This is getting pretty wild, especially considering how early on in the game we are. It is merely the 27th of December. Donald Trump doesn’t put his hand on the Bible (please God, don’t let it be one of *his* Bibles) for almost another month. Yet the best laid plans of Musk and men are going all to hell right now. And Elon’s true character is beginning to shine out. He doesn’t have a thick enough skin to be in politics, me thinks. He likes the fanfare and the attention, the roaring crowds, but the flip side of that is living in a fishbowl where your every comment is dissected and your every move is criticized. If you can’t take that in stride, politics is not the field for you to be in.
I’m running out of popcorn🍿 pic.twitter.com/re0GpK4CMO
— Republicans against Trump (@RpsAgainstTrump) December 28, 2024
Full disclosure: I’m not finding this in Musk’s feed which either means he deleted it, or this is fake. But this isn’t the only proof that Musk is coming apart at the seams. So take this one tweet with a grain of salt and look at the overall picture.
Question is are we gonna find him with Kleenex boxes on his feet when he passes away? LMFAO
Or perhaps before that, but after Royal Ketamine overdose?
Confusing times, I tell ya.— marebare (@BrueyMary) December 28, 2024
This next one is definitely real. This is pinned at the top of Musk’s account.
America rose to greatness over the past 150 years, because it was a meritocracy more than anywhere else on Earth.
I will fight to my last drop of blood to ensure that it remains that land of freedom and opportunity.
🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸 https://t.co/IYfbxzwOMm
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 28, 2024
If you hit the link in the tweet that Musk references you’ll see that it quotes a statistic of only 6% of white males getting new jobs, the inference being a slam on DEI. So this is white male patriarchy we are talking about here.
Musk is wrong that America was always a meritocracy. We’ve had our fair share of political scandals (Teapot Dome) and robber barons. That’s not a recent development.
And Musk totally fails to look at the fact that WWII was a global reorganization and after WWII America grew the biggest middle class in the history of the world. Meritocracy, yes. But also a time of opportunity and affordability like we do not see the likes of these days.
Musk is basically propagandizing DEI and immigrants because that’s part of the overall mantra of MAGA these days. And the H1-B visas and Vivek Ramaswamy’s ravings about the inferiority of American culture are not helping Musk’s situation right now.
Civil war has broken out within the MAGA Republicans. On the one side are the traditional MAGAs, who tend to be white, anti-immigrant, and less educated than the rest of the U.S. They believe that the modern government’s protection of equal rights for women and minorities has ruined America, and they tend to want to isolate the U.S. from the rest of the world. They make up Trump’s voting base.
On the other side are the new MAGAs who appear to have taken control of the incoming Trump administration. Led by Elon Musk, who bankrolled Trump’s campaign, the new MAGA wing is made up of billionaires, especially tech entrepreneurs, many of whom are themselves immigrants.
During the campaign, these two wings made common cause because they both want to destroy the current U.S. government, especially as President Joe Biden had been using it to strengthen American democracy. Traditional MAGA wants to get rid of the government that protects equality and replace it with one that enforces white male supremacy and Christianity. New MAGA—which some have started to call DOGE, after the Department of Government Efficiency run by Musk and pharmaceutical entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy—wants to get rid of the government that regulates business, especially technology, and protects American interests against competition from countries like China.
Their shared commitment to the destruction of the current government is about the only overlap between these two factions. […]
On Wednesday, December 25—Christmas, a major holiday for MAGA supporters—Musk took a stand against Loomer and the MAGAs. He posted on X that the U.S. needs twice the number of engineers it has, and welcomed foreign engineers. “The number of people who are super talented engineers AND super motivated in the USA is far too low,” he tweeted. “Think of this like a pro sports team: if you want your TEAM to win the championship, you need to recruit top talent wherever they may be. That enables the whole TEAM to win.”
Loomer responded: “Is DOGE real? Or is it a vanity project?” Others complained about the “Tech Bros” “hubris [and] arrogance with their flippant, condescending, and elitist responses to legitimate criticisms of the H1B1 program.” Still others pointed out that there were big layoffs in tech this year and asked why they weren’t getting rehired if there was such a desperate need for workers.
Musk posted: “Investing in Americans is actually hard. Really hard. It costs money and time and effort to make a person productive. It’s a short term net loss. It’s much easier to bring in skilled workers who might not do quite a good a job [sic], but will work for a fraction of the cost and be happy just to be here.”
Loomer responded: “The elephant in the room is that [Musk], who is not MAGA and never has been, is a total f*cking drag on the Trump transition. He’s a stage 5 clinger who over stayed his welcome at Mar a Lago in an effort to become Trump’s side piece and be the point man for all of his accomplices in big Tech to slither in to Mar a Lago.” [sic]
Musk called Loomer a troll, and she responded that “Telling the truth isn’t trolling… You bought your way into MAGA 5 minutes ago…. We all know you only donated your money so you could influence immigration policy and protect your buddy Xi JinPing.”
Thursday everything broke open. Ramaswamy, who was born in Ohio to parents who immigrated to America from India, posted on X an indictment of American culture that seemed a direct assault on MAGA Republicans, who have been vocal about their disdain for education.
