Ingraham: Twitter moved to ‘stifle’ Hunter laptop story
James Woods: Elon Musk may have saved America
Political Elites Want to Shut Down Twitter But Musk Says This Must Happen
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RylCWmlCy20
Twitter Files: Elon Musk releases Hunter Biden censorship documents
Musk’s Twitter files make Watergate look like ‘jaywalking’: Clay Travis
The Media Undertakers Must be Getting Exhausted
The media worked hard to bury the FTX scandal. There a young (but well-connected to leftist politicos and media) tech slob Sam Bankman-Fried “lost” eight billion dollars, shelled out at least $40 million to Democrats, is suspected of laundering a lot of taxpayer money through Ukraine, and cloaked his outrageously criminal conduct in the garb of promoting social justice once he realized he could no longer disguise his Ponzi scheme.
The gravediggers hardly had begun to return their shovels to the cemetery shed when there appeared a new story that needed burying. Elon Musk and Matt Taibbi just opened up another crack in the door revealing how outsiders along with the DNC manipulated Twitter in the runup to the election. Not that the shadow banning and actual banning on Twitter of conservative voices wasn’t obvious before, but Musk is inside the belly of the beast and proof of the outrageous behavior at Twitter which preceded his purchase is now being made public, with Musk promising there’s more to come. Twitter staff and executives used barriers designed to combat spam and fraud to manipulate speech that was neither. Even worse, outsiders, including the DNC with connections to these insiders, used these tools to control what people could post and viewers could read, even going so far as to censor items transmitted on the direct message (private person-to-person) feature of the site. In effect, well-connected private parties (almost exclusively Democrat) could and did remove posters. Among the stories Twitter actively blocked was that of the salacious Hunter Biden laptop contents. So shocking was the material on this laptop, so revealing of the perversity of Hunter and the corruption of Joe Biden, that one post-election survey reports that 16% of persons who voted for Biden said they would not have had they known of the contents of this laptop. One major newspaper, the NY Post, did publish a story about it, and several online posters did as well. The most detailed, should you care to see for yourself what was on the laptop, is here.
The laptop reveals not only sexual depravity and illegal drug use, but corruption and influence buying as well. Taibbi reports “Twitter took extraordinary steps to suppress the story, removing links and posting warnings that it may be ‘unsafe’.” The only person it was unsafe for was Joe Biden, the Democrat party’s presidential candidate,
Even then, White House spokesperson Kayleigh McEnany was locked out of her account for tweeting about it. Several insiders questioned what was going on and received the untrue defense that the material was removed because it violated the company’s “hacked materials” policy. The laptop was never hacked. It was abandoned by Hunter, then was unlocked while in the possession of the NY Post, and it and its contents are authentic. At any other time in history of which I am aware such a scandal would have been front-page news in the weeks preceding an election. In 2020 Twitter and the mainstream media decided that was not to be the case when the scandal clearly would impact the Democrat candidate. The key player in this was the formerly richly compensated, now fired, Twitter head of legal affairs, policy, and trust, Vijaya Gadde. Apparently, CEO Jack Dorsey was never even informed. No one at Twitter had the guts to reverse Gadde’s deceitful partisan power play. So, as one might expect in a bureaucracy, they just shut up and went along with it, despite even Ro Khanna, Democratic congressman, expressing concern that this autocratic, unwarranted censorship was creating backlash on the Hill. While Gadde was born in India, she was raised and educated here, is a lawyer and should, but evidently does not, have some idea about the scope of the First Amendment. Ro tried in vain to explain to her that even had the laptop been hacked the story should not have been blocked. “A journalist should not be held accountable for the illegal actions of the source unless they actively aided in the hack.” Other Democrat congressman thought this was fine and dandy and said they want even more “moderation,” by which, of course, they mean censorship of facts and views not in their interest.
Of course, if Twitter had merely determined on its own not to allow certain views, there would be no justiciable claim of a constitutional violation. But here’s the problem -- it appears that the censorship was being done on orders from the government to suppress speech.
Now you’d think this was a big story and would garner attention on the front pages of the Washington Post and New York Times. You’d be wrong -- the Fourth Estate biggies apparently like suppression of dissent and are happy to keep their readers from knowing what Taibbi reported.
Charles Lipson posted those papers’ front pages -- nothing there on this.
