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This is because these dipshits are eagerly carrying water for a vindictive dictator. They are not operating in good faith but due to the alignment of the owners of this site with those self-same fascists you are meant to act as if they're not trolls.
You are watching a very different game from me.
6 years of investigation and all they could find was that Hunter did drugs and owned a gun. I am sure if we drug tested congress, we could prosecute a bunch of congressmen for the same crime. Maybe thats why supreme court is looking at the constitutionality of the law and its all been ruled unconstitutional in one of the courts districts but hey lets prosecute Hunter Biden for it.
Trying to minimize Hunter's significant legal problems to "he did [many hard, highly regulated] drugs and [illegally] owned a gun [which was thrown into a dumpster]" is disingenuous and factually incorrect.
Hunter's (and other Biden family member's) legal issues were so plainly severe, with a near-guarantee of prison time, President Biden was forced to issue an unprecedented, unconditional pardon for "offenses against the United States which he has committed or may have committed or taken part in during the period from January 1, 2014 through December 1, 2024." A decade-long period during-which any crimes Hunter committed were erased and forgiven.
Nobody is above the law? This was Biden's own DoJ.
[1] https://www.justice.gov/archives/sco-weiss/pr/grand-jury-ret...
Also if the gun charges were so serious, why aren't we prosecuting Joe Rogan, its literally a slam dunk case. He smokes pot(a schedule 1 drug) on his podcasts and brags about his concealed weapons permit. You don't even need to find witnesses, just show the jury of him smoking pot and a copy of his federal form. Or we could just cross reference the ATF background database with states' Medical Marijuana Registries. Could prosecute tens of millions of people including Joe Rogan.
It's clear that he was correct that Trump was going to target his political enemies, but it sounds like he can't win here -- if he pardons everyone including Comey, people would say he's abusing the power by pardoning everyone. If he only pardons a few then he's accused of leaving others "high and dry."
Biden's use is far more forgivable, as it's a given that his son was being prosecuted politically to punish Biden (though certainly he was guilty) and would likely have been prosecuted more under Trump, like Comey is being prosecuted today. And certainly "saving your children" is a far more forgivable sin than naked bribery, but being better than Trump is a low bar, but it's still not okay to excuse criminals from punishment because they have an important family member.
(Changpenh Zhao - made him billions; Trevor Milton - donated $1.8 million; Walczak - his mom donated millions)
That said, this shouldn't be a competition of who is "more self-serving". Just because your neighbour murdered two people, doesn't mean that you get to murder one.
And I say this as someone who despise Trump. A broken clock can be right twice a day.
So, a net negative impact on society.
I'm glad he pardoned CZ. The previous administration + SEC are responsible for this mess by not passing reasonable laws. Coinbase fared much better fighting them all the way.
Trump did the right thing here.
The decision is a lot more respectable than "this guy gave me a bribe." They are worlds apart. And some may be theoretically willing to roll the dice on that for their family, but it reads naive.
If he’d pardoned a whole team of people he’d also signal to the world that he believe they are guilty too.
Seems like you should do some more research about this before forming such strong opinions, because you are not correct -- Biden preemptively pardoned more than just his family. He pardoned Fauci and Miley after Trump accused them of treason; as well as some members of the J6 committee like Liz Cheney (Trump retweeted a post that claimed Cheney was guilty of treason and should face a military tribunal).
I still think you should answer my question though, because it establishes a baseline for acceptability. I believe that you personally would pardon your own family against such threats because I believe most decent people would. So if you're willing to pardon your own family, then there's a conversation to be had about why you would need to, and whether that protection should be extended, for the good of the nation, to other people not related to you.
The problem we see right now with the pardon power was predicted by the founders:
"The President of the United States has the unrestrained power of granting pardons for treason; he may pardon crimes which were advised by himself. It may happen, at some future day that he will establish a monarchy, and destroy the republic... If he has the power of granting pardons before indictment, or conviction, may he not stop inquiry and prevent detection?" - George Mason
Hamilton argued:
"In seasons of insurrection or rebellion, there are often critical moments when a well-timed offer of pardon to insurgents... may restore the tranquillity of the commonwealth."
"Humanity and good policy conspire to dictate that the benign prerogative of pardoning should be as little as possible fettered or embarrassed."
"Without an easy access to exceptions in favor of unfortunate guilt, justice would wear a countenance too sanguinary and cruel."
And in doing so they ensured that the pardon power reflects the soul of this nation. We get the government we vote for, and the pardon power is used in a way that we the voters tolerate.
The problem isn't the pardon power is broad, it's that we as an electorate are so willing to elect someone who is comfortable abusing those broad powers and other authority for his personal gain.
