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https://apple.news/APEuOPHP2TWqeUTR_h8QypA
So the Republican speaker of the house has decided to open an impeachment inquiry into Joe Biden’s business dealings with hunter. I have serious doubts that this will go very far as democrats still control the senate. This looks like an attempt to stir up the base for re-election season.
I personally see this as a big distraction as we have a lot of very serious problems that need to be addressed. BRICs, Taiwan, Ukraine, inflation, and
A few news articles I've read have mentioned that McCarthy announced the inquiry without a vote of the House because he thinks he wouldn't have the votes to get it to pass. The article you linked even quotes a Republican who says they'd vote against it. If McCarthy doesn't have the votes to even open an inquiry I'm skeptical he would have the votes to actually pass any articles they had drafted. It would be a pretty amusing end to this that Republicans spend all this time investigating Biden and aren't united enough to actually pass the articles that are the result of that investigation.
Somewhat amusingly Politico reports there's a Trump era Office of Legal Counsel memo that claims federal executive agencies can ignore subpoenas in impeachment inquiries unless those inquiries are opened in response to a vote of the House.
I think Republicans are making a category error. They think Ukraine and Lewinsky impeachments hurt the impeaching party because Americans don’t like impeachments.
The alternative explanation is Americans don’t like bullshit impeachments. Watergate helped democrats. Indeed, once the evidence mounted if the democrats didn’t do something it would’ve hurt them.
I imagine if the inquiry is able to put together a very strong case (there already is a very large amount of evidence — the inquiry will need to find a bit more hard evidence and put it together) republicans and even some democrats will be forced to vote to impeach.
You are missing a lot of the data if you think it is only about the laptop.
Here is the case (ignoring everything else that adds to it).
A. The Biden family got paid (at least) roughly 20m for Hunter’s actions. Note “family.” Kind of weird that Hunter was so generous for his activity.
B. These payments alone generated 72 suspicious activity reports by banks. One or two is well odd. 72 is astounding.
C. We know Joe was aware of what Hunter was doing. Indeed, Joe met in person with a certain Russian oligarch that then paid Hunter 3M. Oddly, that oligarch hasn’t received sanctions like the rest.
D. Beyond just meeting, Joe using an alias emailed Burisma CCing Hunter.
E. Burisma was in trouble. They needed per two witnesses testimony help from DC. Hunter got Joe to talk to them (again with the alias)
F. The State Department internal emails show in the couple of months before Joe’s visit that they were impressed with Shokin and his anti corruption efforts. They were caught off guard when Biden strong armed Ukraine into firing Shokin. Likewise, the European Commission 9 days after Joe’s visit praised Shokin. The idea that it was general US policy to get Shokin fired simply wasn’t true. It appears Joe changed that policy and the only explanation was it benefited Burisma.
G. There was a credible informant who stated Joe was paid millions to make Shokin go away.
You put all of that together and it paints a picture of bribery.
In the tax law, if I perform services and tell you to pay my kid it is still income to me. Same principle here.
Other people in the family other than Hunter (including people not involved) got paid.
Re the meeting it was a private dinner. Not an event with a +1. https://nypost.com/2023/08/10/inside-dcs-cafe-milano-where-joe-biden-met-hunters-cronies/
I messed up my memory. Joe called the president of Ukraine with Hunter Cced after the call came in for help.
It isn’t hard to litigate. The state department determined internally that Shokin did enough to qualify Ukraine for funds. John Kerry was impressed. The turnabout was a surprise. Maybe there were internal discussions that disproved the written communications but Biden needs to show that (ie the burden has shifted).
Your comment that it must be activity after he became president is risible. Some but not all of this info was known before the election. So we have in fact learned NEW facts; our understanding has evolved. Moreover, at the time of the election you had 50 intelligence agents claiming it was Russian disinformation and on that basis social media quashed the story. Now we know that was all bullshit (and in part engineered by Biden’s campaign). So no we aren’t limited to what happened after Joe took the presidency and suggesting that is almost per se bad faith
You do understanding being a guy? Most of us want to have a legacy or pass on our genetic heritage - basically have ourselves exists in others our descendants. That is why men care about making far more money than we could ever spend in a lifetime so that our children have money to reproduce.
Hunter getting money is as beneficial to an old guy like Joe (probably more for tax reasons) than Joe getting money directly.
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