I know HN isn't really the place for this, but since you asked and I did a fairly deep dive into this just to know what's going on, here's what seems to have happened, complete with evidence to the contrary:

From Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viktor_Shokin:

> Shokin claimed in May 2019 that he had been investigating Burisma Holdings.[28][29][30][31] However, Vitaliy Kasko, who had been Shokin's deputy overseeing international cooperation before resigning in February 2016 citing corruption in the office, provided documents to Bloomberg News indicating that under Shokin, the investigation into Burisma had been dormant.[32] Also, the investigation into Burisma only pertained to events happening before Hunter Biden joined the company.[33]

I believe that's true, and the cited sources seem to check out, and predate this whole scandal. It's worth noting that a lot of these Ukrainian politicians are pretty sketchy and they have a big problem with corruption, so there are other geopolitical interests at play with these Ukrainian political figures.

To be sure I'm not being duped by Wikipedia, I find Google News searches for articles about the key players in any controversy that were published before the MSM started caring give a way clearer picture of what's going on. It can help you figure out who's spinning what.

It's helpful to know that Shokin was widely condemned for being a corrupt prosecutor that, ironically, wasn't pursuing corruption cases against political allies. From March 2016: https://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/europe/eu-hails-sackin... It's pretty clear that Shokin was a known corrupt actor, for real reasons, prompting domestic and European outrage in ways that Biden would have had great difficulty manufacturing.

In May 2019, there was also a controversy in Ukraine that Lutsenko (the new prosecutor) was acting improperly by manufacturing allegations against Biden: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-05-13/ukraine-p...

By July, Trump's pressure was working: https://www.unian.info/world/10630023-lutsenko-shokin-help-t...

I don't read Ukrainian, so some of the local reporting isn't clear to me, but the English reporting from Ukraine seems like they're telling the whole story as they know it.

Also, from US reporting: https://eu.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2019/10/02/donald-trum...

> Joe Biden said he has never spoken to his son about the directorship. Hunter Biden told the New Yorker that his father simply said, "I hope you know what you are doing."

Joe knows his kid is a fuckup that's trying to cash in on the family name. I don't think he would stake his reputation on doing something corrupt for his kid and then brag about it. It's far more likely that was Joe is just bragging about his own amazing diplomacy skills. In reality, he was just doing what the administration told him to do, after the groundwork to remove Shokin had been being laid by EU and Ukranian interests way in advance.

It's pretty clear that Hunter Biden was never being investigated, but the likely-corrupt gas company did have a prior history of being investigated for corruption issues. It's also clear that Hunter Biden has skated by his whole life on being Joe Biden's kid, and his moral compass may be lacking. There is no evidence that Joe was actually involved in anything corrupt.

Additionally, there's a raging debate on the left about how what Hunter Biden did is completely unacceptable, but not illegal: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/09/hunter-bid...

The unfortunate truth is that Hunter's actions probably were legal, and that's a real problem, but you can't condemn Joe for his kid trying to cash in on the family name.

So yes, the video of Joe Biden isn't great, but it's because he was bragging about how great he is at negotiating in a Q&A section. And really, he was taking credit for other people's work to remove Shokin, even if he actually was the final tipping point in making Ukraine take action. Not one of his finer moments, but it's not the admission of corruption you think it is.

Here's the full video at the time you're referencing. If you watch more of it, he's actually pretty informed about this whole Ukraine/Russia business: https://youtu.be/Q0_AqpdwqK4?t=3100

The bit you're referring to is at the tail-end of the Q&A and he's obviously loosened up a bit before he starts telling his likely-exaggerated war story about getting Shokin fired.