DL Open Thread: Saturday, August 12, 2023
The Fuck-Up That Is Hunter Biden Isn’t Going Away. Yeahyeah, I know all about false equivalency, which only matters to people who haven’t allowed their brains to rot. Still, there’s no doubt that Hunter grifted off his old man’s name, even if he was never able to deliver promised favors from the old man:
They thought it was over, that they could put it in the rearview mirror. All that Hunter Biden had to do was show up in a courtroom, answer a few questions, sign some paperwork and that would be it. Not that the Republicans would let it go, but any real danger would be past.
Except that it did not work out that way. The criminal investigation that President Biden’s advisers believed was all but done has instead been given new life with the collapse of the plea agreement and the appointment of a special counsel who now might bring the president’s son to trial.
For the White House, the attorney general’s Friday afternoon announcement was an unpleasant surprise, a head-snapping reversal from just seven weeks ago, when the president’s team thought it had turned a corner with Hunter Biden’s agreement with Mr. Weiss to plead guilty to two tax misdemeanors and accept a diversion program to dismiss an unlawful gun possession charge.
The Biden camp was deeply relieved that five years of investigation had added up to nothing more serious. The president made a point of inviting his son, who has struggled with a crack cocaine addiction, to a high-profile state dinner two days later in what was taken as a spike-the-ball moment declaring victory over the family’s pursuers.
The Hunter Biden legal team wants certainty that a guilty plea would end the matter, given that Mr. Trump has vowed to prosecute him if elected president. But as Mr. Weiss revealed on Friday, subsequent negotiations intended to iron out the disconnect have reached an impasse, making a trial all but certain to be the next step and making it easier for Republicans trying to shift attention from Mr. Trump’s three indictments.
They are, of course, hardly comparable cases. Hunter Biden was never president and never will be president, and even the most damning evidence against him does not equate to trying to overturn a democratic election in order to hold onto power. But it has been a useful strategy for Republicans to complain about what they call a “two-tier justice system.”
Of course not. But that won’t matter to a broad swath of voters. What I think it will do is to further dampen already tepid enthusiasm towards Biden’s reelection campaign.
One Senator. 301 Military Nominations. No Confirmations. Just as the Founding Fathers envisioned?:
Data obtained and verified by The Washington Post reveals that, as of Aug. 12, 301 high-level positions were ensnared in Tuberville’s hold. That number is expected to more than double by the end of the year, officials say, unless the impasse, which stems from the Pentagon’s abortion policy, is resolved. By year’s end, The Pentagon estimates that about three-quarters of the generals and admirals in the Defense Department — 650 of 852 — will be affected by Tuberville’s hold.
Previous holds have been resolved relatively quickly, however, making this case uniquely troubling and destructive over time, said Peter Feaver, a professor who studies civil-military relations at Duke University. Feaver, a national security official during the presidential administration of George W. Bush, said the nation is now in “rare and uncharted territory” given the sweep and significance of the roles affected.
I’ll say it again. Time to move some Federal stuff out of Alabama. Hmmm, maybe Florida as well b/c that’s where he’s lived for the past twenty years:
Tuberville’s office says his primary residence is an Auburn house that records show is owned by his wife and son. But campaign finance reports and his signature on property documents indicate that his home is actually a $3 million, 4,000-square-foot beach house he has lived in for nearly two decades in Santa Rosa Beach, Fla., located in the Florida Panhandle about 90 miles south of Dothan.
His wife, Suzanne Tuberville, a licensed real estate agent in Florida, has worked at a Santa Rosa Beach real estate firm since the start of this year; she does not have an Alabama real estate license.
Read the whole thing. Simply put, he’s not an Alabama resident. What’s that? Dave McBride on line 2?
Gov. Abbott Kills Three-Year-Old Girl. Died while on one of Abbott’s ‘Operation Lone Star’ migrant buses:
A three-year-old girl from Venezuela being transported to Chicago from Texas by bus with other migrants died at a local Illinois hospital after showing signs of illness, the Texas department of emergency management said on Friday.“Once the child presented with health concerns, the bus pulled over and security personnel on board called 9-1-1 for emergency attention,” the TDEM said in a written statement.
“After the ambulance arrived, the bilingual security personnel translated for the parents and the paramedics who were providing care for the child,” the statement said. “The child was then taken to a local hospital to receive additional medical attention and was later pronounced deceased.”