I will close by just noting that both of the abuses of the pardon power we are talking about were precipitated by Trump. Biden wouldn't have pardoned any of the people you're mad about if Trump hadn't first promised to abuse his power to persecute them. Biden had the good judgement and foresight to take Trump seriously, because he turned out to be 100% right.
And all of the members of Congress on the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack for anything having to do with their role on that committee.
Schiff was on that committee. He said the pardon was unnecessary and unwise.
https://www.justice.gov/pardon/pardons-granted-president-jos...
The Trump prosecutions were not only warranted, they were insisted by Republicans; the Republican Senators explicitly declined to convict Trump in his second impeachment because they anticipated he would be prosecuted in a court of law for January 6. From Republican Leader Mitch McConnell when he explained his rationale during the 2nd impeachment trial:
https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/13/politics/mitch-mcconnell-acqu...
“Former President Trump’s actions that preceded the riot were a disgraceful, disgraceful dereliction of duty,” added McConnell. “Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day.”
“We have a criminal justice system in this country. We have civil litigation. And former Presidents are not immune from being held accountable by either one,” he said.
In refusing to convict Trump on J6, McConnell set the precedent that it is improper to impeach a President if he commits crimes between the Election and the Inauguration as Trump did. According to McConnell, accountability lies in the Courts. If it's true that the incoming administration also cannot prosecute those crimes, then POTUS is essentially immune from any and all accountability under the Constitution, which cannot be the case; POTUS would be able to commit or attempt to commit any crimes he wants between Nov and January 20 at the end of his term, up to and including high crimes like insurrection against the government.
Republicans shirked their Article I duty by refusing to impeach a man they publicly blamed for provoking events which led to the deaths of multiple people. Specifically it was Republican Senators who punted it to the Biden DOJ, which made them Constitutionally bound to prosecute.
Obviously he's upset by this outcome, but even if you agree with him, his response has been to burn down the rule of law and the entire concept of justice. Even if you feel he was wronged by James, weaponizing the DOJ against James is not justified by "She started it".
Of course, once it is done by a president representing the party you (generic you) feel affiliated with, the double standards inevitably kick in.
Less that, more we're all aware of what Trump campaigned on and what he promised to do to Biden's entire family. And we're disheartened that there's cultists (not you) trying to convince us that we should let our families suffer if dear leader demands it.
I don't know these people, I don't have a strong feeling if any of them go to jail for something they did, because I'm not in a personality cult. But I care a lot more if people are going to jail just because a more corrupt person got the keys to everything. Turns out, those fears were valid, and I'm increasingly alarmed that there's still so much vitriol towards Biden pardoning a checks notes gun charge, than there is for the blatantly corrupt shit we see every day.
A paper you signed is insufficient protection from truly Erdoganesque leaders who are about to gain an imperial presidency. It is just bad politics from all perspectives: inefficient in its original purpose and controversial at the same time.
It’s probably good that Biden took away this particular show trial option from them.
Disloyalty is the worst crime around Trump. You must never stop proving your loyalty. Just look at videos of their meetings.
Each person speaking must first have a little sermon praising and thanking God, oh sorry no, not God, I meant Trump.
Personally, I’m reminded of how every dysfunctional country’s deposed regimes flee or are killed. We sheltered Americans find it easy to forget that peaceful transfer of power is an accomplishment of lawful society, and as rule of law weakens we have only more chaotic, ignominious, and probably eventually violent transitions to look forward to.
Reaction to the Biden pardon is a pretty huge thing to be completely unaware of. You should reevaluate whether you’re in a media bubble.
the substance of the pardons matters a great deal, as well.
And from what we've seen, he was right to do so. Although, they've been angling to declare his pardons void so they can go after whoever they wish.
Are pre-emptive pardons a common thing for American presidents to do?
Sadly I think Biden's choice was completely rational given how Trump is weaponizing the US justice system.
Ha ha. They (democrats overall) need to look inwards for that.
> Same reason he pardoned Fauci and others. Fauci screwed up our country so bad, it aint even funny. The fact that he needed a PRE-EMPTIVE (i.e. he wasn't even accused of anything at the time) pardon says it all. And the fact that Biden gave it to him, says everything there is to say about Biden.
> And from what we've seen, he was right to do so. Not even close.
> Although, they've been angling to declare his pardons void so they can go after whoever they wish. They should.
- Look at what Biden did to the southern border. And look at it now. - Look at almost any "democrat" run major city. Any. Then look at the crime rates and cost of living. - And the recent farce that was this "No Kings" crap...
Trump isn't perfect. Far from it. He's got major flaws, both in character and execution. However, name any major policy initiative that he's undertaken that is bad for the "country". As a whole.
