Joe Biden pardons Hunter Biden
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Joe Biden pardons Hunter Biden
Throughout President Biden’s term, we’ve had so many stories that we deemed “shocking but not surprising” that it became a regular category of news stories. And on Sunday night, at the end of a long holiday weekend when most people were in tryptophan comas, Biden dropped the mother of all “shocking but not surprising” stories: he gave his prodigal son Hunter a full pardon. Not just for everything we know he did, but for everything we might find out that he did over an 11-year period (the mind reels at that thought!) It’s not just a presidential pardon, it’s a “Get Out Of Jail Free” platinum card.
https://www.westernjournal.com/breaking-joe-biden-pardons-son-hunter/
The reaction from Republicans was also unsurprising, with Congressional leaders denouncing it as another example of two-tiered justice from the most lawless Administration in history.
But the pardon is no surprise, despite the fact that Biden repeatedly swore he would not interfere with the justice system or the jury verdict by pardoning his son. Recall, he also swore he would return normality to politics, he wouldn’t raise taxes on anyone earning over $200,000 a year, he knew nothing about Hunter’s shady deals and never met with his clients, and that Hunter’s laptop was Russian disinformation. So why would anyone believe him when he said he wouldn’t pardon Hunter? We can’t wait to hear Karine Jean-Pierre channel Gene Wilder in “Young Frankenstein”: “Don’t you people know a JOKE when you hear one?!”
Of course, with Joe having been found officially too old and feeble to be prosecuted (although not too old and feeble to continue to be President), this means both Hunter and Joe will be safe from any legal consequences for their (alleged!) long-running family influence-peddling racket. This makes it the most successful high-level corruption ring in American history.
Of course, there are other Biden family members who allegedly benefited, but Biden could always pardon them, too, before leaving office. Some are questioning why he chose to do this now instead of at the last minute. Hunter was scheduled to be sentenced in a few weeks, but chances are he wouldn’t have seen the inside of a jail cell before Trump’s inauguration.
Pardoning Hunter now distracts media attention from the Democrats’ manufactured “OUTRAGE!” over Trump’s Cabinet picks and reminds Americans of the powerful stench of Democrat corruption, which only helps Trump and his message of cleaning up the DC swamp (maybe we should call it a sewer.) Perhaps Biden did it as revenge for being thrown overboard by his Party, like his endorsement of Kamala Harris. It also sucks the air out of the Democrats’ bloviating about Trump pardoning January 6th political prisoners.
Perhaps even better for Trump, in making the sweeping pardon, Biden released a stunningly dishonest statement, claiming poor little Hunter was unfairly targeted by the DOJ for political reasons. In truth, they tried to give him an unprecedented sweetheart deal that was only stopped because the judge read it and was appalled. According to Joe, virtually nobody is actually punished for tax evasion or lying about being a drug addict on gun purchase forms. Really? You try that (WARNING! We’re speaking rhetorically: Do NOT try that!) It is nice of him to admit, though, that not even Democrats take the gun laws they force on us seriously.
Only after Hunter’s crimes became such a hot potato that they were impossible to cover up was the DOJ forced to do its job (which, coincidentally, gave them justification for claiming they were “nonpartisan” as they waged lawfare on Trump and his supporters.)
But in making that self-serving claim that really isn’t true for Hunter, Joe verified that his DOJ is corrupt and unfairly prosecutes people for political reasons. That gives Trump all the ammunition he needs to pardon his supporters who’ve been targeted and to clean out their partisan rats’ nests. Trump made that clear with his reaction to the news on social media:
“Does the pardon given by Joe to Hunter include the J6 hostages, who have now been imprisoned for years? Such an abuse and miscarriage of Justice!”
This anti-climax is frustrating for anyone who cares about justice, since all we can ever hope is that some real journalists (i.e., conservative journalists) will eventually put together the full story of this sleazy scheme and make it all public. It’s a twisted and wide-ranging web of corruption. Rep. Marjorie Taylor-Greene wrote an X post reminding us of all the corrupt members of the “justice” system who turned a blind eye or actively worked to cover it up, and of the fact that the FBI raided Barron Trump’s bedroom but not Hunter Biden’s.
https://thelibertydaily.com/marjorie-taylor-greene-breaks-down-hunter-pardon-warns/
Law professor Jonathan Turley also blasted the pardon, calling it “disgraceful” and “a decision that lives in infamy in presidential politics.” He eviscerated Biden’s rationale for the pardon and said that after all his denials that he would ever do it, this cements his legacy as the “liar-in-chief.”