Illinois officials said in a statement they were working with health officials, state police and federal authorities “to the fullest extent possible to get answers in this tragic situation.”
Texas has bused more than 30,000 migrants to Democratic-controlled cities across the U.S. since last year as part of Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s sprawling border mission known as Operation Lone Star. Besides Chicago, buses have also been sent to Washington, New York, Philadelphia, Denver and Los Angeles.
I can only say that I hope that Gov. Abbott experiences a slow, agonizing death. He is without redeeming human qualities.
What do you want to talk about?
The hunter Biden and trump trials are going to both be similar in one regard – both will only have republican witness and testimony
Your contention that it will dampen enthusiasm for Biden assumes there has ever been any enthusiasm for Biden. I would think his polling numbers over the course of his presidency would put such notions to rest.
The cult of Joe is very, very tiny, and it gets covered to the meager extent it does because media people cover politics even though they have nothing to report, because nobody is going to do anything important in public. Since they can’t report on any of the actual action, they have to report what people say. What people say is best ignored.
People will vote for or against Trump, and for or against Republicans in general. To worry about what some mythical voter with a changeable mind might do is pre-2016 thinking. Those people don’t exist anymore. Sides have been chosen.
Re: Tuberville/McBride: Maybe if Biden promises to name a federal beach in Florida for him he’ll give in.
This seems like an unfinished outline that is not ready to be published. Probably straight dictation from Julianne Murray:
State assessment scores sound alarms for senators
“Statewide assessment score results have been released and Senators Brian Pettyjohn and Eric Buckson are pushing for even more resources to be put towards education.”
WTF? Republican senators aren’t going to push for more resources for education, unless it is for vouchers, or cops in schools.
The article doesn’t have any quotes from Pettyjohn and Buckson and doesn’t mention they are Republicans, nor is there any reaction from Democrats.
The scores in question were a 2% drop in English scores, and a 2% INCREASE in math scores, which could be just statistical noise. True, schools are recovering from the pandemic and scores should be on the upswing, but none of that context is provided, nor are alternate explanations offered.
And this:
“They blame districts’ lack of holding educators accountable and disruptive behavior in the classroom, which makes it more difficult for both students and teachers to achieve success.”
he DEGOP thinks this is a winning issue. Some asshole named Ray Petkevis (SP?) ran for Appo school board entirely on this. His whole deal was “BLACKHAWK DOWN!! Schools are war zones rife with honor killings and murder sprees similar to what you’d find in Somalia.” That’s a paraphrase, of course.
Anyway he lost.
I’m calling it. Trump is going to win.
Benghazi, Clinton’s servers, Hunter, It’s all the same thing. The GOP knows that it can’t expand its voter pool so the only way forward is to shrink the opponents share of the vote. Any why not? It works!!
Our media plays along and with our system electoral college it only takes one third party candidate peeling off 1% in a few districts for the republican to win.
Shit. Even the DNC has played along with this game by putting up lackluster candidates that can typically hover around 50% at best.
Don’t be silly. This all presupposes enough suckers play along. They haven’t in Wisconsin. They haven’t in Arizona. They haven’t in Michigan. Those are all states Trump needs to win to have any chance.
The media encourages doomscrolling so you don’t have to.
It’s a coin flip at best. Robert Kennedy isn’t going anywhere, and negative partisanship is strong in all of those states.
Go ahead, piss your pants. It’ll give you a warm feeling for a bit.
Have not given up on a Biden win, and know all to well the hated electoral college gives the Republicans the advantage. Really sucks that it now always boils down to a few “battleground) states. Do I like the thought of a president in his eighties? Nope. Bad, bad, bad. But on a lighter note either candidate may well drop dead before 2024.
No pants pissing here. I’m not angry or sad. Just dispassionately looking at a winner take all system which is set up to leave the outcome in doubt until the last possible minute by keeping one party viable by any means necessary.
Trump has 47% of the GOP primary vote and yet he will win it. 2024 will mark 20 years since Republicans last won the US popular vote, and yet they’ve won the Presidency 3 times. Sure the battle ground states have shifted but the EC means that the election is comes down to increasing Biden’s unpopularity a few districts. This should not be shocking news for anyone.
The media would like you to believe that, yes.
This is the Möbius strip of argumentation. Me observing that the media creates a close horse race, and you calling me out on observing that as part of the mechanics of it. Fair enough, I suppose.