[Amezarak]

The NBC story is about a completely separate incident. It has nothing to do with the laptop.

The contents of the laptop are not "fake news." At least one email has had its DKIM signature verified. Multiple people who were copied on the emails have verified their authenticity. The pictures and videos of Hunter Biden on the laptop speak for themselves.

It is entirely possible that the story of how the laptop was acquired is at least partially fake, but there's no actual evidence of that, and some evidence pointing the other way - why would Biden's lawyer ask the computer shop owner for the laptop if he didn't have it, and Biden if Biden thought he didn't have it?

This story is truly shocking to me, not so much for the allegations of corruption, which are neither surprising nor interesting, but for the willful blindness of so many very smart people who are using a lot of brainpower to rationalize it away.

[evgen]

And yet none of the actually damaging or morally questionable emails have available DKIM signatures that can be verified. How funny that is. Almost as if the liars who wish to continue pushing this bit of political disinformation are unable to actually provide the info and are just hoping that people accept their unfounded claims. It worked before with Hillary and the Podesta emails, so I guess these agents thought it would be easy to repeat the same playbook but are so lazy that they could not even do the basic opsec legwork to make the claim hold together.

It is not shocking that there are so many useful idiots around the world (and here) that are willing to keep talking up this obvious disinformation. What is shocking is how lazy they are and how stupid they seem to think the rest of us are.

[Amezarak]

The “opportunity to meet” email originally cited by the Post has had its DKIm signature verified. You can find the links throughout this thread and through google.

The goalposts keep moving on this story, which has already been verified far beyond most of the scandals reported by the press in recent years.

None of the counternarrative even makes any sense. It’s all fake! Well, here’s a zillion extremely private photos of Hunter Biden. Where did they came from if it’s not his laptop? The emails are fake! Well, here’s some of the correspondents verifying the authenticity of the emails - which is all the verification usually required. Where’s the DKIM signatures! Well, here’s one that was verified. Some of them are fake! Okay. Has anyone ever applied this level of skepticism to any other story that has ever come out?

Why is it even surprising to anyone that this story would be true? Nobody disputes that Hunter Biden was paid enormous sums of money over the years despite his character and qualifications, and it’s all been widely reported. What did anyone think was going on there? How do people think high-level politicians and their families are leaving office so much richer than they came into it? The denials are almost shockingly naive - “we looked at Joe Biden’s financial disclosures and this isn’t there.” Well, gee, what a shocker he didn’t lay out grey area business dealings for the world to see - nobody does. Anyone who knows a drug addict can hear the ring of truth in Hunter’s self-martrying texts about how Joe makes him give him half his income.

How is it rational to conclude that everything contrary to the favored narrative must be disinformation propagated by highly competent operatives of a has-been midrate regional mafia state power with absolutely no evidence? How does that not reek of the disinformation long favored by the US “intelligence community”?

The complaints about the provenance are one thing, but it’s hard to explain why the FBI subpoenaed the laptop from the store owner, or why Biden’s lawyer tried to get it back. And what does it matter if the information is true, anyway?

[evgen]

It is truly amazing the lengths to which people like you will continue to lie and dissemble for the sake of this false narrative. Not surprising really, but just sad.

The emails that have been verified are bush league vague messages that lack even verification that they went anywhere but straight to the spam folder. Where are the responses indicating the messages were read? Where is the DKIM on any of the emails that suggest impropriety? Oh yeah, you don't have any. No one is moving goalposts, we are clearly stating that you haven't made any forward progress at all and are nowhere near scoring any points.

The best part of all of this is that you and all of the other little Trumpkins have wasted so much social capital pimping these dumb conspiracy theories that the rest of us can easily ignore you going forward. As unpleasant as the past four years have been, one minor upside to the experience is that it revealed many of the truly deplorable among us.

[Amezarak]

I am sorry you feel that way. I am struggling to see how I can bridge this gap.

This is the link verifying the “opportunities” email. It also explains DKIM issues with other emails.

https://github.com/robertdavidgraham/hunter-dkim

I am truly having trouble understanding how this is a conspiracy theory. The alternative seems to require a massive conspiracy involving foreign intelligence agencies planting false information with true information - I mean, you don’t doubt the pictures, right? Moreover, the “false” information is not anything groundbreaking, it’s almost all the same information already reported by mainstream outlets with a few new bits added. And they somehow convinced other correspondents on the emails to come forward and speak lies? publicly. How is this not conspiratorial thinking?

Do you approach Trump stories with the same level of skepticism? For example, how do we know the tax returns are real? Absolutely nobody has confirmed them except anonymous sources speaking to the NYT.

[evgen]

The 'opportunities' email itself means nothing, which is why this whole exercise is laughable. What is being questioned is the rest of the so-called email dump. Emails that actually suggest damaging claims and which would be worth looking into. How strange it is that people like you cannot seem to come up with answers on those. It is so easy do to, just provide the full emails so that we can all continue to see the content and context of the entire conversation.

I could easily send you an email from my gmail account asking if you have managed to get burn all of the films Epstein made of you and those little kids on his island. It too would have a valid DKIM signature. Now show me the follow up from Hunter, or even proof the message was actually seen by him. If an actual hard drive was possessed as claimed then this would be trivial. The fact that it is not available is damning in this case. As has been noted repeatedly in this case an equally likely source of this data is an iCloud hack for some pics and the known hack of Burisma a while back. Mix in some fake messages and then add useful idiots who are willing to believe anything if it supports their cause.

Thankfully this story will return to obscurity along with the partisan hacks trying to push it. It was a lame attempt at an 'October surprise', it was executed poorly, and thankfully this time the means of viral distribution of same was limited while everyone looked into the story and then had a good laugh.