Changes are coming for Hunter
Hunter may never see jail time (unless he does something new to deserve it; what are the odds?), but his life isn’t likely to get any easier with no more influence to sell. It’s doubtful his “paintings” will be going for six figures anymore. And we suspect the extreme generosity of the “friends” who’ve been supporting him may dry up (as to what’s behind that, we’d urge journalists to look closely at the flurry of other pardons that is sure to come before Joe Biden shuffles out of the White House and into the pantheon of Worst Presidents Ever (or as liberal “historians” call them, the “Best Presidents Ever.”) The names on those pardons might finally provide some answers to the question, “What do all these people who are supporting Hunter expect to get out of it?”
RELATED: Politico has either become the ultimate liberal media cliché with zero self-awareness, or else they’re trolling us all. Check out how they covered the angry Republican reaction to Joe Biden letting Hunter off scot-free for literally every illegal thing he’s ever done:
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President Trump’s DEA nominee
President-elect Trump has named 32-year veteran Florida Sheriff Chad Chronister, the “recipient of countless commendations and awards for keeping his community SAFE,” to be administrator of the Drug Enforcement Agency. We anxiously await Democrats telling us how being a sheriff in Florida for over three decades doesn’t qualify you to enforce drug laws.
Why Billionaire tech investor Marc Andreessen switched his support to Trump
It’s becoming more obvious with each passing day what a huge bullet America dodged when Trump beat Kamala Harris, but this revelation is the most stunning of all.
Billionaire tech investor Marc Andreessen has always backed Democrats before, but he switched to Trump this year, and he revealed why to Joe Rogan. He said that last spring, he participated in a series of White House meetings about the future of AI, and he was alarmed by what he heard.
Andreessen said that the Biden Administration’s plan was to allow only a handful of select big corporations to have AI technology. Those companies would be completely controlled by the government. No start-ups would be allowed to compete. He said this would create “full government control” of AI tech, which means control of communications, information, banking and more. Sounds like they were scheming to turn America into the old Soviet Union, or copy communist China’s vile “social credit system” that uses technology to spy on and control every aspect of every citizen’s life.
Rogan asked, “When you leave a meeting like that, what do you do?” Andreessen replied, “You go endorse Donald Trump!”
Mexico and Canada react to Trump
Migrant rights activists are protesting that Mexican authorities have broken up two huge caravans of migrants who were crossing Mexico to enter the US illegally, after Trump threatened 25% tariffs on Mexico. Wait, you mean it’s possible for Mexico to STOP people from walking across their country to enter the US? Who knew?!
https://apnews.com/article/mexico-migrant-caravans-trump-tariffs-c4611c47fc53e2c494545a7cef194e88
And guess who else immediately came calling to talk to Trump about border security. If you guessed Canadian PM Justin Trudeau, you win a cigar.
As you can see from this hilariously snarky report from Scott Pinsker, Trudeau is facing Arctic headwinds in next year’s election, with 57% of Canadians wanting him off the ballot. This is good news for our Canadian cousins.
We’ve received objections from some Canadian readers that the real border security problem is with Mexico, not Canada, and they have a point. However, while there might not be as many entries from the north, it’s not something to be unconcerned about. The National Post of Canada reported Friday that according to US Customs and Border Security, 87% of people identified as “terror suspects” who tried to enter the US via a land border in 2024 came from Canada. The good news: they were stopped at the border. But these are the ones we know about.
Besides, strong border security would also be beneficial for Canada. It would keep them from being invaded by entire states’ worth of whiny leftist insurrectionists who want to secede…
…And while a wall across the entire Canadian border would be very expensive, think of how many Trump-hating Hollywood celebrities it might keep out. Money well spent!
