The pace at which Joe Biden became his own worst campaign narrative is astounding. In 2020, Biden accused Donald Trump of being an unhinged authoritarian who presided over chaos—a lie—and change needed to happen. Flash forward, and the world is in turmoil, thanks to Biden. The economy teeters on the edge, and he's channeled a gross authoritarianism concerning using the Justice Department as his private police force. Biden is miffed he couldn't use the trials from the indictments by Special Counsel Jack Smith against Trump, but he's primarily used the DOJ to protect his son, Hunter Biden. Yet, the recent invoking of executive privilege on the audio tapes concerning the classified document probe is a Nixonian throwback.
Let it be repeated that Biden's attorney opened the door to this pandora's box. The president was said to be old and have a failed memory, which infuriated the left despite Special Counsel Robert Hur opting not to file charges over recklessly storing classified materials in various locations. Biden's lawyer said that he thought Biden was cogent and not acting in a manner as described by Mr. Hur. Fine, let's play back the tapes.
We can't because while we know what Biden said in the transcript, he doesn't want to be heard. As House Republicans look into holding Attorney General Merrick Garland in contempt for refusing to honor a subpoena and turn over the tapes, the Biden White House hopes to slow-walk a legal matter impacting the president. Liberals have been making the argument to expedite all legal proceedings involving Donald Trump—dog bites car strikes again. As Law professor Jonathan Turley observed, this executive privilege route by Biden is both Voldemortian and would "make Richard Nixon blush":
The invocation of privilege over the audiotape is so transparently political and cynical that it would make Richard Nixon blush. Multiple committees are investigating Biden for possible impeachment and conducting oversight on the handling of the investigation into his retention and mishandling of classified material over decades. Classified documents were found in various locations where Biden lived or worked, including his garage. The mishandling of classified material is uncontestable. Broken boxes, unprotected areas and lack of tracking are all obvious from the photos.
The comparison to the Trump case in Florida is both obvious and disturbing. Where Trump was charged with a litany of charges, including mishandling and retention of documents (in addition to obstruction)…
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A court may be a tad confused as to why a president’s answers are not privileged, but the actual audio recording of those answers can be privileged.
White House counsel Edward Siskel added to the dubious basis for the claim in a letter to House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio.) and House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) on Thursday. He suggested that, if there were a compelling reason for the audiotapes, it might be different.
“The absence of a legitimate need for the audio recordings lays bare your likely goal—to chop them up, distort them, and use them for partisan political purposes,” wrote Siskel. But that is not a basis for an executive privilege assertion.
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For the Justice Department itself, these pendulum swings between being a contempt hawk and dove are enough to give a judge vertigo. The department just prosecuted Trump officials for refusing to appear or supply evidence to Congress. Likewise, arguments of privilege by former Chief of Staff Mark Meadows have been rejected. Yet privilege is now being asserted for this conversation between Hur and Biden concerning potentially criminal conduct committed when Biden was a private citizen — neither vice president nor president.
Turley admits this privilege motion won't hold up legally, but it's a win politically because nothing will be resolved until after the election. But the damage is done, as Biden already looks like he's in the deepest throes of brain fog while the legal circuses involving Trump are backfiring on Democrats. When Trump is against the wall, Trump thrives and outmaneuvers his enemies. He might take some blows, but the hush money trial is disintegrating, the two trials by Smith are on hold, and the RICO case in Georgia has been out of the news for weeks after the revelation that Fulton County DA Fani Willis had an undisclosed and inappropriate relationship with the then-top lawyer on her team, Nathan Wade, who was forced off the prosecution team.
What comes out of the Biden presidency is what you get when you have a president who has dementia and is unprincipled. It also explains the rudderless foreign policy we've seen over the past three years: Exiting one war only to get bogged down in another, taking Islamic extremist groups on and off terrorist lists, spitting in Israel's face over a justified defensive war against Hamas. The real kicker was Biden telling Iran not to attack Israel, which was a lie. It was reported that Biden knew an attack was coming regardless, informing Tehran that it had to be "within certain limits."
Say what you want about Nixon; he knew foreign policy and how to get strategic dividends for the United States. Opening China turned one billion people against the Soviet Union at the time. Biden left arms and armor for the Taliban, keeps funding a quagmire in Ukraine, and is withholding arms from Israel because he can't get his way because he's too stupid.
Now, on the domestic front, he's taking a page from Obama (and Nixon) in abusing executive privilege because he thinks he's too good and smart to be held accountable. The arrogance of Joe Biden remains this man's fatal flaw, and hopefully, we can get rid of him by next January.