If you’re feeling like every time you look at the news you’re playing some kind of Bizarro World game show, you’re probably wondering who, if anyone is winning.
The winners are clearly not Aurora, Americans, Democrats, Republicans, or really, anyone, anywhere.
I’m not talking about actual Aurora elected officials going on national TV and begging for ICE and military squads to invade the city and round up brown people without U.S. birth certificates. I’ll talk about that soon. No, I’m talking about the recent biggest loser.
No doubt the week’s biggest loser was President Joe Biden. Biden shocked everyone and no one when he broke the promise he made publicly over and over that, no matter what, he would not pardon his son Hunter Biden for his series of gun and tax crimes.
I think most caring, normal people with kids would immediately sympathize with Biden the dad, who just couldn’t bear to see his kid, albeit a 54-year-old kid, go to prison.
It’s unconditional love in real life. I’ve seen it dozens of times in courtrooms. There, heinous murderers being sentenced to prison or death hear their mom or dad on the stand beg a judge or jury for mercy for their child, no matter how incredible the crime.
If any parent with a kid in cuffs had the power of the pardon, I have little doubt everyone would use it. I would.
What’s pissed off so many people, including a growing list of prominent Democrats, is that Biden promised, over and over, that he would refuse to grant the pardon because no one, not even the president’s son, is above the law.
Had Joe Biden been sailing out of the White House soon, handing the oars over to anyone even just half as psychologically disturbed or corrupt as Donald Trump, the Hunter Pardon flap would have lasted through the news cycle for maybe a week.
But because Hunter’s case parallels Trump’s own legal foibles, and because Trump and his allies have already weaponized it for their own malevolent purposes, it was as if Biden tossed a pinned grenade straight to Trump. Worse yet, it’s as if Joe Biden turned tail and ran, leaving what’s left of the free world to fend for itself.
It felt personal in a way politics shouldn’t.
Quick to draw, Gov. Jared Polis struck out on social media seemingly minutes after the story broke, triggering an explosion of sad dads and mad- as-hell voters who feel betrayed by just another politician breaking just another promise.
“While as a father I certainly understand President Joe Biden’s natural desire to help his son by pardoning him,” Polis said in a post on the social media platform X, “I am disappointed that he put his family ahead of the country. This is a bad precedent that could be abused by later Presidents and will sadly tarnish his reputation. When you become President, your role is Pater familias of the nation. Hunter brought the legal trouble he faced on himself, and one can sympathize with his struggles while also acknowledging that no one is above the law, not a President and not a President’s son.”
The post has drawn widespread outrage both from Democrats and Republicans alike. Solid Dems cursed Polis for breaking ranks, just as the battle with Trump is reaching fever pitch. Republicans have taken umbrage with Polis, mostly for being Polis, but also for not going beyond Joe Biden’s blunder of pardon and just taking shots at Biden for anything and everything else.
Colorado Democrat Sen. Michael Bennet was more succinct in his criticism.
“President Biden’s decision put personal interest ahead of duty and further erodes Americans’ faith that the justice system is fair and equal for all,” Bennet posted on X.
The point is well taken. In theory, a rabid prosecutor has no chance to usurp justice because the judge, jury and the rules of trial provide for — drum roll, please — a fair trial of the facts and evidence.
Anything else is Donald Trump and Matt Gaetz and the parade of Trump sycophants claiming “lawfare” against the former president and a rigged court and jury system that delivered 34 felony counts against Trump earlier this year.
And if there were, by chance, courtroom shenanigans that deprived a defendant of a fair trial? The appeals court is supposed to be the final check and balance.
At least, that’s what the rest of the country has pushed back to Trump and his acolytes as they’ve claimed that all of his legal woes were nothing but political retribution for his being so disliked by Democrats.
Only a soulless sycophant would disagree that Republicans and the media gruesomely hounded Hunter Biden, tortured him unfairly and unrelentingly with rumors, lies, facts and fiction in a gleeful attempt to discredit his dad.
Tragically, Joe Biden pulverized his credibility and reputation far worse than the Hunter Biden faux scandals did.
