to try and attack your political enemies. That's all this is. Naked partisan propaganda to slander the Bidens.

And I loathe Joe Biden, for the record. I hate his smarmy "just a casual down-to-earth dude" image. I hate that everyone's decided to just overlook the significant harm his early-career policies did to the nation, like the Crime bill of the '90s that was a significant contributor to how much worse policing got in the decades since. I'm not here to defend Biden. I'm here to call out horrendous, dishonest bullshit.

[Teriz]

Can you imagine what it would be like to just have a President that didn't have a bunch of useless kids gathering millions from shady foreign actors? Ah, a man can dream. Until then, we'll all need to remember to pretend that it's really not a big deal and that people probably don't really take any interest in where their kids are getting millions of dollars from anyway. If there was actually anyone still on the board that liked Trump, they'd probably do the same, so I guess that's fair enough.

You mean like Obama who the right wing attacked as a secret Muslim terrorist who had a thing for tan suits?

Meanwhile, I just heard a segment on right wing radio about how Trump shouldn't be charged in the documents case because he's a hoarder who doesn't like to let go of things. What a nice way to spin obstruction of a government investigation. Given the blind eye they're giving to Trump and his numerous, obvious crimes, you think they give two fucks about Ivanka or Jared?

[Spectral]

I'm sure any minute now you're going to link when you had the same issues with Kushner and Trump's children.

Because until you do, this line comes off as partisan bias without any form of evidence, and as such, can be summarily handwaved.

I actually already covered that on the last page! As mentioned, I think you'll find that I've never expressed even the slightest bit of enthusiasm for the Trump clan's involvement in the White House. I'm more than happy to expound upon that if you'd like. I largely adhere to the perspective that the appearance of impropriety is impropriety, which the Trump clan has obviously gone well beyond.

[Jastall]

You actually don't have to utterly debase your integrity in this fashion. It's actually entirely possible to support your preferred policy positions and thus support Biden without feeling the need to pretend that it's actually pretty normal for the President's corrupt kid to call him from meetings.

It's just kinda hard to take the whole "corrupt Biden crime family" shtick seriously right after the Trumps redefined what nepotism was in the White House. Compared to the shit that went on there, Joe maybe using his name to help his kid score a bit too much money (and then again it's a maybe) is downright business as usual in Washington DC. Which is part of a real problem, mind you, but the right-wing media that hyperfixates on this issue aren't at all interested in the systemic problem of there being too much money in American politics, they're just interested in smearing Biden as an individual.

There's reasons not to like Joe. There's reasons he's not that popular. This empty husk of a scandal has, I'd assume, very little bearing on anyone who isn't already a committed Republican voter looking for validations for their pre-existing opinions.

[Spectral]

You mean like Obama who the right wing attacked as a secret Muslim terrorist who had a thing for tan suits?

I can't say that I can personally be accountable for people that didn't like Obama - I voted for the guy and have repeatedly praised his personal integrity as part of why I maintain a positive view of him.