“The biggest story Friday night is the release of Twitter documents showing how the company’s previous executives killed the Hunter Biden laptop story. Yet here are the webpages from the late Friday night for the NYT and WaPo. Radio silence. They killed the story about killing the story.”
He adds, “CBS News hopes to verify the Twitter release within 2 years.”
It was not only Twitter, certain congressional figures, and the DNC directing the control of information on Twitter. One FBI whistleblower has just testified that ”the FBI held weekly meetings with Big Tech companies in Silicon Valley ahead of the 2020 presidential election to discuss “disinformation” on social media -- muscling the tech firms to censor views and facts. It probably took little effort to get compliance, knowing how FBI Director Wray’s agency and Silicon Valley types share the same penchant for shutting up those not on the Left.
Blocking, banning, and shadow banning social media posters does not appear the end of it. As Julie Kelly reports in the context of the January 6 sound and light shows on the Hill and in the D.C. courtrooms, Attorney General Garland’s minions in D.C. are now criminalizing speech with which they disagree, charging the Oath Keepers with “seditious conspiracy” although there were no weapons on them, they were military veterans “most suffering various degrees of service-related disabilities,” and it’s certainly hard to see how unarmed individuals “without a single firearm or explosive device” could possibly meet the law’s test of conspiring “to oppose by force the authority of the Government of the United State, and by force to prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of any law of the United States.”
In China, protestors against Xi’s absurd COVID lockdowns gather and hold up blank pieces of paper to protest the lack of free speech. What do we have to do? Confine ourselves on social media to cat and dog pictures and pretend we are having open dialogues on matters of interest to citizens?
The Armageddon of Free Speech
Just a few days ago, as many will remember, Elon Musk trolled CNN by posting on Twitter a meme with a fake headline attributed to the the cable news network. The image included a screenshot of anchor Don Lemon next to a stock photo of Musk. The headline read, "CNN: Elon Musk could threaten free speech on Twitter by literally allowing people to speak freely." Needless to say, CNN's public relations department quickly posted a screenshot of Musk's tweet, which included a disclaimer saying that the tweet was in violation of Twitter's rules. In response, Musk brushed off CNN's response, tweeting: "Lmaoooo." Those are the initials for "laughing my a-- off."
In addition to being funny, the episode was also in some ways incredibly meaningful and emblematic. In other words, the "fake headline" was not so fake. On the contrary, it was a brutal and effective synthesis of the way liberals, leftists, and progressives approach the issue of freedom of speech. They put things less crudely; they are so often sophisticated intellectuals who speak elegantly and like to dance around things instead of getting straight to the point. But the final result is always the same. Their reproach for the supporters of freedom of speech — or what they call "free speech absolutists" — is that "free speech is not simply about saying whatever you want, unchecked, but about negotiating complicated compromises." According to the critics of Elon Musk, the "rhetoric of free speech absolutists" fails to understand that "for some speech to be free, other speech has to be limited."
It's curious that most of the time, their arguments are self-referential and self-assertive statements and propositions: "Like Trump, Musk has become the tribune of fascists and racists by way of adolescent contrarianism, an insatiable need to flaunt his control and a radicalising inability to cope with being told he's wrong on the internet. For him, 'free speech' seems merely a vehicle for his delusional plan to make Twitter into a fawning 'digital town square' that he presides over."
Do you remember the medieval ipse dixit argument? "He (Aristotle) said it himself," serving as a phrase capable of ending arguments. Now it has become, "We (liberals, progressives, etc) say so." It's true because we say it's true, and if you don't agree with us, you are a fascist/racist/homophobe, etc., and we don't want your kind here. It's the contrary — o tempora, o mores! — of the answer Supreme Court justice Louis Brandeis gave in 1927 to the question, "When someone says something we disagree with, should we shut them up?" "The remedy to be applied," he said, "is more speech, not enforced silence."
That's also the rationale behind what White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre once said: "When you are not with what majority of Americans are, then you know, that is extreme. That is an extreme way of thinking." It's the triumph of self-referentiality. The definition of what is meant by the term "extreme" is entirely arbitrary and light-years away from the principles of liberal democracy as we have known it.
The massive "immune response" to Elon Musk's commitment to free speech from left-wing activists, mainstream media, and Big Tech prompted journalist Colin Wright to tweet that people should be frightened. "This is a battle they cannot be allowed to win," he wrote. Musk responded, "This is a battle for the future of civilization. If free speech is lost even in America, tyranny is all that lies ahead." That seems to be the best way to put things. This is the Armageddon of free speech. If we lose, it's the end of Western civilization.
