Yes, Hunter Biden Matters
Whether a Delaware laptop can be linked to the Bidens — or not — there is no mistaking the impact of Burisma on 2020 politics.
A good story always beats a good argument.
This was the central tenet of Walter Fisher’s scholarly career.
Fisher repeatedly posited the predominance of a narrative paradigm over the accepted “rational world” paradigm that held sway since the time of Plato. To paraphrase:
- Humans interpret the world through stories.
- Their decisions — thought to be rational — are based on each individual’s understanding of history and culture, on perceptions of others, all of which are incomplete, subjective . . . imperfect.
- Narrative “rationality” only requires such stories be consistent within themselves, and to resemble the lived experiences of the listener.
In brief: a good story will be more convincing than most any sound, fact-based argument.
The story of Hunter Biden and Burisma Holdings is more significant than the sum of its clunky parts. And, for some of the allegations, clunky is quite charitable.
Within a month of the election, White House lawyers handed materials to the Wall Street Journal, but it took a lesser paper — and a lesser lawyer — to get the story they wanted published.
Rudy Giuliani said he brought the alleged emails and photos to the New York Post because “either nobody else would take it, or if they took it, they would spend all the time they could to try to contradict it before they put it out.”
You know — fact-checking.
To that end, the New York Times — a far more reputable publication — tells us the lead author refused to put his name on the story because of his “concerns over the article’s credibility.”
The people credited in his stead:
1] a deputy editor unaware of her inclusion until after the fact (she a former associate producer of Sean Hannity’s show on Fox);
2] a woman with no previous bylines, yet notable Instagram photos with Sarah Sanders, and with Steve Bannon, who was a listed source for the story.
The story was released, nevertheless — albeit in a tabloid owned by Fox’s Rupert Murdoch, with its own writer meekly choosing to remain anonymous.
In addition, an effective October surprise would ideally be . . . well, a surprise. In January, Russian hackers breached Burisma’s servers and US intelligence analysts had been expecting this data dump since September. To them, it was a matter of when, not if.
For a narrative to be effective, according to Fisher, the characters must show continuity in action and motive. Without admitted, documented past drug use by Hunter Biden, the entire affair would be a smear of enormous proportions, a trigger for libel suits, and an untouchable prospect, even for the sensationalistic New York Post.
In the same breath, much of said continuity is far from organic. Lev Parnas, assisting Giuliani in the Biden ‘dirt’ treasure hunt since 2018, stated Rudy was told of these explicit photos and private emails on May 30 — of 2019, no less.
It is also perilous to think too critically on the timeline (if the laptop was given to the FBI last December, why notify them again?) or the technical oddities presumed by the tale of the laptop repairman. [Question: do you usually have access to old emails when you are offline? Do you make a habit of downloading and saving scores of years-old business messages to read without an internet connection?]
Ax-grinders aside, the rest of us certainly play our part. The Hunter Biden story still lives because Americans gave it oxygen. It is suggested the digital gatekeepers, trying to contain misinformation, only brought it more attention; that ignores the ongoing battles waged continually on foreign election interference, by companies like Facebook and Twitter (a war being lost since 2015). In consuming and spreading questionable information to this day, it seems we have moved the truth needle in the wrong direction, if anything, since the last presidential election.
Partisans knowingly use repetition in campaign slogans and messaging, because it works. Yet getting a reiteration effect boost during the inquiry and articles of impeachment was beyond their wildest dreams: the name Hunter Biden became widely known (when the President was impeached for withholding money in exchange for help promoting the exact same scandal now professed so readily). Irony be damned, every Burisma, Biden and Hunter transcribed into the official record helped add itself to our collective psyche and, in turn, to its fake air of legitimacy.
This is also the reason the Democrat has not used impeachment as a weapon in campaign messaging. Even though Trump is the first impeached president ever to try to be re-elected, Joe Biden cannot mention the word without also calling to mind thoughts of his son and his alleged scheme involving Ukraine. So that double-edged sword, probably the best rhetorical weapon at his disposal, remains utterly sheathed. As a bonus, the waters had been muddied so the “Ukraine scandal” of Trump’s quid pro quo can just as easily be linked to Biden.
Had Trump not irrevocably changed U.S. politics, Hunter Biden would have been a footnote known only to the ‘dark web.’ Now, despite Joe’s consistent and categorical denials of every salacious accusation, conspiracy theory is heard everywhere, from video chats to venerable halls of government.
The Hunter Biden story matters because we let it. We retell it, share it, and decide the mere possibility of its validity is somehow equivalent to a myriad of documented scandals, affairs and assaults from Joe’s opponent (not offspring but the candidate himself).
It matters because we (and the media and opposition party) are complicit in expecting lies and cover-up; we ask that a candidate try to prove his innocence rather than ask why spurious claims have so conveniently appeared, at just the right moment. Perhaps too much time has passed since Russell’s teapot illustrated that the burden of proof rests on those who make the claims — this is why there is no such thing as a “burden of disproof.”
Burisma and Hunter Biden matter because we have yet to learn the lessons of 2016, ever responsive to refrains of “secret emails.”
The story matters because we will accept help from enemies who would defile and destroy our democracy rather than admit we were wrong.
It matters because we will love and trust a good story to the bitter end. And a bitter end is nigh, unless we bring ourselves to reject Trump’s fanciful version of events — his MAGA story.
We must resist the pull of the story. We must return to rationality. We must admit, once and for all:
Donald Trump is anathema to the values, security and prosperity of America.
