THE BEGINNING OF THE END FOR BIDEN?
The other shoe drops for you, Joe
Something changed last week inside the Beltway that suggests the people who run the Democrat Party now realize President Biden’s tenure in office is not sustainable beyond 2024.
The “tell” was not, however, the latest revelation by IRS whistleblowers about his corrupt administration. It was instead the sudden awakening of the White House press corps.
The same “reporters” who snored through more than two years of preposterous claims by Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre and her predecessor simultaneously woke up last Friday (6/23). Correspondents from CNN, CBS, NBC, and even the New York Times aggressively questioned Jean-Pierre about the metastasizing Hunter Biden scandals.
This wasn’t spontaneous. The word has gone out that regime change is coming. Thus, the “news” outlets that usually repeat Biden’s claim that he and his son never discuss the latter’s business deals actually reported the testimony of IRS whistleblowers who allege political interference in their Hunter Biden investigation.
CBS, for example, ran an unusually honest story about the whistleblowers that prominently included full transcripts of their testimony before the House Ways and Means Committee. The committee released the transcripts after it was announced that Hunter Biden had agreed to plead guilty to misdemeanor tax charges. The two IRS whistleblowers testified that he committed felony tax evasion:
“One of the IRS whistleblowers was Gary Shapley, an agent who worked on the Hunter Biden probe and recently spoke exclusively with CBS News’ Jim Axelrod. In his transcribed interview with the House Ways and Means Committee, Shapley told congressional investigators that the IRS’ findings supported both felony and misdemeanor charges, and that charges were blocked in jurisdictions outside of Delaware, including in Washington, D.C.”
There isn’t the slightest possibility that CBS or any of the media outlets noted above would have run a story like this a year ago. Nor would any member of the corporate media have pressed Attorney General Merrick Garland aggressively enough for him to angrily characterize legitimate questions about the Department of Justice as “an attack on an institution that is essential to American democracy, and essential to the safety of the American people.”
Garland, like Karine Jean-Pierre and National Security Council spokesman John Kirby, isn’t accustomed to probing questions and he clearly doesn’t like answering them. It will nonetheless be difficult to avoid additional queries from a press corps that has been let off its leash.
As George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley succinctly puts it in the Hill, “The only thing abundantly clear is that someone is lying. Either these whistleblowers are lying to Congress, or these Justice Department officials (including Garland) are lying.”
It is also clear that the incentives all point in one direction.
Merrick Garland and the other political appointees at the Department of Justice could and probably do have multiple reasons to lie. The two whistleblowers have absolutely nothing to gain by doing so. Indeed, they have voluntarily put themselves at considerable risk by coming forward. Gary Shapley made that fact all too clear in his opening statement to the House Ways and Means Committee:
“I am hoping the whistleblower process will allow me to give this protected disclosure and leave it to you to make your determinations based on what my testimony and the documents say about the investigation. I respect this institution and have faith that the issues I raise will be considered appropriately. I beg of you to protect me from the coming retaliatory storm. You are my only hope, and your actions send a message to all those out there that see wrongdoing but are terrified.”
Shapley testified that he has already been the target of retaliation from his superiors, and his suggestion that other potential whistleblowers are waiting to see what happens to him is entirely plausible.
Meanwhile, the public is already convinced the Justice Department is covering for the President. According to the latest Harvard CAPS/Harris poll, 55 percent of voters believe the FBI is not really investigating corruption allegations against Biden.
Moreover, 66 percent of voters believe Biden has lied about his knowledge of his son’s business dealings, and a whopping 83 percent want the FBI to make public a report alleging that Biden accepted a $5 million bribe from a Ukrainian oligarch/KGB asset while Vice President.
Sadly, neither the credibility of the IRS whistleblowers nor the widespread suspicions of ordinary voters would normally be enough to motivate the corporate media to cover the latest Biden scandal, much less ask genuine questions during a White House press briefing.
Only a signal from Democrat Party heavyweights that the President’s days in office are numbered could have been enough to awake the Fourth Estate from its long slumber. Not coincidentally, a few outlets ran stories on Friday about “rising” Democratic governors who could if necessary step into Biden’s shoes in 2024. ABC, for example, highlighted Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, and Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker.
Yet, despite Biden’s cognitive decline, failing physical health, mounting scandals, and even a possible impeachment inquiry, there is one obstacle that must be overcome before anyone can dislodge him from the White House — “Dr.” Jill.
As this puff piece from Politico makes abundantly clear, the First Lady has no more intention of departing 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue than did Edith Wilson just over a century ago. If the people who run the Democrat Party want Biden out of the way in 2024, they will need more than the corporate media to convince her. In the end, she will decide if last week was the beginning of the end for Biden.
David Catron is a free lance conservative journalist.