When I read this astoundingly mendacious story in the Times, the first thing that I was reminded of was the memorable moment in “Plain Trains and Automobiles” when John Candy confidently tells a dubious state trooper that his burned out, roofless wreck of a car is “safe to drive.” (This goes right into the Ethics Alarms Clip archive.)
President Biden has repeatedly insisted that he has no knowledge of his son Hunter’s various sleazy business schemes, and that Joe never discussed Hunter’s money-making activities with him. Yet yesterday, in his nearly five hours of closed-door testimony to the House Oversight Committee, a former business partner of Hunter’s, Devon Archer, revealed that President Biden met with and spoke to his son Hunter’s international business associates on about 20 occasions as Hunter sought consulting deals (translation: lucrative influence and access peddling arrangements).
Hilariously, Archer claimed that the Joe Biden was not party to any of his son’s business deals. You see, Hunter Biden was just trying to sell the idea that he could provide access to his powerful father—by providing access to his powerful father. He was claiming that he could influence his father by showing that he could persuade him to pick up the phone, drop by and shake hands. Yet, reports the Times, Democrats on the panel insisted that it wasn’t what it was, by definition.
“Democrats said that Mr. Archer had described the conversations in which the elder Mr. Biden participated as short and casual — about topics like the weather — and his interactions as little more than stopping by a dinner or a hotel for a brief handshake or a few pleasantries over the phone,” the Times dutifully parrots. “The witness was very, very consistent that none of those conversations ever had to do with any business dealings or transactions,” said Representative Dan Goldman, Democrat of New York and a member of the Oversight Committee who participated in the interview. “They were purely what he called ‘casual conversation.’”
The Times actually repeats this absurd interpretation as if it is perfectly reasonable and makes something akin to sense. It doesn’t. It doesn’t matter what Joe Biden talked about. His son was influence peddling, his father was the object of the influence, and the evidence was that Joe met with, talked with, and listened to the targets of his son’s schemes. That interaction was designed to seal the deals: again, by definition, “those conversations” had everything to do with Hunter’s business dealings and transactions. If it weren’t for those business dealings and transactions, the conversations would not have taken place.
Representative Jamie Raskin of Maryland, the top Democrat on the panel, tried deceit rather than outright lying like Goldman, saying that “President Biden was never asked to, nor did he, take any official actions in relation” to Hunter Biden’s business interests. No, meeting with foreign interests to give the impression that he would help his son get favors for those who paid him sufficiently isn’t an “official” action, but it also is an unethical use of power and position to benefit a family member. If Joe met with Hunter’s marks to help his son get compensated in the belief that he COULD persuade Dad to “take official actions” beneficial to them, then Joe Biden was either abetting illegal influence peddling or assisting in a fraud. There is no third, benign interpretation.
The Times then engages in its familiar game, loading the front of the article with misleading spin. “Republicans have claimed repeatedly — and so far without proof — that the investigations implicate the president in corruption and crimes,” it says. That’s false and misleading. The meetings Archer described are evidence that the President was involved in corruption. The Times is playing the “evidence” vs. “proof” game: most readers think “no proof” means no evidence. That’s what the Times wants them to think; but Archer’s testimony is evidence.
“Republicans pointed to the interview as evidence that President Biden had lied when he claimed he had no involvement in his son’s business dealings,” the Times goes on. Republican pounce! THEY say, those fascist racists, that it’s evidence, but the Times won’t…and it is evidence.
After 12 paragraphs and (let’s see…) 539 words, the Times finally reveals, “Still, Mr. Archer’s testimony underscored that Mr. Biden had made false or misleading statements regarding his family members’ finances….In 2019, Mr. Biden also repeatedly said he had “never discussed” and had “never spoken to” Hunter Biden about his business dealings.” That’s not just burying the lede, it’s actively hiding it.
