What To Do About Hunter Biden

The president's son is a huge liability. But Joe Biden has no good options.

Let me start by saying that I am generally disgusted by Hunter Biden. Yes, addiction is a rough animal. Yes, Hunter faced more than his fair share of trauma in his young years. Yes, the GOP and right-wing media have used Hunter Biden as a political cudgel, and yes they have turned personal misdeeds into political albatrosses, and yes many of their attacks are far beyond the scope of political fair play, and yes their impeachment inquiry is an absolute farce and an embarrassment.

But a small fraction of the concerns about Hunter Biden are valid. And regardless of whether the right plays fair — they don’t — Hunter is the president’s son. He is a 53-year-old man who is old enough to understand what that means. He has, by all accounts, been loved and supported. He has been given endless opportunities, many of them unearned, and endless chances, despite seemingly endless screwups. And still, he makes decisions that devastate his family and that imperil the career of the person who has done the most for him.

I struggle to wrap my mind around a man like Hunter Biden, who meets his father’s grace and generosity with such selfishness. While I can feel for anyone who fights against the disease of addiction, I also really find it difficult to feel sorry for Hunter Biden. I really wish he would grow up, take some responsibility, and get his act together. I wish he demonstrated the kind of decency, integrity, loyalty, or even just bare-bones basic concern his father has shown him. I wish he wasn’t such a bad-decision machine, for the good of his family and for the good of the American public.

I’m not sure, though, what exactly Joe Biden is supposed to do about any of it.