This is a ridiculous standard. Each of his policies (individually) only hurting some Americans is not a flex.
The totality is what matters, not you, not me.
His foreign policy means even the EU is now looking inward more because we simply don't trust you guys anymore. Thanks, we were depending on you guys too much anyway! It will take a while before we're weened off of you for sure, but your global influence will shrink tremendously thanks to your current president's untrustwortiness.
In dutch we have a saying which is roughly translated as "Trust comes on foot, and leaves by horse"
Any? His energy policy.
I have plenty more.
Oil prices are down, we now produce more oil than anybody else, and enjoy low energy prices domestically.
Where’s the problem?
Now compare that to...
Yes, solar and wind projects are being canceled, and yes, there may be an element of ideology involved, but the reality also is that the math aint working.
If the math worked, Europe's energy prices wouldn't be where they are now, given the commitment they've made to renewables. I'd much rather see a national focus on nuclear, which is as clean as any other form of energy, and to a degree that is happening now.
The math is clear - solar + batteries is the cheapest source of electricity. China isn't generating 80% of all new electricity with solar because they want to be green above all else.
> Europe's energy prices wouldn't be where they are now, given the commitment they've made to renewables
Again a tired old lie. Europe is a big place, just like the US. Some countries have high prices and some countries don't.
Be better informed. Stop lying.
And I guess the two countries (combined) that have almost 3B people don't believe in climate change either? Because if they did...
The problem is that the rest of the world is very actively moving on, led by China. A great many oil importing countries reduced their imports last year. China deploys more solar in 6 months than the US has deployed ever and is distributing this technology to the rest of the world far cheaper than they can bring it here. The US had a program to get 1000 new auto chargers installed. China installed 100,000. People are simply unaware of the sheer scale of the Chinese juggernaut. They think that since we're ahead now (questionable) and we're going 95 MPH, we'll always be ahead. They don't realize that China is going 250 and we're getting passed.
Trump would do well for the country to plan ahead JUST A LITTLE BIT.
But as Bolton said, it's unclear if Trump knows the difference between his personal interest and the national interest, or if he's even aware there is a national interest.
We already stopped that a while ago so I don’t know why you’re referencing it other than the blatant partisanship you’re showing across the thread.
What level of evidence would you need to accept that this admin had done something negative?
And they are not “our” treaty commitments. Treaties by definition involve more than one party.
But out of curiosity, what commitments are talking here? Talking in abstracts is meaningless.
They're usually not that bad for his billionaire grifter buddies, I'll give you that.
* Using the justice system to corruptly punish the opposition and prevent them from competing in elections,
* Using the security/military/law enforcement establishment to simply kill the opposition,
* Using the regulatory bureaucracy, and/or the security/military/law enforcement establish, to coerce media into friendly, or at least out of critical, coverage,
* Using the regulatory bureaucracy, and/or the security/military/law enforcement establish to reward people providing personal material benefit to the leader, or to punish those not doing so,
* Using the pardon power to assure that crimes committed in the course of doing any of the preceding items are unprosecutable
Pardoning family members, by itself (provided that the standards applied are different than those that would be applied to non-family members), is certainly corrupt as a form of nepotism, but hardly the outer limit of banana republic behavior.
That is until you see what's currently happening, the President personally directing the DOJ to arrest his political enemies, of which Biden and his family are considered to be primary antagonists (remember they labelled them the "Biden crime family" and chanted "lock them up"). That is the most banana republic as it gets, so how is preemptively defending against that behavior out of bounds?
They tried to put true in jail for 4 years, and kept saying he is a Nazi so people would try to shoot him. I don't think it's so different
I had made an extended repones about that notion here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45689915
But it suffices to say Biden did not direct any prosecutions at all.
> kept saying he is a Nazi so people would try to shoot him.
These are very different things, you'll need to make a better argument to conflate them. The actions Trump took to direct his DOJ to prosecute is political enemies is a direct action that violates the presumed and intended independence of the DOJ.
You equate those direct actions with something neither Biden nor any Congressional Democrat I know of actually did. Biden never called Trump a Nazi, and never tried to get him killed. In fact Biden increased protection on Trump after there was an attempt on his life.
Do you have any quote I'm unaware of? I do recall that the current Vice President JD Vance has called Trump a Nazi, so apparently that's not really such a concern.
Trump has been accurately labelled a "fascist" by elected Democrats. I don't think that's any different from Trump calling Democrats "communists". He's also called them "fascists" as well.
Nice to see the people who fucked it up isolated from the consequences of his second term. (/s)
The only reason Trump hasn't challenged the constitutionality of the pre-emptive pardons is because he indends to do the same.