Barack Obama’s ethics chief, Walter Shaub, who worked in the Office of Government Ethics from 2013 to 2017, ripped Joe Biden for promoting his son Hunter’s book in a now-deleted tweet that was caught by the Washington Examiner. After Joe Biden promoted his son’s book, Shaub tweeted, “It is not acceptable for the President of the United States to be part of the book promotion tour. No.”
After being heavily criticized by other liberals for pointing out Biden’s ethical faux pas, Shaub deleted the tweet, which seems like a perfect metaphor for the way ethics work with liberals.
In a pre-Super Bowl interview with CBS, Biden talked about his son’s book.
“The honesty with which he stepped forward and talked about the problem, and the hope that — it gave me hope reading it. I mean, it was like, ‘My boy’s back.’ You know what I mean? Anyway, I’m sorry to get so personal. …He’s fixed it, he’s worked on it. I’m proud of him. I’m proud of my son.”
It’s understandable that any father would want to see his ne’er-do-well son with a horrible drug problem pull it all together. But on the other hand, his ne’er-do-well son obviously owes all his success to promising people access to his politically powerful father. There’s no Ukrainian energy company hiring Hunter Biden for his skill set, they’re hiring him for the promise that he can get “dad” to do things to benefit them. It certainly looks like “the Big Guy” came through on that for his son, too, although many people are still denying it.
This book is just another variation of the same scam. “My dad is Joe Biden. Give me money for my book,” which liberal groups/donors will probably buy in bulk to score points with the Biden administration. The whole thing is just the latest sleazy grift that turns on Joe Biden using his influence as a politician to help make his family rich. That’s not how politics is supposed to work.
John Hawkins is the author of 101 Things All Young Adults Should Know.
