Fixed
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I donât think much can be done about that unfortunately, but at least itâll be even clearer that itâs just a fishing expedition as opposed to anything that can be linked to his fatherâs positions in presidential administrations?
That was the point of saying that heâs a bridge, leaving open the possibility that he could run again. I donât think I was ever under the impression that he wouldnât run again.
Without being close enough to the action, not really got an opinion here. However, another way to look at this for consideration⌠We donât know how close Hunter is to âsnappingâ, the guy looks hounded and haunted âŚ
With Trump world about to commence, the pardon might be the only thing that prevents him from doing, what some would call⌠taking the easy way out.
But if he intended to be a two term president, why use the word âbridgeâ?
And , if I remember correctly , wasnât it deemed a deciding factor in him securing the nomination that he made it implicit that he wouldnât seek a second term ?
As a cynical ploy to imply that he would be a one-term president without actually promising it?
I donât remember this, but I thought he already had the lead after the first few primaries and it was quite clear that he had the advantage?
No , he was in trouble after the first few primaries , it was only when the black representative (Clyburn I think) came to his rescue in one of the southern states that his campaign took off. Whether that support was dependent on his pledge to just serve one term I donât quite remember , but I suspect it was. And it certainly was a pre-requisite afterwards to guarantee him the nomination.
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It looks like anything illegal he does from here on in he can be done for, so thread carefully and keep your nose clean. What Biden has done is protect his son from anything trumps people pull out of their arse from the past and decide to throw the book at him and the key away. I donât believe under these circumstances we have coming up that anyone would have left a family member to the mercy of a vindictive dictator
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Bowman (a scholar who is writing a book on the history of presidential clemency) sort of says it all with:
'if we had anyone other than Trump coming in, I would think this is inexcusable. But I donât know, man. Weâre kind of playing with different rules here."
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That frustration is misplaced as that simply isnât what the DNC is in place to do. To have done anything to prevent Biden running again It would have had to create new powers and authority to do anything about it.
As I said yesterday, Kash has a long record of promising to go after him for alleged crimes he has already been investigated for as part of an absurdly lengthy and multi pronged investigation. He has from the outside decided what the crime is and is promising to charge him for it. This act is not about protecting him over âcrimes he might have committedâ but further investigations of allegations he has already been investigated and cleared over. And it is important to understand how powerful a weapon vindictive investigations can be even when the subject has clearly done nothing wrong. They are financially crippling to defend yourself against.
That piece is kind of frustrating in that despite it airing Bowmanâs clear vision of the situation, the way the piece is framed is still around âcrimesâ rather than investigations.
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Huh? Wait what?
I donât have a problem with you singling me out as I have said that but no idea how you make the case he didnât say that. That would require some serious pretzel-ing even for his staunchest supporters.
Wish Iâd never broached this topic at all. 
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It was a weird set of primaries and to make sense it you have to recall the long running debate over whether the primary calendar needs to change. The early states have an oversized role in setting the narrative, but as the calendar was at the time those states are too small to have enough delegates at stake to matter that much, and have demographics that donât really represent the party as a whole. The concern was then that the calendar would allow a popular narrative to form around someone who does well early but isnt set up to win nationally, potentially promotion a bad general election candidate.
The result of that was that Biden entered 2020 as the clear leader in the polls, but facing a map where his support was not strong in the early states. The gave us a weird dynamic where he failed to win any of the first 3 states, having finished as far back as 5th in NH, but was still leading in the national polls and had the majority of the institutional support of the party leaders. The first Biden stronghold to vote was SC, which came up 4th, and the last primary before âSuper Tuesdayâ. That is the first day where multiple states vote at the same time meaning there were loads of votes at play. A candidate cannot afford to go into Super Tuesday limping because the presumption is that voters at that stage of the process wont waste a vote for someone who cannot win the nomination, so SC was viewed as a referendum on Bidenâs viability. People were willing to overlook weak performances in the first two states and an only ok performance in Nevada, but he needed to justify his polling lead by winning in SC otherwise there would have been calls for him to drop out. He ended up winning big there giving him enough delegates to get back to the front of the race. That was enough for a couple of second/third tier candidates to drop out (Pete and Klobouchar), thinking their only path to win, taking advantage of a weak Biden, had been closed down. Biden then had a strong showing on Super Tuesday including winning the big states and the race was essentially over at that point.
As you say though, the narrative of his age and inability to serve two terms was one of the main issues of his campaign even then. Even if he never explicitly promised to only serve one term, he very clearly ran that campaign with a message that supporting him was simply the best way to get Trump out of office and once weâd done that someone younger would have the baton passed to them. We can probably only guess at whether he himself believed that meant one term or whether events (seeing the resurgence of popularity of Trump, believing he had the unique special sauce to beat him, misreading the results of the 2022 midterms as a pro biden vote) caused him to change his mind. But I think even if we put that question aside, what did he do to be the âbridgeâ to the younger generation that he promised? Who got a platform from being in his administration to put themselves in place to run in 2024 they would not have had? Pete does his own thing and would have been doing the Fox News hits regardless because he firmly believes they are the right thing to do. Harris was given a brief that was the exact opposite of what she would have been given if the idea was to promote her from within. She didnt really have anything viable or helpful to do until she took it upn herself to be the administrationâs spokesperson over the Dobbs decision. Even if we take Biden at his word from 2020 and he intended to walk away, he failed at being the bridge, which maybe contributed to his mistaken belief he needed to be the savior again this go around.
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At times, Iâm almost wishing for a really nasty virus to appear. That would expose these frauds.
Unfortunately, it would hit innocent people, so scratch that.
Totally agree with you. Then again, Bidenâs move, which is a clear âfuck youâ to Trump, is probably hopeless anyway, as Trump can have it easily reversed, canât he?
I expect Biden junior to leave the US soon, or heâ'll probably find himself behind bars soon enough.
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I doubt it can be reversed, but I wouldnât put it past him to try/ask to reverse it or to have his people look for some other crime Biden Jr might have committed prior to 2014.
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The attraction of the 2014 period is it ties into his first impeachment, which if people cast their mind back to, was based on Trump trying to trade sending the weapons to Ukraine that Congress had already voted to approve in exchange for public support of Trumpâs smears about the Bidensâ corruption in Ukraine.
It is as much about vindicating Trumpâs argument in the losing 2020 election as it is hurting Hunter.
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Naive question here, but why canât he reverse it? Heâll control all the buttons in a month from now, wonât he?
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Presidential pardon power is explicitly granted in the constitution. In terms of precedent, Bush overturned one of his own before it had been finalized due to public pressure, and Grant was able to overturn one of Johnsonâs because it had not been finalized. But in cases where the paperwork has been finalized there is no defined no legal pathway to overturn them.
But I think weâre going to see a good amount of uncharted legal/constitutional territory over the next 4 years
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