Although, as I often write, I do not have any dog in any fight in the US or non-African issues, I do dabble in writing about them, but only in the context in which they relate to Africa.
President Biden pardoning his son, Hunter (who, after stuffing his nose with cocaine, literally and figuratively hunted people, children and all) is a case in point. Many Africans see the US as one shiny city on a hill. These people have been so brainwashed into thinking that Uncle Sam is one flawless paradise on earth.
Many African nations cut and pasted significant portions of their constitutions from the US Constitution without expending efforts like the intellectual giants who crafted the Federal Papers. It is in the hands of these lazybones, who imposed on us alien socio-economic cum political systems without any traditional inputs that the future of our continent has been entrusted with the tragic consequences that we all see around us to
Let’s not forget that many African Political Scientists (a joke if you asked me since there is nothing remotely scientific about politics) earned their degrees from studying the American “democratic” system, in quote because, were the truth to be told Plutocracy (government by the wealthy) is what best describe what the US practice. The last election only amplified this.
We have some Africans who also berate everything about their countries, especially the justice system, and point to the US as an example of a country that practices the rule of law.
Blessed are the ignorant.
From the 630-page report on his laptop, Hunter Biden was charged with 191 sex crimes, 128 drug offenses, and a whopping 140 business crimes, yet he gets a pardon from his Dad for offenses that could have gotten people life sentences if not the electric chair. It is impossible to watch the guy’s sickening videos without wincing. Yet, he got FULL pardon from his father who happened to be the President of the United States of America, the bestest democracy in the world with the greatest judicial system ever invented by humans.
The Western media would have roasted us were this to have happened in Africa.
As a student of American politics, I find nothing new or surprising about President Biden’s actions. His entire political career was built on lies and corruption. How a man with his record got to lead America should tell us about the corrupt system that American media sold to the rest of us as a good model.
Of course, we can say the same thing we say about Biden also about Mr Donald Trump.
In this analysis, I will explore President Biden’s career and examine how he has promoted corrupt politics to the levels of praxis. This has culminated in his and his family’s financial entanglements in Ukraine, which have led the world to the worst nuclear confrontation since the Cuba crisis of 1962.
Corrupt allegations against Biden, a professional politician with no other job, span his decades-long political career. They reveal a troubling pattern of ethical lapses and vast corruption. Early in his career, he was plagued by plagiarism scandals, which graduated to accusations of cronyism, influence peddling, and financial misconduct.
His career has been so marked by repeated controversies that it suggests a willful desire to pursue politics that prioritize personal and family interests over public service.
Biden’s first brush with controversy occurred during his ill-fated 1988 presidential campaign. As a relatively young senator from Delaware, Biden’s rented mouths presented himself as a charismatic and visionary politician capable of uniting Americans.
However, the campaign quickly unraveled after revelations that he had plagiarized parts of his speeches, appropriating significant portions from speeches made by the late British Labour Party leader, Neil Kinnock. Biden’s rosy speech described his family history and upbringing in terms strikingly similar to Kinnock’s.
The press (there was still serious journalism in those days!) went to town and discovered that Biden had also plagiarized during law school, where he borrowed large portions of his academic works.
Shamefaced, Biden apologized and withdrew from the race. The scandal, however, left a permanent blemish on his reputation. This should have warned people that Biden was willing to bend ethical norms for political gains. It became a pattern that would resurfaced and troubled his entire career.
During Biden’s lengthy tenure (36 years, 13 days – see here: https://www.senate.gov/senators/longest_serving_senators.htm) as a senator from Delaware, a hub for corporate registration, became synonymous with Biden’s cozy relationships with powerful business interests. He was accused of chronic cronyism, using his position to benefit family, friends, and donors.
One early example involved Biden’s ties to credit card companies headquartered in his state. He supported the 2005 Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act, which was favorable to the financial services industry. The bill, widely criticized for protecting corporate creditors at the expense of ordinary citizens, made it harder for ordinary Americans to declare bankruptcy. Biden’s strong advocacy for the bill reflected the interests of his campaign donors, not his constituents.
The media also revealed lucrative consulting contracts awarded to Biden’s family members, which often seemed to coincide with Biden’s support for policies beneficial to the companies in question, raising concerns about conflicts of interest.
What became apparent was that the fortunes of Biden’s family members rose in proportion to the advancement of his political career. His son, Hunter Biden, became controversial, particularly during Biden’s tenure as vice president under President Barack Obama.
Hunter, with no experience, was catapulted to the Ukrainian energy company Burisma Holdings board on a $50,000 monthly salary. It was obvious that this was a clear, crude attempt by Burisma to curry favor with Joe Biden, who at the time was deeply involved in U.S. – Ukraine relations as vice president. He was tasked with overseeing U.S. policy in Ukraine, a role that became increasingly significant after Russia annexed Crimea in 2014.
Biden frequently traveled to Ukraine, where he advocated for reforms in the fight against corruption and removing corrupt officials. In 2016, Biden famously pressured Ukraine to fire its top prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, threatening to withhold $1 billion in U.S. loan guarantees if Shokin was not removed. Biden later bragged about the episode during a public event, claiming, “I said, ‘You’re not getting the billion dollars.’”
Of course, Mr Shokin’s version of events differs significantly from Biden’s narrations.
Biden’s controversial relationship with Ukraine deepened after he became president in 2021. His administration moved quickly to provide Ukraine with tens of billions of dollars in military and financial aid. While much of this aid was justified as part of the effort to defend Ukraine against Russian aggression, questions linger about how these funds were managed and whether Biden or his associates benefited financially.
Although he has no expertise in either field, Hunter Biden has been involved in contracts related to Ukrainian reconstruction and energy development. Many individuals close to the Biden administration have also been accused of profiting from U.S. assistance to Ukraine.
