Before I get into Hunter's legal issues, past drug use and accusations of corruption, let's take a minute to look at his qualifications. It's been suggested that he was unqualified for any of the board positions that he held and only offered employment because he was the son of Joe Biden. Actual qualifications of lack of them aside, does anyone really believe that Hunter Biden is the first child of a prominent politician to be offered a lucrative job? Of course there was an expectation that he would take advantage of his proximity to power to express his opinions to his father. There's nothing illegal or unethical about that. People in all manner of businesses make use of their relationships to lobby those who have the means to make their life easier. Is there an expectation that politicians live in a bubble and not talk to any of their friends and relatives? But was Hunter Biden's only qualification that he was Joe Biden's son? He was a graduate of Harvard, so he received a top-notch education. Those of us who make a living producing something tangible tend to suspect that those who's business is more opaque aren't really working, and that there's something shady involved. Hunter's first job after graduating from Harvard was as a consultant to MBNA Bank and eventually rose to the rank of Executive Vice President. What was a typical day like for someone in those positions? I have no idea, but there's thousands of people with similar titles and they can't all be sitting back with their feet up on their desks sipping martinis. After leaving MBNA he served in the Commerce Department focusing on ecommerce policy in the Clinton administration. President George W. Bush appointed him to the Amtrack board. He founded a lobbying firm and served on the board of World Food USA, a charity that supported United Nations food sustainability efforts. He created investment and advisory firms, including a company devoted to advising companies on how to escaped their business into foreign markets. Around 15 years ago he began serving on various boards of foreign based companies. He joined the board of the Ukrainian firm Burisma in 2014 (more on that later). Hunter Biden started or was part of many successful companies; the suggestion that the millions of dollars that he earned was necessarily due to corruption is based on wishful thinking on the part of those who wish to undermine his father.
Hunter Biden made a very convenient target. He is a recovering from a drug addiction which was fueled by the generous salary he received for his many successful ventures. This made it easier for those who opposed President Biden to believe that there couldn't possibly be anything legitimate about his businesses and therefore there must be corruption involved. When the contents of his laptop were leaked they showed a video record of much of his debauchery. Republican House members delighted in showing images in committee hearings. But all any of this proves is that Hunter Biden was a successful businessman who made terrible choices in his personal life.
Hunter Biden first became widely known due to Donald Trump's attempt to undermine Joe Biden's presumed presidential run by alleging that then Vice President Biden pushed to have Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin fired to protect his son, who was on the board of Burisma, a company that Shokin was supposedly investigating. The problem with Trump's narrative was that Shokin wasn't investigating Burisma and that Biden's pressure to have Shokin removed was President Obama's decision and was supported by the European Union leadership. Burisma's executives, far from relieved to have Shokin gone, were worried that whoever the new prosecutor was would dig into their affairs. Trump and his supporters claimed that Hunter was on the board of Burisma for no other reason than to influence Joe Biden to get Shokin fired, while he was actually hired to assist Burisma with creating corporate governance best practices. All of this came to a head in 2019 as Trump attempted to strong arm Ukrainian President Zelenskyy into opening an investigation into the Bidens and Burisma in exchange for military aid. Trump was impeached for this.
Much has been made of the several dozen "shell companies" that members of the Biden family (mainly Hunter and Joe's brother James) utilized in their various businesses. The term "shell company" sounds devious somehow, and it's meant to. Another, more accurate, term is "Limited Liability Company", or "LLC". An LLC can be owned by a single owner, multiple owners, a partnership, or another LLC. They are sometimes referred to as "flow-through entities", i.e. the profit or loss "flows through" to the owners. There is nothing nefarious about someone's income moving through multiple LLCs. Sometimes different aspects of a business need to be kept separate for legal or accounting reasons; there may be tax benefits; one LLC may have a different set of owners than another. It's a common business practice - in my job at The State Department of Revenue I see it all the time. The Republicans are painting a perfectly ordinary business practice as prima facie evidence of corruption.
Presidential candidate Trump has made no secret of his intention to turn a second Trump term as a vehicle for retribution, revenge and retaliation. The recent announcement that the House of Representatives has opened an impeachment inquiry is nothing more than that. Trump was impeached, therefore Biden must be impeached. The difference between the two is that despite suspicions of corruption all through Trump's term, no action was taken to impeach Trump until something solid and undeniable came to light. The extorting phone call to Zelenskyy wasn't alleged, it wasn't suspected, it was real: Trump himself released the transcript. The question was not whether the threats had occurred, but whether the threat was sufficient grounds to impeach. The committee investigations and now the impeachment inquiry are nothing but fishing expeditions. They are starting from the conclusion that President Biden was and is corrupt and are interpreting every dollar in the bank as evidence of that imaginary corruption.
The Tinfoil Hat Caucus in The House is using what it perceived as a weak link, President Biden's son Hunter, in order to take the president down. But the "weak link" isn't playing along. Hunter, remembering how the Republicans misrepresented (okay, lied about) the testimony of his former partner Devon Archer when he testified behind closed doors, is refusing to testify unless it's public. He is fighting back and not allowing them to control the narrative. He is being charged with felonies that for anyone else would be slap-on-the-wrist misdemeanors - to get to the president. His not-so-squeaky-clean past his being put on display - to get to the president.
Retribution, revenge and retaliation. The Republican legislative agenda.
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