The "Biden Family Corruption" mega-thread

[maize]

This goes right with what Lrrps just said.  Where was Bill Barr?  

Peter Schweitzer comes on and mentions that it's been 5 years since he broke this stuff.  Lower level FBI guys reached out to him, but he said this was shut down at the upper levels.  So yeah I think Ronnie Jackson is right, we're likely going to go through a dead period, regarding information, as the top floor digs in their heels.  

Schewizer even mentions the work of the house here.  These guys are doing what they were sent to do  --  fight!  

Well what do ya know, the House's set has finally dropped.  Just imagine this place being ran by Paul Ryan or John Boehner.     Kudos to this current crop of guys and gals.

Remember when John Kasich was a thing back in 2016? That was almost a decade ago. <-- that last part was a joke.

[3rdgensooner]

Joe sure has a lot of nice homes in nice areas for a lifelong government servant. Hmmm…

Obama's "personal chef" died yesterday in an accident on Martha's Vineyard. He and his wife had decent jobs over the years but not "personal chef" decent. Not even close. These guys seem to do much better than most in their income brackets.

Obama had a couple book deals worth a ton of money. Here is just one of them:
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/obamas-...ial-memoir

With a decent investment strategy, he's probably worth well over $100M right now.

Interesting. I looked up his first book and it said it sold 2.6 million copies. The advance was 65 million. Somebody's getting a pay off.

[Syncro]

Book deals have been, for decades, the most easy way to pay off a politician. Nothing about this is new...

[wydileie]

Joe sure has a lot of nice homes in nice areas for a lifelong government servant. Hmmm…

Obama's "personal chef" died yesterday in an accident on Martha's Vineyard. He and his wife had decent jobs over the years but not "personal chef" decent. Not even close. These guys seem to do much better than most in their income brackets.

Obama had a couple book deals worth a ton of money. Here is just one of them:
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/obamas-...ial-memoir

With a decent investment strategy, he's probably worth well over $100M right now.

Interesting. I looked up his first book and it said it sold 2.6 million copies. The advance was 65 million. Somebody's getting a pay off.

The advance was for two books, one from each of the Obama's. "The Promised Land" from Obama sold at least 4M hardcopies and who knows how many digital copies. Michelle Obama's book, "Becoming" sold 14M copies as of 2020. Assuming Obama's digital sales at least doubled his hardcopy sales, he sold ~12M books so, $65M for ~26M books sold is actually a pretty fair advance. 

I assume they initially sold for around $30, and the average sale price was probably around $15-20, so the publisher's revenue off their books was likely somewhere in the neighborhood of $400-500M. Split that with the retailers, and they are still looking at $200-250M.

[P1tchblack]

[3rdgensooner]

Joe sure has a lot of nice homes in nice areas for a lifelong government servant. Hmmm…

Obama's "personal chef" died yesterday in an accident on Martha's Vineyard. He and his wife had decent jobs over the years but not "personal chef" decent. Not even close. These guys seem to do much better than most in their income brackets.

Obama had a couple book deals worth a ton of money. Here is just one of them:
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/obamas-...ial-memoir

With a decent investment strategy, he's probably worth well over $100M right now.

Interesting. I looked up his first book and it said it sold 2.6 million copies. The advance was 65 million. Somebody's getting a pay off.

The advance was for two books, one from each of the Obama's. "The Promised Land" from Obama sold at least 4M hardcopies and who knows how many digital copies. Michelle Obama's book, "Becoming" sold 14M copies as of 2020. Assuming Obama's digital sales at least doubled his hardcopy sales, he sold ~12M books so, $65M for ~26M books sold is actually a pretty fair advance. 

I assume they initially sold for around $30, and the average sale price was probably around $15-20, so the publisher's revenue off their books was likely somewhere in the neighborhood of $400-500M. Split that with the retailers, and they are still looking at $200-250M.

The math doesn't work so easy. 26 million at 30 dollars? No way in either sales or price. I saw sales of 2.6 million of the first book. An author would make about 5 million off those kinds of sales.

[wydileie]

Obama's "personal chef" died yesterday in an accident on Martha's Vineyard. He and his wife had decent jobs over the years but not "personal chef" decent. Not even close. These guys seem to do much better than most in their income brackets.

Obama had a couple book deals worth a ton of money. Here is just one of them:
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/obamas-...ial-memoir

With a decent investment strategy, he's probably worth well over $100M right now.