It's not by chance that on the one hand, Elon Musk's $44-billion takeover of Twitter is being investigated by federal authorities over national security concerns that his foreign partners may be able to access user data, and on the other, the E.U. commissioner responsible for implementing the upcoming Digital Services Act (DSA), Thierry Breton, recently said that Twitter has "huge work ahead" to get ready for the bloc's strict new rules for online platforms. He posted a short video clip of a meeting with CEO Elon Musk, saying that he welcomed Musk's "intent to get Twitter 2.0 ready for the DSA." But Twitter "will have to implement transparent user policies, significantly reinforce content moderation and tackle disinformation." He also told the Financial Times that Twitter needs to make a number of changes to meet the DSA's requirements. It will need to "aggressively" tackle disinformation, submit to an audit, provide clear criteria about which users are at risk of being banned, and carefully consider how it lifts bans in the future. It's almost a declaration of war.
It's not just Brussels that is on the warpath. French digital minister Jean-Noël Barrot didn't appreciate Twitter's change of policy on COVID-related information. "COVID-19 and vaccination misinformation [are] now freely available on Twitter. Another milestone is reached in irresponsibility," he tweeted. In turn, in an interview with U.S. broadcaster ABC, French president Emmanuel Macron called Twitter's decision "a big issue." "I think we need to take the issue head-on, I'm in favor of the exact opposite, more regulation," he added.
In short, the die is cast. The Armageddon of free speech has just begun.
Samuel Robert Piccoli is a blogger and the author of the books Being Conservative from A to Z (2014) and Blessed Are the Free in Spirit (2021). He lives in the Venice area.
Image: Elon Musk. Credit: JD Lasica via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0 (cropped).
THE BIDEN CRIME FAMILY - 50 YEARS OF CORRUPTION ALL COVERED BY LIBERAL MEDIA
These networks ignored Twitter's Biden laptop censorship revelations
What was the disinformation board’s mission?
James Woods Vows to Expose the ‘Corrupt, Vile Vermin’ at the DNC over Twitter Censorship: Joe Biden, ‘I Am Not Afraid of You. And I’m Coming for You’
In an explosive interview on Fox News’ Tucker Carlson Tonight, two-time Academy Award-nominated actor James Woods described the Democratic National Committee as a bunch of “rats” and “corrupt, vile vermin” and vowed to sue the DNC after evidence contained in Elon Musk’s Twitter files showed that the DNC pressured Twitter to violate the actor’s civil liberties by censoring his speech.
Addressing President Joe Biden and the DNC, Woods said: “I am not afraid of you. And I’m coming for you.”
Watch below:
The Twitter files, which Musk released late Friday to independent left-wing journalist Matt Taibbi, showed that DNC officials ordered Twitter to remove a tweet from Woods less than a month before the 2020 presidential election. Woods’ tweet is believed to have referenced the Hunter Biden laptop scandal.
On Tucker Carlson, Woods expressed outrage over the act of censorship as well as the left’s attempt to ruin his five decade-spanning Hollywood career for being an outspoken conservative.
“I’ve been a target of these people for six years,” the actor said. “They have destroyed my career. They have destroyed my livelihood. They’ve destroyed my faith in a country that my family has defended in the military since the Revolutionary War.”
Woods described the First Amendment as the most sacred right for Americans.
“The government of the United States conspired to take my free speech and throw it in the gutter,” he said.
“And there’s something they should fear more than anything they have ever imagined in their wildest dreams, the most dangerous man to these corrupt vile, vermin is an American who is not afraid of them. And Joe Biden, and all those rats who work with you at the DNC, to close down my speech — I am not afraid of you. And I am coming for you.”
Woods praised Musk, saying the new Twitter owner “very possibly has saved America.” The actor repeated the sentiment in a subsequent tweet Friday.
As Breitbart News reported, Elon Musk released internal Twitter discussions about censoring the Hunter Biden laptop story Friday night via journalist Matt Taibbi.
Among the revelations was that there was widespread internal and external concern at the suppression of the story, a decision made without CEO Jack Dorsey’s knowledge and spearheaded by Vijaya Gadde, then the head of Trust & Safety — Twitter’s top censor.