Ramaswamy posted that tech companies hire foreign-born and first-generation engineers rather than native-born Americans because “American culture has venerated mediocrity over excellence for way too long…. A culture that celebrates the prom queen over the math olympiad champ, or the jock over the valedictorian, will not produce the best engineers.” He called for “[m]ore math tutoring, fewer sleepovers. More weekend science competitions, fewer Saturday morning cartoons. More books, less TV. More creating, less ‘chillin.’ More extracurriculars, less ‘hanging out at the mall.’”
Ramaswamy hit a nerve and MAGA is railing against him. The sublime irony here is that the growth of MAGA is dependent upon precisely the kind of cultural laziness and misplaced values that Ramaswamy rails against. It’s almost comical. If we had an electorate capable of critical thinking and putting an emphasis on development of the intellect, Trump would have been laughed out of town in 2016.
Even Nikki Haley got offended: “There is nothing wrong with American workers or American culture. All you have to do is look at the border and see how many want what we have. We should be investing and prioritizing in Americans, not foreign workers.”
Here’s another irony, neither Musk nor Ramaswamy seem to understand is that right-wing media only gains by lashing out at them. That leads to MAGA outrage and MAGA outrage leads to clicks. So expect Steve Bannon to mete out his fair share of abuse. It’s in his interest to do so. Same with Loomer and Musk is obviously threatened by her on some level or he wouldn’t have publicly chastised her on Twit/X. She’s not the only one who has been punished for incurring Musk’s wrath, either.
I have the screenshot: pic.twitter.com/YmDmCF9OdR
— Phoenix_Ranger_ProdigalSon (@Phoenix_Ranger2) December 28, 2024
Trump doesn’t really care what happens. He got what he wanted. The feds are off his back now and he’s going back to his golf game the White House. So everybody else can fight and melt down. Trump will have a Diet Coke and do executive time.
Ramaswamy may or may not accept this state of affairs. He seems to be able to lose and not go nuts over it, as we saw when he didn’t last long in the presidential primary. But Musk is not used to losing and he doesn’t seem to be handling it well.
That’s why the analogies to Howard Hughes are happening and will continue to take place. The cat is out of the bag. It’s known what DOGE is about and whether Musk can keep things going to his advantage remains to be seen. Musk says that “the people voted for major government reform.” Really? Then why did Trump only achieve a plurality and not a majority? And why are there razor thin margins in both chambers of Congress, if there was some sweeping mandate.
Musk may be in for an awakening.
Gotta love this: intramural warfare in an administration that doesn’t even exist yet. Reminds me strongly of how Hitler ran his regime, by encouraging his minions to savage one another in a battle for favor and favors from him, the all-powerful Fuhrer. It guarantees that no one sycophant will get too strong, or if one does manage it, all the others will unite to bring him down. Herr Trumpler will, as you say, rule from the links and the nation will slowly crumble.
“Musk called Loomer a troll, and she responded that “Telling the truth isn’t trolling… ”
When did Loomer turn into a “lib?” I mean, haven’t us “libs” been talking about how “the truth has a liberal bias?” And the idea of “telling the truth isn’t trolling” isn’t too far from “the truth has a liberal bias” at its heart.
My inner child is overjoyed watching this internecine conflict! My 70 year-old self is apprehensive about what these jackasses are going to do to my golden years!
No one at the top of this pile is in their right mind. Trump’s brain is disappearing due to syphilis and dementia. RFK, Jr.’s brain is wormy. Moses Mike Johnson’s brain is full of power mad religious fervor. Ramaswamy is an annoying tagalong little brother. The worst, though, is Musk. His power madness comes from all the very darkest places. And, his madness is largely fueled by drugs…all kinds of drugs that he is mixing and overusing in very dangerous ways! He proudly smokes large amounts of cannabis to slow his anxiety…it ain’t working. He proudly uses Ozempic for weight loss (the basis of his fight with RFK, Jr.) and this brings with it side effects that are painful and make a person lose focus. Just try running the world when you have bouts of diarrhea/constipation, stomach pain, heartburn, and headaches. Now, let’s add Musk’s favorite…ketamine. It is impossible to know how much he is taking, but we know he shouldn’t be using it at all!! Ketamine is a powerful hallucinogen used for palliative care in terminally-ill patients!! It aids in lessening fear of dying. In Musk (not dying, but is killing himself), we can see the side effects of agitation, cognitive difficulties, and even some amnesia!!
All of these clowns are naturally and/or pharmaceutically nuts!! Everything they do comes from altered thinking! Why in hell are we staying calm and normalizing this?!! Can we please collectively get a little more active about stopping these literal mental patients?!! Please!! 🤬🤬
Blaming cannabis is the propaganda of this culture. It’s the phucking love of money and Hypocrisy,(our national religion). Nazis are created by culture, parents, and choices. By the way muskrat and all others who believe the myth of American meritocracy…wtf????? How much did we pay the Indians for stealing ALL THE LAND AND NATURAL RESOURCES??? How much did the slaves get paid for hundreds of years of forced labor and breeding???? ALL THE WEALTH IN THIS COUNTRY WAS STOLEN THEN BUILT ON. FACT. Meritocracy my ass. Research has shown 80% of wealth is INHERITED…just like the emerald mines muskrat and his family got rich over. I wonder how many poor black south Africans died for his wealth?