The media was overwhelmed yesterday and today with stories and analyses about President Biden pardoning his son, Hunter. Most of those articles were negative and just show the continued bias the media repeatedly demonstrates in Trump world. There was very little ink dedicated to the stories about Trump appointing his son-in-law’s father, Charles Kushner, to be the Ambassador to France or appointing, Lara Trump’s father-in-law, Massad Boulos, to be Trump’s senior advisor on Arab and Middle Eastern Affairs. You might remember that Charles Kushner served time in prison for illegal campaign contributions, tax evasion, and witness tampering and, by the way, was pardoned by Trump. Where is the media outrage at these appointments and actions?
Trump pardoned a laundry list of unsavory characters including Gen. (ret) Michael Flynn, political dirty trickster Roger Stone, Paul Manafort, and others. Not to mention he has repeatedly said during his campaign that he intends to pardon those convicted of crimes associated with the January 6th insurrection. Trump has done more to undermine the rule of law in this country than any other president and yet, President Biden pardons his son who the Republican congress has been hounding for years for two crimes that would not have resulted in any jail time for anyone other than someone named Biden, and the media unleashes a tsunami of ink.
However, the most important part of this story that the media seem to be completely disregarding and which, in my opinion, is one of the main reasons President Biden took the action he did despite the fact that he originally promised not to intervene in his son’s case, was the simple fact that the picks Trump has made for key positions in the DOJ are all part of the Trump revenge squad. There is little doubt in my mind that, if confirmed, Pam Bondi as Attorney General and Kash Patel as FBI director, could work to make Hunter Biden’s life even more problematic for no reason other than exacting more revenge on Trump’s behalf.
We will never know what President Biden’s decision would have been if someone headed the new administration other than Trump who took their oath of office seriously and who chose people who really and truly believed in the Rule of Law and the U.S. Constitution. However, would anyone entrust the fate of their family to Trump and his revenge squad? I believe what President Biden did was entirely reasonable and defendable in the context in which the decision was made.
The media continue to cover stories in Trump world as if it is the ‘normal’ world we all grew up in. If they genuinely want to write honestly about the pardoning of Hunter Biden, they need to include all the details about the shady characters Trump pardoned and the backstories of the sycophantic lap dogs Trump is trying to put in charge of the DOJ. I believe once people understand the larger context, President Biden’s decision will not only be understandable but defendable.
The sooner people and the media understand that nothing in Trump world can be based upon heretofore accepted norms of behavior and everything we have known about the Rule of Law and possibly even the Law of Gravity will be warped and need to be reported and viewed through that lens.
I, for one, fully support Biden’s decision and anyone who is criticizing his decision should look in the mirror and honestly ask themselves if they wouldn’t have done the exact same thing given the warped landscape of Trump world that we will all now be living in. If you think you would have done something differently, my gut tells me you are lying to yourself. But, then again, there seems to be a lot of that going around these days.