House Oversight Committee Ranking Member Rep. James Comer (R-KY) has promised to haul every Twitter employee who was involved in the handling of the story before the committee.
Follow David Ng on Twitter @HeyItsDavidNg. Have a tip? Contact me at dng@breitbart.com
Ingraham: Twitter moved to ‘stifle’ Hunter laptop story
James Woods: Elon Musk may have saved America
Political Elites Want to Shut Down Twitter But Musk Says This Must Happen
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RylCWmlCy20
Twitter Files: Elon Musk releases Hunter Biden censorship documents
Musk’s Twitter files make Watergate look like ‘jaywalking’: Clay Travis
Hunter Biden Attends White House State Dinner with Celebrities, Foreign Dignitaries, Politicians
Hunter Biden, under investigation for tax fraud and gun-related violations, attended the state dinner at the White House on Thursday with more than 300 influential guests celebrities, foreign dignitaries, and politicians.
The dinner was hosted by President Joe Biden in honor of French President Emmanuel Macron.
Why Hunter appeared at the dinner is unknown. He does not officially work in his father’s administration or hold elected office, nor is he known to have any business dealings with the French government, as he has conducted with the Chinese, Ukrainian, West African nations, and South America governments.
Hunter was presumably permitted to mingle with some of the most powerful people in the U.S. government, along with celebrities, and foreign businessmen. Many of those in attendance were:
- Comedian Stephen Colbert
- Actress Jennifer Garner
- Singer John Legend and model Chrissy Teigen
- Vogue editor Anna Wintour
- Apple CEO Tim Cook
- Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA)
- Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA)
- Secretary of State Antony Blinken
- Secretary of Transportation Peter Buttigieg
- Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME)
- Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholmc
- Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines
- Chief of Staff Ro Klain
- French businessman Thibault Lanxade
- Minister of the Economy H.E. Bruno Le Maire
- Director General of the Treasury Emmanuel Moulin
- Rep. Michael McCaul (R-TX)
- General Mark Milley
- Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Alexandra Pelosi
- Laurene Powell Jobs
- Assistant to the President & Director of the Domestic Policy Council Susan Rice
- Sen. James Risch (R-ID)
- Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY)
- Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen
Given Hunter’s infamous foreign business arrangements and speculation around his father’s involvement — and his ongoing art business — there is heightened scrutiny on the Biden scion’s access to power in Washington.
According to recent polling, 62 percent approved of the GOP’s investigation into Hunter, including 42 percent who strongly approved. Thirty-four percent disapproved, with 23 percent of those strongly disapproving.
Sixty-one percent of voters believe it is likely Joe Biden was consulted about and perhaps profited from his son Hunter’s business deals. Only 34 percent 34 percent did not believe Joe Biden was consulted in the family’s business, despite overwhelming evidence.
In 2018 and 2020, Breitbart Senior Contributor and Government Accountability Institute President Peter Schweizer published Secret Empires and Profiles in Corruption. Each book hit #1 on the New York Times bestseller list and exposed how Hunter Biden and Joe Biden flew aboard Air Force Two in 2013 to China before Hunter’s firm inked a $1.5 billion deal with a subsidiary of the Chinese government’s Bank of China less than two weeks after the trip. Schweizer’s work also uncovered the Biden family’s other vast and lucrative foreign deals and cronyism.
Breitbart Political Editor Emma-Jo Morris’s investigative work at the New York Post on the Hunter Biden “laptop from hell” also captured international headlines when she, along with Miranda Devine, revealed that Joe Biden was intimately involved in Hunter’s businesses, appearing to even have a 10 percent stake in a company the scion formed with officials at the highest levels of the Chinese Communist Party.
Follow Wendell Husebø on Twitter @WendellHusebø. He is the author of Politics of Slave Morality.
McCarthy: Twitter Disclosures Show Biden Doesn’t Want Free Speech, I Wonder What Facebook, Google Are Hiding
On Friday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Jesse Watters Primetime,” House Minority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) reacted to disclosures on Twitter’s suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story by saying he thinks the disclosures are just the tip of the iceberg, he wonders what internal machinations at Facebook and Google have been hidden, and the disclosures show “why the White House is going after Elon. They do not want him to tell the truth and they do not want to have free speech.”