Interesting. I looked up his first book and it said it sold 2.6 million copies. The advance was 65 million. Somebody's getting a pay off.

The advance was for two books, one from each of the Obama's. "The Promised Land" from Obama sold at least 4M hardcopies and who knows how many digital copies. Michelle Obama's book, "Becoming" sold 14M copies as of 2020. Assuming Obama's digital sales at least doubled his hardcopy sales, he sold ~12M books so, $65M for ~26M books sold is actually a pretty fair advance. 

I assume they initially sold for around $30, and the average sale price was probably around $15-20, so the publisher's revenue off their books was likely somewhere in the neighborhood of $400-500M. Split that with the retailers, and they are still looking at $200-250M.

The math doesn't work so easy. 26 million at 30 dollars? No way in either sales or price. I saw sales of 2.6 million of the first book. An author would make about 5 million off those kinds of sales.

I didn't say 26M sold at $30. I said the average sale price was probably $15-20. I said the initial price upon release was likely $30 which makes the average sale price I quoted pretty reasonable seeing as he sold 1.7M hardcover books in the first week, alone, at likely the original retail price. The sales of 2.6M were just from the initial year of release, only in the US, the UK and Canada while it was released in something like 20 other countries. He had 4.3M hardcover books printed in the first year, alone, after an initial order of 3.3M, so I would assume the publishers were quite confident they would exceed their need for the initial 3.3M order. And again, that's only physical books. One has to assume digital sales far exceed physical sales, or at least match it.

That was only his book. Michelle has 14M in sales according to the Wikipedia page for her book. So, even at an extremely conservative estimate, they had to have sold at least 20M books combined, and at an average sale price of ~$15, you are still talking $300M in revenue. Take out half that for expenses and payments to the retail partners, and the publisher probably netted at least $150M revenue. A payment of $65M to the Obama's still netted them $85M, maybe a little less if the Obamas also got royalties. A pretty nice chunk of change.

You have to remember they have cache and the bargaining power. I'm sure every single publisher was scratching to get their book deal. They had the luxury to play them off each other.

[lrrps21]

I believe all goes thru Biden's sister because she has been running his campaigns since the 1970s. Anything happens to her he still has his power position to right things. If things go thru him he loses power position status and they all sink. Same with his brother and Hunter. Everything was supposed to be away from Joe so he could always get them out of trouble. Now, they don't care because they have the DOJ/FBI/CIA/IRS/Media doing their bidding.

USA USA USA

[P1tchblack]

Ziegler on CNN w/Poppy Harlow.  I don't think the cat can be put back in the bag...

There's video at the link below, but here's the transcript:

Harlow: You have questioned whether David Weiss had full authority. And in that part of the letter I read to you, he she believes and he said to Congress in this letter that that he does. Do you believe that someone stopped David Weiss?

Ziegler: So all I can go back to is what we stated in our testimony. We know that the Department of Justice went to the DC US Attorney’s Office to bring the 2014 and 2015 felony and misdemeanor tax charges there. They said no. We also know that he went to the District of California, a President Biden appointed US attorney two to charge that case, the felony and misdemeanor charges there. He was told no. So all along, we’re we’re trying to defend these charges in the different venues.

Harlow: That is just the response to that has been that has been contested, that assertion that he went elsewhere and was prevented by by the attorney general. You know, this case, as you well know, because you were lead on it for two years, this this investigation went on under the Trump administration. And Bill Barr in December of 2020 said this about it, he said, I think to the extent there’s an investigation, I think it’s being handled responsibly and professionally. He went on to say that he sees no reason to appoint a special counsel. Why was this not charged in those two years? And do you disagree with what Bill Barr asserted there?

Ziegler: Yes. I don’t know what basis for that statement, and I’m not going to speculate as to why. What I can tell you is that after D.C. said no IRS agents on the team, including the FBI, we were trying to figure out internally how to bring on a special counsel. We already saw that there was improper things being done. And as law enforcement officers, we make an oath to the office to do the right thing. I think that’s so important, regardless of your political affiliation, regardless of what your political beliefs are. We have to be impartial and we have to be fair to taxpayers, people that are paying their fair share of taxes. And in this case, we wanted we thought all along that that David Weiss was going to do the right thing for the right reasons. I can recall saying that so many times. But when he only charged two misdemeanor counts and did not charge the felony when the felony charges were recommended for approval, that I’m sorry, we’re not treating taxpayers the same.