In a perfect world, Hunter Biden would have told his dad not to issue the pardon, and that he would refuse it if he did. He could take his chances with the U.S. law just like everyone else. Just like Trump must.
Because the one thing we will all be hoping for during the next few years is that, after Trump is finally done being president, we will still abide by the rule of law, and that no one is above it. Not the president nor former president. Not the president’s son, nor Trump’s militia of misfit anarchists. Not anyone.
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Tempest in a teapot.
Let’s poll the electorate on this in 10 years.
President Biden pardoned his son to protect him from further persecution and prosecution by Trump and his despicable cronies. He is not just protecting him from punishment for his convictions but the probability of further shenanigans.
LOL, Trump wasn’t going to do anything to Hunter that the DoJ hadn’t already started. MSNBC tardation is cooking what’s left of your brain cells.
I see you’re as classy as usual. Which is, not at all.
No need to be “classy” towards leftists, Jeffy-poo, while your side gets to indulge in politics as a cage match. I realize you want your political opponents amiable and compliant while you act out like those spastics Tay Anderson and Tim Hernandez, but those days are gone.
Yes, you really make a point by using baby talk. I don’t think it’s the point you think you’re making.
Pathetic.
I’m simply giving you the level of respect you deserve. If you don’t like it, look in the mirror.
The false equivalence of the President pardoning his son to the crimes of the first Trump administration strains credulity. The tax fraud of Charles Kushner, the financial fraud of Steve Bannon, the multiple crimes of Paul Manafort, the treason of Michael Flynn, and the collusion of Roger Stone were all pardoned by the convicted felon and president-elect, Donald Trump. Richard Nixon was pardoned for trying to conceal the Watergate scandal. When Hunter Biden was tried, many judicial experts were surprised the charges were not dismissed. I’m tired of this gaslighting, aren’t you?
If you are looking for an honest politician with any principles in today’s environment, you are not dealing with reality. Further, if you have ignored the fact that Biden has never explained why he has shell companies to hide the money he has gotten from other countries and channeled into his family, then you don’t deal with reality. Biden is simply a crook who is protecting his accomplice. Certainly, Donald Trump doesn’t display any admirable qualities other than having a few right policies. The fact that neither party can field someone that we can hold up to our children says a lot about where we are as nation.
Specifics, please. I keep hearing vague accusations of corruption from the Trumpalos in power, but nothing anyone can point to and substantiate. They even tried to call a repayment of a personal loan, well documented, a bribe.
Name these shell companies. Document the “money trail”. Tell us about this “money from other countries”.
Facts, please. If yo can find one.
Oh my lord people, even when the facts are put in front of you you do not believe them. 31% voted trump, 30% voted Haris, 40% didn’t vote-why.
The minority besieged by lies, the billionaires run 99% of the media, influenced by outside interests (Russians), serve you the stuff you read or hear and believe. Truth can be found but you have to dig for it and often pay to reach it via MSNBC, or on Sirius or in papers like the Sentinel. Try the truth, you will hate less but realize this country is a mess and kind of always has been. Your anger and hate are not helping make it a very good place.
LOL, the projection in this post can be seen from Pluto. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with “hate,” especially when your side continually uses it as a thought-stopping power word to prevent resistance against your dumb political theology. And stop with this “these are the actual percentages!” nonsense, since you certainly don’t apply the same logic when your side wins elections itself. But the double standard of Marcusian “liberating tolerance” are your side’s stock in trade.
I heard a commentator advise that Biden might consider taking the list of enemies from Patel and give blanket pardons to everyone listed. It would rob Trump and the republican house from the circus show that Trump so dearly loves, keeping their fake outrageous anger from manifesting into more hearings that our tax dollars pay for. Trump wants the headlines, the TV coverage, Bannon’s ranting on X, the false justification that he is blameless and the only rightful heir to the throne. Convicted of 34 felonies and sexual assault. Biden pardoned his son. You want him to sacrifice his son to Trump & the trumpettes? Seriously…