WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden pardoned his son, Hunter, on Sunday night, sparing the younger Biden a possible prison sentence for federal felony gun and tax convictions and reversing his past promises not to use the extraordinary powers of the presidency for the benefit of his family.
The Democratic president had previously said he would not pardon his son or commute his sentence after convictions in the two cases in Delaware and California. The move comes weeks before Hunter Biden was set to receive his punishment after his trial conviction in the gun case and guilty plea on tax charges, and less than two months before President-elect Donald Trump is set to return to the White House.
Biden, who time and again pledged to Americans that he would restore norms and respect for the rule of law after Trump’s first term in office, ultimately used his position to help his son, breaking his public pledge to Americans that he would do no such thing.
Off-topic, …with almost everybody having a cell phone in hands why do we still elect anybody to represent us? It’s because that’s how it always been?
Because it’s hard for a committee of 334,000,000 to make decisions? Maybe I’m misunderstanding your question though. Are you suggesting more of a bottom-up, local-first way of running things? I think there would still have to be representatives at various levels, for the same reason.
I think about this sometimes but the challenges for direct democracy are very hard to overcome. To vote right now, you go to a place and someone verifies your identity and then you vote on a machine that should theoretically have not just your vote but some form of backup to ensure your vote is counted.
Obviously this would get really obnoxious if you were voting constantly. So something like change.org maybe where people can propose things and others can vote on them. But now how do we handle identity verification, and ensuring only one vote per person? On something connected to the Internet, how do we verify security? This needs to be even more secure than a bank, as every hacker and government in the world will want to sway the results.
We could maybe distribute something like a USB key to cryptographically ensure everyone’s identity, but then you will need to handle people losing theirs, or theft, and it wouldn’t work great with cell phones. There’s other identity solutions like scanning documents or facial ID but they have their own security issues and also are a nightmare for privacy.
I dunno. There’s probably a solution out there that might work, but it would take a lot of work to make it trustworthy and that work would largely be overseen by people the system is meant to replace so they aren’t exactly incentivized to get it right.
TBF I don’t think a system of thousands of referendums would be much better. What I take bigger issue with is the electoral college, but I don’t have a good solution in mind. Popular vote wouldn’t be much better, especially because of how it would affect campaigning.
Legislation is still pretty complicated, having professional legislators makes sense just as a technical profession.
We could certainly stand to have more direct input though!
Centralized power doesn’t let go without force
We don’t build bridges by committee, why would politics be better?
It’s a specific skill set to understand legalese and the processes
And democrats will really stare at me, holding their hands and wringing their wrists over “but why didn’t you vote for our corrupt-assed party”
I mean, i can see why. What are a few drugs, tax fraud and gun felony next to being cumplicit in the genocide of an entire people.
I bet Biden is proud of his son, for being a little better than him. Hopefully, Hunter’s son will only get speeding tickets.
Hey someone help me out, how many people could Biden have freed from prison for drug possession charges if he just pardoned as many as he could? Assuming he was a good person, I mean.
He still can, he’s not out of office for another six weeks!
Bonus question: if Biden actually cared about a potential mass deportation under Trump, how many millions of immigrants could he pardon of crossing the border unlawfully? It’s a federal crime, after all.
Lame duck don’t give a fuck.
I can’t believe a PRESIDENT would LIE like that!
-Fox, probably
In all fairness, I doubt he remembers making that promise in the first place.
I read over Biden’s statement, and it makes sense to me. Hunter was singled out for political purposes. It would seem weird if Biden didn’t issue the pardon.
Honestly, at this point, what do those pledges even matter? Integrity is not worth much in politics nowadays. People will just vote whomever makes the bigger promises.
Biden is proving he is willing to violate the norms to bail out their criminal family. But not use those powers for the average American.
It is certainly impressive Democrats are willing to waive this away as a minor thing. Wasn’t their entire point that they are not the fascistic party but committed to law and order?
No, the Republicans are the self proclaimed Law & Order party.
I love how pearls get clutched when a Dem does it. Where were you the last 8 years?
Republicans have been pulling these blatant violations for ages. Trump pardoned Blackwater criminals on his way out.
Supposedly however Biden couldn’t load the courts or achieve anything because “norms and values”.
Democrats achieved nothing and at the end took a steaming dump on those values they used as the excuse for doing nothing
The republicans have been getting stuff done by abusing their presidential powers. Democrats were the supposed “law and order party”. who “didn’t want to abuse their powers”. Throwback to Obama doing nothing because “law and order”
Now say that again for everything trump has done and I might actually believe you have any actual sense of reality.