Some Cautionary Tales about Government Efficiency
By Col. Ken Allard
In the month since Donald Trump’s astonishing landslide, few initiatives have been more intriguing than his dramatic announcement that Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy will open a new White House-level Office of Government Efficiency. Its probable targets include those hardy Beltway perennials of waste, fraud and abuse as well as cutting a federal bureaucracy grown like Topsy whenever its lordly denizens actually report to work. The canonical example: That Carter-era abomination known as the Department of Education, seen by the incoming administration as the protector of teachers’ unions and usurper-in-chief of parental responsibilities best reserved for the several states. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/new-details-emerge-about-the-department-of-government-efficiency-s-proposed-cuts-to-federal-workforces/
Although prickly Democrats have already promised resistance in Congress and the courts, Republicans seem to be on a roll, despite their paper-thin majorities as well as those other hardy Beltway perennials known as ‘elections.’ Now in my dotage, I can well remember similar circumstances when in July 1985 President Reagan empaneled a blue-ribbon commission headed by David Packard, founder and Chairman of Hewlett-Packard. As an industrialist and public servant, Packard was a most formidable man. So too were the objectives of his reforms: The overall organization and management of the nation’s defense establishment, particularly its development and procurement of weapons systems.
Re-reading his final report nearly forty years later is enough to make is enough to make anyone cry, because those words still resonate: “DOD must displace systems and structures that measure quality by regulatory compliance and solve problems by executive fiat. Excellence in defense management cannot be achieved by the numerous management layers, large staffs and countless regulations in place today.” https://dair.nps.edu/bitstream/123456789/3705/1/SEC809-RL-86-0106.pdf
However imperfect, the Packard Commission provided a continuing blueprint for reform. It spurred landmark changes, particularly the Goldwater-Nichols Act of 1986, that elevated improved armed forces teamwork to our highest defense priority. Just four years later, Saddam Hussein provided that milestone legislation with the ultimate readiness test of high-intensity joint combat. By then, General Norman Schwarzkopf had reduced its complexities to a wonderfully succinct directive: “You get off that plane and you’re working for me!”
After working for Congressman Nichols as an Army Congressional Fellow, a series of bizarre happenstances placed me several years later astride one of the Packard Commission’s principle remaining goals: Reforming the laws affecting defense acquisition. And what an odd fate: I was not a lawyer, knew nothing about weapons acquisition and seemingly had nothing in common with its practitioners. But my experience with Pentagon reform had left me with many useful object lessons in “the art of the possible”- some of which might interest Messrs Musk and Ramaswami.
The first was recognizing that the operational environment surrounding defense procurement was a series of mutually suspicious and well-armed encampments – not unlike the warring factions I later encountered in Bosnia. Bring up any issue, no matter how benign it might seem on the surface, and you should proceed only after doing your homework to determine the most realistic limits of the possible; otherwise, just like with Serbs, Croats and Bosniaks, you were likely to emerge only after a long and pointless discussion of lineage, parentage and the egregious failings of persons who may or may not have been present.
We also had to understand precisely where we were. Our charter asked us to analyze the laws affecting defense acquisition. Well, how many of those laws were there? It took some painstaking research but we eventually came up with the astounding total of 800 laws! What was even worse: Each one of those laws generated multiple enabling regulations, the usual ratio being 1:3. So our 800 procurement laws were magically responsible for procreating at least 2400 regulations, an endlessly expanding crowd of orphans every time Congress passed a new law! Where and how could it all end – and what could our advisory panel do about it?
It took a little over two years to answer those questions, putting in place a comprehensive structure to review those laws, analyze their impact and make a well-documented case for retention, amendment or repeal. We kept close contact with our armed camps by ensuring that our reviews and recommendations fully considered their opinions – pro or con. Although often tempted to conclude that this was merely a fool’s errand, I was very pleasantly surprised when newly-inaugurated President Bill Clinton made our report the basis for his “reinventing government” initiatives.
So the good news is that these reforms eventually transformed all of federal procurement: The bad news is that, thirty years later, we need to do it all over again! Either way: Good luck, Elon and Vivek!
