Editor, Times-Union:
Last week we saw Hunter Biden sitting in the Congressional hearing about holding him in contempt of Congress for not going to a closed-door hearing about his business deals with other countries and his dad's involvement in the businesses a crack-smoking whoremongering, man would normally not be allowed to be a part of. If he does appear before a Congressional committee, Democrats have said he can refuse to testify by "taking the Fifth." But that can only happen if he is allowed to violate the provisions of the Fifth Amendment.
The Fifth Amendment states that no person can be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against themselves without due process of law. According to Congress, if a person understands why he is being charged with a crime, according to the grammatically correct reading of the Fifth Amendment, he can be compelled to testify against himself since a Congressional hearing in Hunter's case is due process of law. For him to "take the Fifth," if applied correctly, he would be forced to testify or be held in contempt of Congress which means he would have to be thrown behind bars. For him to get away with not testifying means he thinks he is above the law and as Nancy Pelosi said, no one is above the law. That must be applied to Hunter. If Attorney General Garland allows Hunter to violate the Fifth, that would mean Garland is violating the Constitution he has sworn to uphold.
Since the Fifth Amendment was adopted into the Constitution, judges and lawyers have been allowed to misread it and criminals that have been tried in courts (due process of law) that have refused to testify have violated the Fifth Amendment. A judge that was involved in a trial against people that robbed an armored car gave me a dirty look when I told him how to properly interpret the Fifth Amendment.
So if Hunter "takes the Fifth" and refuses to testify because it might get his dad in trouble, he should be put behind bars for Contempt of Congress just like Trump supporters that have done the same thing have been. Hunter is not above the law. And just because a wrong has been considered right for over 200 years doesn't mean it is right. That also applies to hatred for the Jews that has gone on for thousands of years.
Rick Badman
Warsaw, via email