In paragraph 14, we learn that the White House paid liar Karine Jean-Pierre, is now saying that Mr. Biden “was never in business with his son,” echoing the White House counsel’s office which has stopped denying that Biden ever spoke about Hunter’s business with his son, and now says he “was not in business with his son.” Both carefully crafted weasel-sentences leaved room for reality, which is that Joe discussed Hunter’s business dealings with his son and participated in them, as Archer described. Jean-Pierre lied, saying, “I’ve been asked this question a million times. The answer is not going to change. The answer remains the same. The President was never in business with his son.” But the answer has changed! It used to be that Biden never discussed business with his son.
Does the Times point out the paid liar’s lie? Of course not. Then the Times has the gall to tell us, “It has long been known that the elder Mr. Biden at times interacted with his son’s business partners.”
AHA! The popular “it’s old news” rationalization! (See #51 and #52) “Long been known” by whom, exactly? The President has long denied that and never admitted it. That fact isn’t even known now by most readers of the Times, because the paper intentionally put it so deep into the article that they never got that far.
The Times is rejecting its duty to let the public know the implications of Archer’s revelations objectively, accurately and analytically. Instead it is actively engaging in disinformation to bolster the cover-up efforts of its patron political party.
Ethics Alarms 
Can news media organization be liable if they report what paid liars say?
Yes. If the news source know that a defamatory statement was false when they published it, or if it can be demonstrated that they did not make reasonable efforts to determine the accuracy of the false defamatory statement, they have grounds for a libel suit. Unfortunately, there is no realistic chance of a libel action brought by Donald Trump getting anywhere in a New York courtroom.
Check out this laughable, ridiculous, desperate spin being delivered for the Bidens by CNN. This is CNN:
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2023/07/31/jonathan_turley_rep_dan_goldmans_account_of_devon_archer_testimony_insults_the_intelligence_of_voters.html
Hunter was selling the illusion of access to his father. You’d think this reporter is actually Debbie Wasserman Schultz in disguise.
I reasonably informed that the only thing Biden is guilty of is loving his troubled son.
How can you be so cruel as to hate a loving old man you pouncy rethuglikkkan?
God. That “he loves his drug addicted son” talking point has to go into the talking point Hall of Fame. Joe could give a rat’s ass about his son, other than his bringing home the bacon.
The New York Times is and active part of the Democratic Party’s lapdog Pravda-USA.
Well heck, if this isn’t as good of a reason to impeach, then nothing is worth impeaching over. Claim: Biden engaged in corruption during office, i.e. acting as his son’s benefactor in regards of Burisma. Evidence: Biden tells the Ukrainians to get rid of a guy, who happens to be investigating Burisma under the threat of withholding aid money to Ukraine. I mean, you have the corruption, and, let’s call it the “Trump precedent”, pressuring an ally to engage in behavior that personally benefits Biden, using appropriated funds. I mean, we can have a nice 3 to 5 month long impeachment inquiry that will definitely not cover Biden in glory. Not like the DOJ would investigate their boss. That’s like bees against honey! Would the Senate convict, probably not, but this is still good politics and the foundation for such an inquiry would be on sound ethics ground.
Even more ironic: The Democrats IMPEACHED Trump for trying to get the Ukrainians to investigate whether Joe was getting paid off to force the Ukes to fire the prosecutor who was going after Burisma. The first Trump impeachment was pursued to PROTECT Joe! Let me repeat that. The first Trump impeachment was pursued to protect Joe Biden. Talk about abuse of power.
See my comment to Aleksei, among many others on this blog over the past few weeks. There was nothing to protect Joe from. His demand to Ukraine was an extension of official U.S. policy and had wide international support. It did not and could not have had anything to do with protecting Hunter or Burisma; it was in response to the global community’s agreement that Shokin was a corrupt prosecutor. Trump’s demands, on the other hand, had no wider support and did not serve any legitimate foreign policy interest, thus we must conclude they were made solely for his personal and political interests.
And what authority decides which foreign policy interests are legitimate?
Jack posted about this in 2019.
Was Jack wrong?
Moi???
Yes.
Were you wrong?
“And what authority decides which foreign policy interests are legitimate?”