COL (Ret) Ken Allard is a former West Point professor, Dean of the National War College and NBC News military analyst.
A confident Trump makes his move, nominates Kash Patel for FBI director
On Saturday, President-elect Trump confirmed it: his choice for the new FBI director is none other than the brilliant and eminently qualified Kash Patel, who has made it clear that he would work to dismantle the bureaucracy, saying, “I’d shut down the Hoover FBI Building on Day 1 and reopen it as a museum of the Deep State.”
https://x.com/TrumpDailyPosts/status/1863007459788628379
Of course, this also confirms that current Director Christopher Wray is being given the boot. There’s no need at this point to expound on why that resounding kick out the door and down the steps is so richly deserved on his part.
(To those without a clue who’ve actually said, “But Wray is a Republican who was appointed by Trump,” we’d simply reply that he’s made it clear through his actions and his total lack of transparency that he’s a “Republican” only in the sense that Liz Cheney or his own predecessor James Comey is one. Keep in mind, Wray got that job because he was recommended to DC-neophyte President Trump by Chris Christie, who should forever hang his head in shame for such a lousy suggestion. As time passed and Biden took the White House, Wray just happened to fit right in with the Biden administration’s goals, fulfilling Attorney General Merrick Garland’s dictums as diligently and opaquely as any Democrat might have done.)
If you’d like a refresher on Wray, here’s a scathing reminder from Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, who’s in line to chair the Senate Judiciary Committee in the next Senate term, to our good fortune...
But enough about Wray. Does someone as perfect for the job as Patel have any hope of actually being confirmed by the new Senate? Texas Sen. Ted Cruz predicts he will be, along with Trump’s other nominees. He quickly runs through Patel’s outstanding qualifications.
“I gotta say,” Cruz continues, “all of the weeping and gnashing of teeth, all of the people pulling their hair out, are exactly the people who are dismayed about having a real reformer come into the FBI and clean out the corrupted partisans who sadly have burrowed into senior career positions at the FBI.”
The clip is just a little over a minute long. News analysts at CBS’s FACE THE NATION must have loved hearing this from Sen. Cruz...
Tennessee Sen. Bill Hagerty concurs that Patel “represents the type of change that we need to see in the FBI.” Here he is on NBC’s MEET THE PRESS, whose host was probably every bit as thrilled to hear this as the folks at CBS were, meaning not. (Read her solemn expression at the end to see how she likely felt.) Mainstream “journalists” must be profoundly dismayed at the prospect of losing their leaky FBI “anonymous sources.” Again, just a brief, must-see clip...
Kash Patel is SO highly qualified for the job of FBI director that anyone who criticizes him on this score is really saying, in the words of commentator J. D. Rucker, “Holy c**p! Kash Patel’s gonna catch us all!”
Rucker also posted in more detail on X that this is why they’re going to come after him “with all they’ve got.” It’s a must-read. Surely both President Trump and Patel himself are aware of what’s ahead for the confirmation process. Those desperate enough, with enough to lose, will try anything and everything, just as they have with President Trump. (Oh, no, are we all going to be subjected again to the Democrats “trotting out the women”?)
https://x.com/JDRucker/status/1863247098969546850
Patel’s name had previously been floated as the possible nominee for DEPUTY director, which doesn’t require Senate confirmation. But Trump apparently is feeling confident that Patel will get through, as he should. Pam Bondi, as U.S. Attorney General, will be his boss.
https://dailycaller.com/2024/11/30/donald-trump-kash-patel-fbi-director/
We hope that together, Bondi and Patel can rid the “justice” system of politicized actions such as this…
At this point, you’ve seen plenty from Patel’s stellar resume. But some are noting that former Attorney General Bill Barr said this about Patel in his 2022 book:
“I categorically opposed making Patel deputy FBI director. I told Mark Meadows it would happen ‘over my dead body.’ In the first place, all the leadership positions in the bureau, except the director, have always been FBI agents. They've all gone through the same agent training and have had broad experience in the field and at headquarters. Someone with no background as an agent would never be able to command the respect necessary to run the day-to-day operations of the bureau. Furthermore, Patel had virtually no experience that would qualify him to serve at the highest level of the world’s preeminent law enforcement agency.”