McCarthy stated, “I expect this is just the beginning. Remember, when you go to a long show, you have episode after episode after episode. He’s just slowly bringing this out. This is going to be a long show. This is episode one, and I think at the end of the day, you’re going to have more viewers than ‘Yellowstone.’ Because, put it in perspective, you’ve got to think about the timing. This is in October. This is just weeks before an election. I never could get a tweet taken down, nor did I ever try. But — so, the campaign’s directly in with Twitter. But also, remember what’s happening, you’ve got the intel. community, 50 people signing a letter saying this is all rubbish, right? It’s all coming from the Kremlin. That’s John Brennan. That’s James Clapper. You’ve got Adam Schiff… telling Wolf Blitzer that this is coming — we’ve known it for so long — from the Kremlin. So, they’re using every power they have. The real question will be, what [do] Facebook and Google have that they’re not bringing forward? Now you know why the White House is going after Elon. They do not want him to tell the truth and they do not want to have free speech.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
Comer: Every Twitter Employee Involved in Squelching Hunter Laptop Story Will Testify Before Congress
On Friday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Hannity,” House Oversight Committee Ranking Member Rep. James Comer (R-KY) reacted to disclosures on Twitter’s suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story by vowing that when he assumes the chairmanship of the Oversight Committee, every Twitter employee who was involved in the handling of the story will be in front of the committee.
Comer stated, “Well, in January, Jason, when I take your old position as Chairman of the House Oversight Committee, I can promise you this, every employee at Twitter who was involved in suppressing the Hunter Biden laptop story will have an opportunity to come before Congress and explain their actions to the American people. This was a huge story. … But this story’s just beginning, Jason, because we’re going to have every single person at Twitter that was involved in this in front of the House Oversight Committee as soon as possible.”
He added, “[W]e knew that the Democratic National Committee was communicating with Twitter. We knew the Biden campaign was communicating with Twitter. That’s why, in April of this year, we, on the House Oversight Committee, requested that Twitter preserve all documents and correspondence between Twitter executives and the Democratic National Committee and the Biden campaign with respect to the Hunter Biden laptop story.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
Emails: Biden Admin Appointee Was Partner in Biden Family Business
Current Biden administration appointee John Nevergole was a partner in Biden family business activities in Western Africa before joining the administration on the Advisory Council on Doing Business in Africa (PAC-DBIA), emails from Hunter Biden’s laptop show.
Nevergole, given the administration post by Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo on July 14, was previously a business partner of Hunter through the Biden family’s now-defunct investment firm that conducted business in Africa.
Nevergole is the co-founder and CEO of the project development firm ABD Group. During his time with ABD Group, he was simultaneously working with Hunter’s Rosemont Seneca Advisors as a senior advisor since 2012, introducing the Biden family business to key contacts in China, Africa, and Latin America, according to emails verified by Fox News.
Nevergole and Hunter’s association with Rosemont Seneca likely began as early as 2011. Their business relationship recorded in Nevergole’s ABD bio remained until 2019 when it was erased one year before President Joe Biden assumed the White House.
Emails in 2015 show Nevergole offered Hunter’s business partner, Eric Schwerin, advice to provide Hunter before his planned visit to China.
“In terms of Hunter’s trip to China I would say one immediate thing is if there are any large firms, typically the state owned construction companies, that they know who we should try to meet when we go to China,” Nevergole wrote. “These groups generally bring funding from China Exim to fund the African government on a project to be done by the China state owned construction firm.”
“For example this is what we are doing with CACC (China Airport Construction Corppration) and what we do with Samsung with Kexim money,” Nevergole continued. “They work with us to put the deal together in Africa.”
In January 2017, a few months after Joe Biden left the White House as vice president, Nevergole’s company, ABD, held a 30 percent interest in “six energy, infrastructure and healthcare projects in Western Africa,” an email from Schwerin to Hunter reads.
After Joe Biden assumed office in November 2021, Nevergole’s ABD signed a preliminary business deal with Senegal’s government-run infrastructure company, Ageroute, to “develop, finance, and construct two bridges to ensure trade between Senegal and its neighbors remains easily accessible.”
On November 22, that deal was signed in Senegal with Secretary of State Antony Blinken as a participant. “I believe that the ripple effects will be felt throughout Senegal. Better infrastructure can create jobs, can connect more people to cities, can improve public safety, and can increase resilience against climate change,” Blinken said at the event.
