![Irresistible. Trump and Musk in June 2020. (White House)](https://i0.wp.com/flaglerlive.com/wp-content/uploads/musk-trump.jpg?resize=1000%2C667&ssl=1)
By Diane Roberts
Let’s talk about Elon Musk, that unlovely carbuncle on the backside of the planet.
It’s not fun but given that he’s as much a threat to the rule of law as the Palm Beach Pumpkin, it’s necessary.
Musk gives aid and comfort to right wing rioters in England, stokes hatred, accusing an Olympic boxer (a woman) of being a man, does his damnedest to destroy once-valuable companies, and spreads 19th Century racist pseudo-science.
He’s also — no surprise here — supporting Donald Trump.
Musk says he voted for Joe Biden in 2020, but the president hurt his little feelings by failing to invite him to a 2021 automaker hoedown at the White House, and then the SEC started looking into the alarming way Tesla’s “autopiloted” cars’ have a habit of crashing and killing people.
Plus, Democrats have made it clear they’d like to tax the hell out of billionaires. Communism!
In 2023, Musk picked Ron DeSantis for his new BFF, calling him “centrist and sensible.”
As you will recall, Musk hosted Ronbo’s 30-car pileup of a presidential campaign launch on Twitter. The platform malfunctioned, Ronbo malfunctioned, and Musk was clearly on Mars — mentally, if not physically.
Once Ronbo self-immolated in Iowa, Musk discarded him like an empty pudding cup and cast a reptilian eye on Trump. The convicted felon and climate change denier who once said EV owners should “rot in hell,” recognized that Musk, with more money than Trump could ever dream of, might be useful.
Untroubled by principles
Like Musk himself, the Palm Beach Pumpkin has never been troubled by principles or any consistent political ideology.
He changed his tune.
“I’m for electric cars,” said Trump. “I have to be because Elon endorsed me very strongly.”
“I have no choice,” he added, probably still clinging to the hope that Musk would give his campaign $45 million a month.
Musk was never going to do any such thing, but he is throwing money at America PAC, a pro-Trump fundraising outfit and promoting demented pro-Trump propaganda on X.
Trump and Musk have a lot in common: Both harbor the epic delusion they’re central to the operation of the cosmos; both pretend (when it suits them) to be some kind of “Christian”; both exhibit an attitude to women that ranges from dismissive to hostile.
Trump’s had assorted affairs, five kids with three wives, and has been found by a jury to be guilty of rape.
Musk has at least 12 children with at least three women, some through surrogates. He’s been sued for presiding over (and contributing to) an “Animal House” atmosphere in his companies and accused of pressuring employees — even interns — for sex.
He’s having a little trouble with his transgender daughter, too. She’s his “lost” son, a beloved child he says is now “dead, killed by the “woke mind virus.”
She’s punching back hard, calling him a “serial adulterer,” a “fake,” an absent father, and all around jerk she refuses to have anything to do with.
‘Childless cat ladies’
Like Trump’s running mate Corporal Eyeliner, Musk sees women as lesser beings, fetal incubators.
Vance wants all those sad “childless cat ladies” to get themselves some righteous female satisfaction by popping out a passel of young ’uns.
Musk is worse. In his mind, women must step up and be fertile, producing a new generation to populate his extra-terrestrial empire.
In a 2023 interview with Tucker Carlson, he complained about “birth control, abortions, and whatnot,” which allow women to have sex without getting pregnant.
Why should they control their own bodies when he, Elon Musk, world’s wealthiest dweeb, could inject them with his godlike sperm and generate master-race spawn?
Women who worked for him report that he’d hit on them, saying they should “have his babies.”
No wonder he and Trump get along: They’re both predatory, crude, and creepy AF.
Above all, Trump and Musk share a deep dislike of democracy.
Trump’s campaign is based on the old lie that the 2020 election was “stolen,” and the new lie that the 2024 election is “rigged,” even though not one ballot has yet been cast.
He warns of a “bloodbath” if he loses in November; he’s installed conspiracy theorists on the boards that will certify votes — or not; he might even think “his” Supreme Court will install him as President-for-Life.
‘Beautiful Christians’
Trump told his “beautiful Christians,” and repeated on “Fox News,” that if he wins, they needn’t ever vote again.
He’s also said the Constitution should be “terminated.”
This would be cool with Elon Musk. He’s not keen on the Constitution or laws or government by the people or anything else that might interfere with his megalomaniacal designs.
At the height of the COVID pandemic, he told Tesla workers to get back to the plant or he’d fire them. The result? More than 400 employees got sick.
His Texas “space city” is a morass of environmental violations, polluted water discharged in the Colorado River, septic system disasters, erosion — lovely!
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The virtual toxic waste dump he calls X and most everybody else still calls Twitter has been hemorrhaging money, but maybe Musk doesn’t care: It’s his personal soap box; he can use it to rant about puberty blockers, amplify antisemitism, attack journalists who investigate him, spread crazy conspiracy theories (dead Hillary Clinton replaced by a body double?), and enable the likes of Tommy Robinson, the white nationalist igniting racist riots in the U.K.
Now that Musk has embraced Trump, his brother in sociopathic narcissism, X will be even more of a festival of campaign misinformation, hatred, and racism.
The recent deepfake videos of Kamala Harris manipulated to sound as though she can’t put a sentence together or calling herself a “DEI hire” (never happened) would seem to violate X’s own policy against “synthetic” material.
But hey, Musk is the boss of X.
And he wants to be the boss of you and everyone else.
Wait till Donald Trump figures that out.
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Diane Roberts is an 8th-generation Floridian, born and bred in Tallahassee. Educated at Florida State University and Oxford University in England, she has been writing for newspapers since 1983, when she began producing columns on the legislature for the Florida Flambeau. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, the Times of London, the Guardian, the Washington Post, the Oxford American, and Flamingo. She has been a member of the Editorial Board of the St. Petersburg Times–back when that was the Tampa Bay Times’s name–and a long-time columnist for the paper in both its iterations. She was a commentator on NPR for 22 years and continues to contribute radio essays and opinion pieces to the BBC. Roberts is also the author of four books.
The dude says
Diaper Don hated EV’s but now loves teslas…
What changed his mind, hmmm???…
The honest answer should be enough for anyone with integrity and intelligence to conclude he should not be the next leader of the free world. Diaper Don would be just one “favor” or “gift” or even just one compliment away from handing our country over to our enemies. Literally.