Bonchie at REDSTATE wryly comments: “I can’t think of a better endorsement for Patel to serve as FBI director than that.”
He also notes David Frum’s post on X: “We are headed toward a US constitutional crisis vastly bigger than Watergate.” (What, by appointing people who are not career bureaucrats? Seems as though that would make the framers of the Constitution very happy!) As Bonchie points out, “No, we are not heading for a ‘constitutional crisis,’ because the FBI is not a constitutional agency. It is a bloated, corrupt bureaucracy under the direct leadership of the President and one in desperate need of a house cleaning.” Thomas Jefferson, in his day, would likely have been so fed up that he’d call for much more drastic action than what Trump is taking, which is simply to follow the authority given him under the Constitution to make his own appointments, subject to Senate approval.
But, anyway, get ready for a lot more hysterical nonsense like that.
Here’s REDSTATE’s Nick Arama, commenting on the screams coming from former deputy FBI Director (and current MSNBC contributor) Andrew McCabe’s corner. Delightful to behold!
Becca Lower at REDSTATE points out two more whose jaws are sore from all the teeth-gnashing: former Trump National Security Advisor John Bolton and Biden National Security Advisor (and Russia hoaxer) Jake Sullivan. Be sure to read her piece for the quote from Sen. Hagerty about how Biden appointees such as Secretary of State Tony Blinken, who organized the now-infamous “classic earmarks” letter about Hunter Biden’s laptop, “qualified” for their jobs and security clearances
Susie Moore, also at REDSTATE, points out that while former top officials are having a fit, former FBI agents seem quite pleased and even ecstatic about Patel…
In more from REDSTATE, Streiff notes that Bolton actually compared Patel to Lavrenty Beria, a Stalin loyalist who became head of the secret police. According to Streiff at REDSTATE, Beria “carried out the purges of the 30s, ran the gulag system, and kept the Red Army in the field during the trying 1940-1942 period through the use of political commissars, blocking units and summary executions.” Streiff calls Bolton’s statement “mind-bogglingly stupid” and considers it to be quite a solid endorsement of Patel.
FBI agent-turned-whistleblower Steve Friend has some recommendations for the new FBI director. “Director Patel should immediately dissolve the FBI case quota system and Intelligence Branch,” he told PJ MEDIA’S Catherine Salgado. “These protocols have contributed to the bureau’s devolution into a politicized secret police force.”
In the “case quota system,” as explained by Friend, offices and agents are supposed to log a specific number of cases in specific categories, and their promotions rest in their ability to fulfill these. (Think January 6.) Did you even know they had this? On its face, this is a terrible system. It induces agents to create crimes that don’t even exist, and to ignore other types of crimes that aren’t at the top of the priority list, in order to reach arbitrary statistical goals. Patel should retire this system on Day 1.
Over the weekend (before the Patel nomination was announced), legal analyst Andrew C. McCarthy wrote an unfortunate piece for NATIONAL REVIEW called “Trump Needs to End Lawfare,” in which he lamented the thought of Trump using the legal system to go after what he admits were “bad prosecutions.” He found it disturbing that Trump would echo Steve Bannon’s “battle cry for lawfare.” Read it if you’d like…
https://www.nationalreview.com/2024/11/trump-needs-to-end-lawfare/
...but what really is a must-read is Julie Kelly’s response, in which she absolutely takes his argument apart. She’s THE preeminent January 6 expert, and her piece is so masterful, we’ll just give her the floor and encourage you to offer her your undivided attention.
Now I ask you Newsletter Readers, what is the bigger surprise here? Lying, Brain-Dead-Biden, actually doing what he said he would NOT do and pardoning his son Hunter, or Biden accusing the Judicial System of using "Lawfare" against Hunter, because he is "The President's Son"?
I say it is the same ol' Democrat mantra......." Always Accuse Republicans of the very thing you are doing against President Trump and Maga Supporters!"
What a horrible legacy this criminal President is leaving for the history books.
Is there anyone in this country who is unable to see through the democRATs' crocodile tears, lies, and perversion? Please hurry, January 20th!