Harlow: Two more quick questions for you. And look, it takes a lot of guts. I just want to note this for our audience. It takes a lot of guts. I know you’ve said you’re worried that your job was on the line when you came out here publicly to testify to final questions for you. One is, how do you know David Weiss and his team aren’t doing that now? Clearly, the investigation is still ongoing.

Ziegler: So you are correct. I was removed from the team May 15th. I wasn’t provided with a reason why. I don’t know. Yeah, I do not know that answer. But what I what I’m asking for is we need to have someone with independent authority, with full authority, that special counsel authority that can charge that in venues outside of the District of Delaware.

Harlow: The one thing I would just say about special counsel so people understand the difference here is David Weiss is a Trump appointed U.S. attorney, has the authority to follow leads where they will take him and his team, a special counsel, the way the way that that operates. They have to operate within sort of the four corners of what an attorney general sets for them. And if they want to expand the investigation, they have to go back to the A.G., get permission to do that and keep going. So there is the argument to be made that actually David Weiss has more independence here.

Ziegler: So the fact that he that is being stated that he has more independence, I would go to to President Biden, U.S. attorneys both saying no to bringing charges in their districts and the charges not being brought. Like like we said, it’s in Department of Justice tax manual. It’s in their tax manual that you have to charge the felony with the misdemeanor. You have taxpayers who are right now in New England that were charged. These are fishermen. It’s a fishermen case. They were charged with misdemeanor and felony tax charges for failing to file tax returns. I’m sure that those people would like the same agreement that that that Hunter got in this situation. And that’s my argument, is we have to treat people the same in our investigations and how we move forward those investigations.

Harlow: And to the point that you’re making, the allegation that they were blocked by other U.S. attorneys. That has been contested by their office. Joseph, thank you for your time this morning.

Ziegler: Thank you so much for having me, Poppy.

https://www.mediaite.com/tv/poppy-harlow...s_redirect

[ScarletHayes]

Trump's 2016 victory, based on judges alone, has paid multiple dividends.  If you don't want to give Trump any credit and give it all to the Heritage foundation, great.  Fact is that his win paved the way for many pivotal decisions.  Which makes me wonder if the judiciary wasn't the real reason for the deep state's ongoing meltdown that started in November of 2016.  

Implementation of fundamental transformation needs the courts, bigly.  Never mind covering up the "means" to achieve it.  i.e. None of this stuff sees the light of day if Trump doesn't win in 2016.

[ScarletHayes]

Case in point.

[ScarletHayes]

Move over "fake electors." We may now have fake members of the House Ways and Means Committee.

This is a lawyer, not a well placed govt official. Her azz may actually be in a real ringer.



A member of Hunter Biden's legal team may soon find herself in hot water after allegedly pretending to be from the House Ways and Means Committee during a phone call with the court clerk.

Internet sleuths noted earlier this week that Latham and Watkins lawyer Jessica Bengels, who works on Hunter Biden's legal team, apparently called the clerks for U.S. District Judge Maryellen Norieka, who is currently overseeing the criminal tax evasion case against the president's son, and asked for the clerk to place the House Ways and Means Committee's Amicus Brief under seal. Reportedly, Bengels falsely told the clerk that she was doing this at the behest of the House Ways and Means Committee, which is also investigating Hunter Biden's business dealings.

https://www.theblaze.com/news/senator-ca...-committee

[ChinaBuck]

Move over "fake electors."  We may now have fake members of the House Ways and Means Committee. 

This is a lawyer, not a well placed govt official.  Her azz may actually be in a real ringer.



A member of Hunter Biden's legal team may soon find herself in hot water after allegedly pretending to be from the House Ways and Means Committee during a phone call with the court clerk.

Internet sleuths noted earlier this week that Latham and Watkins lawyer Jessica Bengels, who works on Hunter Biden's legal team, apparently called the clerks for U.S. District Judge Maryellen Norieka, who is currently overseeing the criminal tax evasion case against the president's son, and asked for the clerk to place the House Ways and Means Committee's Amicus Brief under seal. Reportedly, Bengels falsely told the clerk that she was doing this at the behest of the House Ways and Means Committee, which is also investigating Hunter Biden's business dealings.

https://www.theblaze.com/news/senator-ca...-committee

Yeah, I saw this a couple of days ago. Super sleazy. The law firm said it was due to a miscommunication. Hmmm...? You don't say.