Nevergole also put out a press release upon the deal signing. “President Biden’s Build Back Better world initiative is delivering on its promise of driving investment in Africa, building new markets for American companies, and creating jobs at home and abroad,” he said. “We’re grateful for Secretary Blinken’s attendance at today’s MOU signing, alongside Minister Hott, on his first trip to Africa.”
It is unknown if the Biden family has reaped any profit from its business dealings in Senegal with ABD.
Nevergole is likely to be called to testify before the House, which is investigating the Biden family business.
In 2018 and 2020, Breitbart Senior Contributor and Government Accountability Institute President Peter Schweizer published Secret Empires and Profiles in Corruption. Each book hit #1 on the New York Times bestseller list and exposed how Hunter Biden and Joe Biden flew aboard Air Force Two in 2013 to China before Hunter’s firm inked a $1.5 billion deal with a subsidiary of the Chinese government’s Bank of China less than two weeks after the trip. Schweizer’s work also uncovered the Biden family’s other vast and lucrative foreign deals and cronyism.
Breitbart Political Editor Emma-Jo Morris’s investigative work at the New York Post on the Hunter Biden “laptop from hell” also captured international headlines when she, along with Miranda Devine, revealed that Joe Biden was intimately involved in Hunter’s businesses, appearing to even have a 10 percent stake in a company the scion formed with officials at the highest levels of the Chinese Communist Party.
Follow Wendell Husebø on Twitter @WendellHusebø. He is the author of Politics of Slave Morality.
Donalds: We Need Biden Suspicious Activity Reports, Even Maxine Waters Has Called for Congress to Get Suspicious Activity Reports Easier
On Wednesday’s broadcast of Newsmax TV’s “John Bachman Now,” Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) called for Congress to receive the suspicious activity reports on President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter, and his brother, Jim, and pointed out that Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) has criticized the Treasury Department for restricting Congress’ access to these reports and filed legislation to make it easier for Congress to access the reports.
Donalds stated, “I want the American people to understand something, whether it was President Clinton, President Bush, President Obama, or President Trump, Congress had the ability to access suspicious activity reports. When Joe Biden became President of the United States, he changed the rules. Even Maxine Waters filed a bill to change it back. This is critical information. Most people might get a suspicious activity report one time in their life, maybe one. Hunter Biden and Jim Biden, the President’s brother, have over 150. This makes no sense at all. So, of course, Congress should get this information, especially when Joe Biden changed the rules when he came into the White House.”
In 2018 and 2020, Breitbart Senior Contributor and Government Accountability Institute President Peter Schweizer published Secret Empires and Profiles in Corruption. Each book hit #1 on the New York Times bestseller list and exposed how Hunter Biden and Joe Biden flew aboard Air Force Two in 2013 to China before Hunter’s firm inked a $1.5 billion deal with a subsidiary of the Chinese government’s Bank of China less than two weeks after the trip. Schweizer’s work also uncovered the Biden family’s other vast and lucrative foreign deals and cronyism. Breitbart Political Editor Emma-Jo Morris’ investigative work at the New York Post on the Hunter Biden “laptop from hell” also captured international headlines when she, along with Miranda Devine, revealed that Joe Biden was intimately involved in Hunter’s businesses, appearing to even have a 10 percent stake in a company the scion formed with officials at the highest levels of the Chinese Communist Party.
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
Joe Biden is unfit to be president. Why didn't anyone stop him?
Despite Democrats performing better than expected in the midterm elections just completed, two-thirds of those voters do not want their leader, President Joe Biden, to run for re-election in 2024. Perhaps, by now, like nearly everyone else in the country, they know the real Joe Biden. Just who is he?
President Biden is a man of mediocre intellect who, over almost five decades in national public office, accomplished little to nothing, other than his election to federal offices and becoming rich off the federal teat and various side hustles. He is a thin-skinned, chip-on-the-shoulder, macho swaggerer who, in a Tucker Carlson phrase, "kisses up and spits down." He is a prevaricator, plagiarist, teller-of-tall-tales narcissist who has no respect for the truth, only narratives that advance his interests or portray him favorably. If not a racist, he still sees only through the lens of race and panders, prejudges, or pounces accordingly. Finally, when it comes to young children and women, he just cannot, as my mother used to put it, keep his hands to himself; he may be guilty of much, much worse.
Sadly, as a result of advanced age and cognitive decline, his skills, such as a quick wit, adroit speech, and pleasant countenance, have eroded as his less desirable traits, such as anger, mendacity, and lack of self-control, have worsened. No wonder people are discovering the real Joe Biden.