I don’t think you understand the critique. The Supreme Court literally gave the office of the president immunity for crimes committed in execution of the duty of the office. Biden promised to not use that new power because he was deeply principled. That means that even though he and the entire DNC are operating on rhetoric that says DJT is literally an enemy of democracy and freedom and America, they won’t do anything about it even though he’s a convicted felon. No action whatsoever.
But he will break his own promises to pardon his son. So he’s really not principled.
So if he’s not that principled, and he has the power to stop the fascism, but he doesn’t, and he has the power to stop putting infants in solitary, but he doesn’t, and he has the power to stop putting asylum seekers in solitary, but he doesn’t, and he has the power to stop sending military surplus to cops, but he doesn’t, and so so so many other things…
If it’s not his principles, then what is it? It must be desire. Either he desires expediency over saving the country and ending torture, or he desires what the right is bringing and he desires torture.
There is no actual way to have the power to stop these things, to say you’re too principled to do anything about it, and then violate those principles for personal gain a few months later without the conclusion being that you never wanted the good things in the first place you just campaigned on lies and you’re in support of the outcomes.
But Trump. The only response.
Sycophant.
You’re out here going “Ra Ra Biden, Trump does worse” all over the fucking thread calling others sycophants? Lmao
“All over this thread…”? Two comments and I really got under your skin. You deliberately avoid understanding me or my position, are devoid of nuance, and just make shit up to suit your narrative.
Fuck off back to your troll farm.
Sycophant.
You deliberately avoid understanding me or my position
lol
Everyone I don’t like is a bot, the sycophants guide to political discussion
And a 100% valid one that you are being willingly obtuse towards. Open your eyes and see that although all politicians have and always will suck and lie, Trump is a traitor. I would elect any non-MAGA Republican for 8 years over Trump for four more. He is not a legitimate politician
Pointing out that republicans do this means you are comparing Biden to republicans. And you saying it is acceptable for democrats as well because republicans do it as well, not because democrats are better. This blatant abuse of power means Biden is a MAGA-democrat. And you are willing to elect MAGA-democrats.
The people defending Biden know this is bullshit. They just want to believe this is a sign that Democrats are finally going to stop complaining about decorum and play hardball. It isn’t, and they won’t, but at least Joe gets to protect his kid I guess. Too bad Joe couldn’t find the will to force Garland to do his job and prosecute Trump instead.
and? Nothing he could have done would have made you support him so why in the everloving fuck should they care that you disapprove?
Of all the things he could have done, he did this?
He was always going to do it.
Not world news. It’s an internal matter of the US.
True. Further, being from the rest of the world, I really couldn’t care less and would likely do similar as Biden. The US people have dropped the ball, fucked the country and sent him packing.
May as well, you’ve got nothing to lose at that point.
Insert shocked Pikachu meme
The US is part of the world.
My wife read this to me last night.
Wife: So apparently Biden pardoned his son Me: Cool. Can’t blame him. Wife: Of course people are say… Me: Fuck ‘em. Wife: You know because he promised… Me: Fuck ‘em.
Hell yea brother’ president is above the law!
You talk to your wife like that?
So what? Half you all voted for a felon rapist. Don’t pretend you have morals.
It was only 70M, nowhere near half of Americans.
So even more reason not to give a shit about their opinion. They are shit AND not a majority.
You sound like a DNC strategist
What you’re exercising here is called whataboutism, and it’s a really shitty thing to do.
So is sexual assault, and the next president has done that too
And the current president molested his own daughter. She wrote in her diary that she had to wait til he went to sleep to shower, or he’d get in with her.
Ok, and? How does that have any bearing on what Biden did?
The author of the crime bill, responsible for the massive incarceration and enslavement of poor people in the US who spoke to congress about not giving a single shit about the circumstances of people who committed crimes, lock em up first ask questions later, just pardoned his son before sentencing because he’s a poor widdle misunderstood boi who didn’t know any better and his circumstances were so tough, what with having a senator dad with a lot of money.
Fucking blue MAGA I stg
They were TRUMPed up charges anyway.
I could give a damn, but you know, it’s an overall race to the bottom
Reading this I just realised I can no longer tell if Americans mean could or couldn’t when they type could.
I couldn’t tell you why
Ah at least couldn’t provides the relief of certainty. I won’t ask you then
