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Notes -
Hunter didn't pull a fast one on Joe. Joe is familiar enough with politics to know that Hunter was selling access to him, and happily continued to meet with Hunter's "clients" in order to facilitate Hunter's scheme. On Joe's part this is sleazy, but it is neither unusual nor illegal - selling access to politicians is what professional lobbyists do for a living, and meeting with clients of a lobbyist who donates to your campaign/hires your relative/might hire you after you leave office is SOP for DC swamp creatures. On Hunter's part it is a FARA violation and, it seems, tax evasion. (But FARA is almost certainly unconstitutional).
If you believe the official story (that Burisma hired Hunter as an "OK name" to make them look more respectable for a possible future US floatation) then no fast one was pulled - having Hunter on the board got them the access they were paying for. If Hunter did pull a fast one on Burisma then this would not be surprising - lobbyists promising influence but only providing access is an extremely common scam.
FWIW, if someone told me they could buy me the VP of the US for a mere 5 million USD, I would consider the offer too-good-to-be-true.
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