Senators who served with him always knew. Nonetheless, none said to another, "Joe's a nice enough guy, but he must never be president." We can't let him have access to the nuclear codes, run the largest law enforcement operation in the world, or make life-and-death decisions about sending our Armed Forces into or out of harm's way. All senators, Democrats and Republicans, refused to hold Biden accountable and make him, at least as to any plan he had for the White House, persona non grata.
Nonetheless, there is historic precedent for such nonpartisan and patriotic action.
On August 7, 1974, my once and future boss, U.S. Senator Clifford P. Hansen (R-Wyo.), joined a few of his Republican colleagues, most famously Senator Barry Goldwater (R-Ariz.) and Senator Hugh Scott (R-Pa.), on a journey to the White House to urge President Richard Nixon to resign. They told him, "not only had he 'lost' the congressional support of his own party and his natural allies among conservative Democrats, [but] also that they would actually convict him at trial and remove him from office." Nixon resigned the next day.
On New Year's Eve in 1974, Justice William O. Douglas, one of the Supreme Court's longest-serving jurists, suffered a severe stroke in Hawaii. After months at Walter Reed Hospital, he returned to the Court, but he was nearly incapacitated, yet he hung on into the Court's new term on the first Monday in October. On October 17, seven of the eight remaining justices agreed that no case would be decided by a five-four vote with Douglas in the majority. Only Justice Byron White of Colorado disagreed and pressed for Douglas's retirement. A month later, after 36 years on the bench, Justice Douglas did so.
In 1988, President George H.W. Bush nominated former U.S. senator John Tower (R-Texas) as his secretary of defense. Senator Tower, who served from 1961 to 1985, was the first Republican senator to represent Texas since Reconstruction. He chaired the Senate Armed Services Committee, later was chief U.S. negotiator at the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks in Switzerland, and in 1986 chaired the Tower Commission inquiry into the Iran-Contra Affair. All that was not enough to prevent the Senate from rejecting his nomination, given its concerns over his alcoholism and other issues.
Years ago, on a visit from Denver to D.C., I met with an old friend who once served as an attorney to the Senate Judiciary Committee and thus had frequent interactions with Biden. Knowing he was aware of my negative view of the senator, I asked his opinion. "He's always been good to me," he responded. "That's a pretty low bar," I replied. "It's my test," he shrugged. So it must have been for the senators, both Democrats and Republicans, who knew the real Joe Biden for nearly five decades. Now all Americans are paying a terrible price for their willingness to set such low standards.
Mr. Pendley, a Wyoming attorney, served in the administrations of presidents Reagan and Trump and for 30 years provided pro bono representation, including before the Supreme Court of the United States.
Grandpa Grinch: Hunter Biden’s Love Child Snubbed Again at Christmas
Sleepy Joe determined to erase granddaughter from existence
Andrew Stiles • November 29, 2022 2:35 pmWhat happened:
President Joe Biden, 80, once again refused to embrace the Christmas spirit and acknowledge the existence of his own grandchild. An analysis of the Christmas stockings hung by the White House chimney with care determined that Navy Joan Roberts, the four-year-old love child Hunter Biden fathered with a stripper named "Dallas," was snubbed for the second year in a row.
By the numbers:
The White House chimney display included nine stockings: six for Biden's acknowledged grandchildren. That includes Hunter's daughter Naomi, who lives at the White House with her now-husband Peter Neal, who also got a stocking. The remaining two were inscribed with the names "Commander" and "Willow," the First Family's dog and cat.
Why it matters:
Joe Biden's heartless determination to erase his granddaughter's existence undermines his reputation as a self-described family man and raises serious questions about his fitness to serve as commander in chief.
The Biden family's behavior toward Navy Joan Roberts has been consistently callous. Hunter initially denied ever meeting the child's mother, Lunden Roberts, whom he would go on to describe in his 2021 memoir as "hardly the dating type," and challenged his paternity in court until a DNA test proved with "scientific certainty" that he was indeed the child's father.
Since then, Hunter has reportedly expressed no interest in meeting his daughter, while Sleepy Joe has refused to provide Secret Service protection for Navy Joan Roberts, even after her life was threatened by a deranged ex-MMA fighter.
The bottom line:
All children deserve to be loved.