I’ve answered this question of yours before. Congress, in concert with the president. He could have vetoed the aid package, but instead secretly withheld it after it was passed. And he did so for obviously corrupt purposes. No one, not even you, thinks that Trump was genuinely concerned about corruption in Ukraine–he only asked about conspiracy theories that directly related to him. The Crowdstrike thing, for instance, which didn’t even have anything to do with Ukraine outside of the far right’s fevered imaginations, and Biden firing Shokin, which Trump either deeply misunderstood or lied about. And as multiple commenters here have shown, this issue is STILL being misunderstood or lied about years later. If Trump’s requests was legitimate, this shouldn’t be necessary. And if he were legitimately concerned about corruption in Ukraine, he would not have focused only on conspiracy theories that he thought he could use to further his own power.
Yes, I do think Jack was wrong about the transcript, but we had a lot more than just that transcript by the time of the impeachment hearings. We had confirmation that this wasn’t just one phone call, but a months-long campaign which relied mostly on Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani. We had sworn testimony from Sondland that Rudy was asking for a public announcement of an investigation. We saw that White House officials were ordered to lock down the transcript. We saw that the aid was withheld until two days after Congress began investigating the whistleblower complaint. All of these facts point to a quid pro quo for a corrupt personal demand. It was an abuse of his office. The fact pattern of Biden’s demand, on the other hand, shows that the pressure to fire Shokin could not have originated from Biden alone, and that it was not done for his own personal purposes.
You are at least the fourth person here I’ve seen in the past two weeks repeat this conspiracy theory, and it remains ridiculous. As I have repeatedly pointed out in replies on other threads, Biden pressured for the firing of Alexander Shokin because that was official US policy under the Obama administration, had bipartisan support in Congress, and was also supported by the IMF, Ukrainian anti-corruption activists, and many European allies. It would be absurd to believe that they all wanted him gone to protect Hunter Biden, who was never personally under investigation, and whose time at Burisma did not overlap with the period of time that the investigation focused on. Shokin was notoriously corrupt and lazy, and the entire problem was that he was *not* doing his job of investigating corruption, including on the Burisma front. There was no benefit to Hunter or Joe Biden in enforcing the Obama administration’s policy in pressuring for his firing.
Can you refer me to an article that lays this all out?
So, the Republicans investigating this in Congress are all just conspiracy theorists who haven’t been made aware of this by the Democratic members of their committees?
They’ve been made aware. They’re lying. Senate Republicans investigated these claims in 2020 and released a report showing no evidence of wrongdoing by the Bidens in regard to Ukraine.
Thank you for asking for a source. This article lays out how strong the campaign to oust Shokin was from our allies. It also points out that Shokin was notorious for not prosecuting corruption, and that he was not actively investigating Burisma at the time of Biden’s demand.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/10/21/fact-check-joe-biden-leveraged-ukraine-aid-oust-corrupt-prosecutor/5991434002/
Laptop was not available yet.
Another meaningless and irrelevant statement from you. You’re suggesting that a defense of Trump is that he demanded an investigation based on evidence that he did not have? You’re suggesting that the laptop somehow disproves the fact that every rational actor in the Western world knew Shokin was corrupt and wanted him fired?
Come on, tell me what you mean. Stop hiding behind vague non-sequiturs. How does the laptop change any of the facts I have laid out here, and how does it justify withholding aid to help Ukraine defend itself against Russian aggression BEFORE the evidence on the laptop was available?
“It has long been known that the elder Mr. Biden at times interacted with his son’s business partners.”
I was half expecting the next line to be that we have always been at war with Eastasia.
Amusing.
It’s truly sickening contrasting how the media, especially those who fancy themselves as objective and nonpartisan (the NYT, WaPo, CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, etc.) go after GOP politicians or the right in general, with how they cover the Dems and the left in general. Anything that GOP politician or conservative will be twisted, analyzes and portrayed in the worst possible light whereas negative stories about the Dems/progressive are ignored as much possible, and when that no longer possible, covered as favorably as possible (deferring to their excuses and explanations, no hard investigation, no tough questioning, etc.). It’s disgusting.
I have no issue with the way the media cover Trump (or any other GOP) if they were half as hard on the Dems