Have you heard about the president who received money from China and other foreign countries? No, not the current president. The former one.
House Republicans recently launched an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden, premised on the claim that he is hiding, in the words of Speaker Mike Johnson, “millions of dollars in payments from America’s foreign adversaries.” As yet, they have produced no evidence to back up the idea that Biden profited. (The payments they have flagged involve the business interests of his son Hunter Biden, who is facing two separate federal indictments at the moment, and his brother James.)
Meanwhile, House Democrats on Thursday released a report detailing how former President Donald Trump received, and then tried to hide, millions in payments from America’s foreign adversaries. Unlike in the impeachment inquiry, which is premised on a suspicion that Republicans hope will turn up evidence, the receipts are here.
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The saga of the foreign payments is a good case study in how Trump has taught Americans to tolerate brazen corruption—so long as it’s his. To do this, Trump relies on two tactics. First, he does much of it out in the open, recognizing that voters tend to assume that only hidden deeds are nefarious. Second, he finds ways to slow-walk the release of the most damaging information, so that by the time the full picture is clear, the public has become almost inoculated—as though it had been out in the open all along.
Ah, grue. We meet again.
+1 on the history here. The history of Dole Corporation in Hawaii is also a fascinating read.
My only riposte is, Republicans have not.merely.exploited corruption, but openly embraced it and invited Common Americans to ride along on the adventure. If we survive this, it will take a century at.keast to unfurl and air out in the social realm. It’s not even clear at this point whether the environmental damage could be undone.
Sadly we’ll be at war with Canada in 15 years to literate their fresh water and oil sands from Godless Socialism, because they won’t be charging fealty or usury for insulin and aspirin. The US.will export Freedom at gunpoint, as we do.
But! 50 hears hence, well have arable land and a Northwest Passage! Wouldn’t that be a feat?
/s, times being what they are. Dense.