Critical questions were also raised about whether Biden’s gung-ho promotion of the war in Ukraine was to further US geopolitical interests or to buttress Biden’s bank accounts, family, and cronies.
Hunter did not limit his ventures to Ukraine; he parlayed his father’s name and influence to pursue lucrative business ventures in China.
More damning were some emails found on Hunter’s laptop, which allegedly referenced a financial arrangement involving “10% for the big guy,” which many interpreted as a reference to his father, Joe Biden. The president dodged the bullet of impeachment because the media chose to bury the story instead of amplifying it.
Hunter was not the only one of the Biden family members to benefit from Joe Biden’s political influence. His brother, James Biden, was also accused of leveraging his connection to secure contracts in the construction and healthcare industries.
The long arc of Joe Biden’s political career, which spans over five decades, not only tells a story of corruption, contradictions, and shifting allegiances but also shows the history of an unethical individual with rank racism.
Let’s shed some light on Biden’s past, which makes us wonder why most members of the Black commentariat lack the will to do basic research before taking positions on issues like their uncritical support for Joe Biden.
Delaware, where Biden began his political career, remains a state that is troubled with its racial past. Although it remained in the Union during the Civil War, Delaware was a slave-holding state deeply entrenched in racial inequalities. The post-Civil War Delaware doggedly resisted the progress of Reconstruction and became a bastion of segregationist policies. For much of the 20th century, the State upheld systemic racism in housing, education, and employment. Wilmington, Delaware’s largest city, became a focal point for racial unrest in the 1960s. The National Guard was drafted to occupy the city for nine months after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
In the early 1970s, a young Joe Biden launched his political career in this racially charged atmosphere, which coincided with national debates over civil rights, desegregation, and busing.
Like most white politicians of the era, Biden’s approach to these issues mirrored the sentiments of the white working-class voters who feared the social changes sweeping the country.
As a senator, Biden’s track record on race-related legislation reveals a pattern of prioritizing political expediency over moral clarity. In his long political career, Biden never showed a concern or commitment to either ethics or morality. He never exhibited strong intellectual or philosophical commitment to what is right or wrong, simply whether or not he can personally benefit from them.
Biden staunchly opposed busing as a means of desegregating schools. In the 1970s, he aligned himself with segregationist senators like Strom Thurmond and James Eastland, co-sponsoring legislation that limited federal authority to enforce busing.
In 1977, Biden defended his stance by saying, “I do not buy the concept, popular in the ‘60s, which said, ‘We have suppressed the black man for 300 years, and the white man is now far ahead in the race for everything our society offers. In order to even the score, we must now give the black man a head start or even hold the white man back to even the race.’”
Beyond busing, Biden’s role in crafting the 1994 Crime Bill remains one of the most damaging aspects of his legacy. Officially titled the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, this legislation expanded mandatory minimum sentences, escalated the war on drugs, and funneled billions of dollars into the construction of prisons. Millions of African-Americans were incarcerated during this period for offense that were considerably lower than what Joe Biden offered his son FULL Presidential Pardon. I chronicled this in my article, The American Gulag, https://alaye.biz/the-american-gulag/
While Biden claimed the bill was necessary to curb violent crime, its devastating impact on Black and Latino communities has been widely documented. Biden’s own words during the debate over the bill reveal an embrace of racially coded rhetoric. “We must take back the streets. They are beyond the pale. Many of them are predators.”
Do the Black commentators who defend Biden ever heard of these? Or did they, as always, turn the other cheek when people of a lighter hue offered the insults?
His support for institutional racism aside, Biden has a history of making racially insensitive remarks. For example, in the 2007 Democratic primary, he infamously described Barack Obama as “the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy.”
This remark was so paternalistic and condescending that many Black Americans refused to accept his apology.
Another revealing moment came during the 2020 presidential campaign when Biden was widely criticized for its arrogant presumption about Black voters’ loyalties and its dismissal of legitimate concerns about his record. Listen to him: “If you have a problem figuring out whether you’re for me or Trump, then you ain’t Black.”
Biden’s tenure as vice president to Barack Obama is often cited as evidence of his progressive evolution on racial issues. However, their relationship was certainly not one made in heaven, and it was far more complex than the public bromance often portrayed. Reports during Obama’s tenure suggest that Biden often chafed under the leadership of America’s first Black president.
In his book, Battle for the Soul, Journalist Edward-Isaac Dovere alleges Biden harbored resentment toward Obama, particularly during policy debates where he felt marginalized.
Obama himself reportedly had doubts about Biden’s judgment and discipline. According to Dovere, Obama remarked during the 2020 Democratic primary, “Don’t underestimate Joe’s ability to f** things up.”*
This skepticism stemmed from Biden’s propensity for gaffes (far too numerous to recount here) and his inconsistent record on key issues, including race.
Pundits noted that while Obama ultimately endorsed Biden in 2020, he waited until it became clear that Biden was the presumptive nominee.
It is a triumph of media propaganda that a man like Joe Biden – an amoral, unethical racist careerist with little to recommend him became the leader of the United States, which arguably remains the most powerful country in the world.
What baffles me greatly is that many Africans continue to look up to a country that chose to be led by a man with the integrity of a famished hyena. It is also beyond comprehension that many Africans continue to spend time studying the complete BS humanities that Western scholars continue to fob off as great scholarship.
©️ Fẹ̀mi Akọ̀mọ̀làfẹ̀(Farmer, Writer, Published Author, Essayist, and Social Commentator.)
My latest book, From Stamp to Click (it’s still a hello) is published and is available online at:
https://www.africanbookscollective.com/books/from-stamp-to-click-its-still-hello
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