[TroyKidd]

Ziegler on CNN w/Poppy Harlow.  I don't think the cat can be put back in the bag...

There's video at the link below, but here's the transcript:

Harlow: You have questioned whether David Weiss had full authority. And in that part of the letter I read to you, he she believes and he said to Congress in this letter that that he does. Do you believe that someone stopped David Weiss?

Ziegler: So all I can go back to is what we stated in our testimony. We know that the Department of Justice went to the DC US Attorney’s Office to bring the 2014 and 2015 felony and misdemeanor tax charges there. They said no. We also know that he went to the District of California, a President Biden appointed US attorney two to charge that case, the felony and misdemeanor charges there. He was told no. So all along, we’re we’re trying to defend these charges in the different venues.

Harlow: That is just the response to that has been that has been contested, that assertion that he went elsewhere and was prevented by by the attorney general. You know, this case, as you well know, because you were lead on it for two years, this this investigation went on under the Trump administration. And Bill Barr in December of 2020 said this about it, he said, I think to the extent there’s an investigation, I think it’s being handled responsibly and professionally. He went on to say that he sees no reason to appoint a special counsel. Why was this not charged in those two years? And do you disagree with what Bill Barr asserted there?

Ziegler: Yes. I don’t know what basis for that statement, and I’m not going to speculate as to why. What I can tell you is that after D.C. said no IRS agents on the team, including the FBI, we were trying to figure out internally how to bring on a special counsel. We already saw that there was improper things being done. And as law enforcement officers, we make an oath to the office to do the right thing. I think that’s so important, regardless of your political affiliation, regardless of what your political beliefs are. We have to be impartial and we have to be fair to taxpayers, people that are paying their fair share of taxes. And in this case, we wanted we thought all along that that David Weiss was going to do the right thing for the right reasons. I can recall saying that so many times. But when he only charged two misdemeanor counts and did not charge the felony when the felony charges were recommended for approval, that I’m sorry, we’re not treating taxpayers the same.

Harlow: Two more quick questions for you. And look, it takes a lot of guts. I just want to note this for our audience. It takes a lot of guts. I know you’ve said you’re worried that your job was on the line when you came out here publicly to testify to final questions for you. One is, how do you know David Weiss and his team aren’t doing that now? Clearly, the investigation is still ongoing.

Ziegler: So you are correct. I was removed from the team May 15th. I wasn’t provided with a reason why. I don’t know. Yeah, I do not know that answer. But what I what I’m asking for is we need to have someone with independent authority, with full authority, that special counsel authority that can charge that in venues outside of the District of Delaware.

Harlow: The one thing I would just say about special counsel so people understand the difference here is David Weiss is a Trump appointed U.S. attorney, has the authority to follow leads where they will take him and his team, a special counsel, the way the way that that operates. They have to operate within sort of the four corners of what an attorney general sets for them. And if they want to expand the investigation, they have to go back to the A.G., get permission to do that and keep going. So there is the argument to be made that actually David Weiss has more independence here.

Ziegler: So the fact that he that is being stated that he has more independence, I would go to to President Biden, U.S. attorneys both saying no to bringing charges in their districts and the charges not being brought. Like like we said, it’s in Department of Justice tax manual. It’s in their tax manual that you have to charge the felony with the misdemeanor. You have taxpayers who are right now in New England that were charged. These are fishermen. It’s a fishermen case. They were charged with misdemeanor and felony tax charges for failing to file tax returns. I’m sure that those people would like the same agreement that that that Hunter got in this situation. And that’s my argument, is we have to treat people the same in our investigations and how we move forward those investigations.

Harlow: And to the point that you’re making, the allegation that they were blocked by other U.S. attorneys. That has been contested by their office. Joseph, thank you for your time this morning.

Ziegler: Thank you so much for having me, Poppy.

https://www.mediaite.com/tv/poppy-harlow...s_redirect

Just imagine this type of conversation taking place before Mueller was appointed.  Sure, there was SOME talk of this sort of thing AFTER Mueller was done….  Even there, Nothing even remotely close to this

[TroyKidd]

How is there NOT an IMMEDIATE response to what is happening here from the halls of congress??

When it was first rumored that Trump was in bed with Russia…. You don’t
F around with that. You get to it NOW. And they did. I supported it. It would be over quick if he was and it wasn’t.

Here we have the same thing in opposite