6 ms·
Sam is liberal, but being a republican is better for business these days. He's more of a survivalist than anything else. I really wish Sam stood by his convict
by gkoberger 2y ago
Sam is liberal, but being a republican is better for business these days. He's more of a survivalist than anything else.
I really wish Sam stood by his convictions. He has the money to make a difference (see: Elon, although obviously Sam has less).
- DoingIsLearning 2y ago> Sam is liberal, but being a republican is better for business these days. He's more of a survivalist than anything else. That's a lot of words to say he is a hypocrite. Seems to be a recurring leadership theme in this new post-civil deglobalization reality.
- gkoberger 2y agoAgreed. This wasn't a defense. I'd argue it's worse.
- stetrain 2y ago> but being a republican is better for business these days Unless your business is directly impacted by tariffs being applied or reverted on a weekly basis.
- gkoberger 2y agoEven then, easier to get an exception (or avoid tarrifs on your product) if you spent the money to sit behind him at his inauguration.
- zzzeek 2y agothat's exactly when you want to pay your $5M fee to have a private session with Trump at Mar a lago, pledge fealty, and get your exception. then make sure you behave lest he changes his mind and has DOGE mess you up.
- insane_dreamer 2y ago> lest he changes his mind and has DOGE mess you up sounds like Don Corleone and Luca Brasi
- femto 2y agoTo quote the The NSW police board's report, written around 1987 when Trump put in a bid to open Sydney's first casino: "Atlantic City would be a dubious model for Sydney and in our judgement, the Trump mafia connections should exclude the Kern/Trump consortium" [1] https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-08-31/trump-chinese-triads-brisbane-casino-cheng-family/103929232 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-08-31/trump-chinese-triads-...
- dralley 2y ago>Unless your business is directly impacted by tariffs being applied or reverted on a weekly basis. It's not like Democratic businesses are exempt from tariffs. Trump is handing out "exemptions" and you can bet he's being more generous with handing out those exemptions to his friends and/or money dispensers.
- PaulHoule 2y agoIn case you haven't read the article (ex paywall here: https://archive.ph/LU7FT https://archive.ph/LU7FT) he's raising money for a Democrat.
- gkoberger 2y agoYup! The context of why this is on HN is because he recently supported Trump, though, hence my comment.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- sampton 2y agoElon was liberal until he wasn't. Politics is like sports teams. It's an immutable identity for the poor. But for the wealthy they are open to purchase any team.
- rqtwteye 2y agoExactly.
- srameshc 2y agoPerfectly said. I wish I could send it to my friend who is all consumed by the Faux and believe some billionaire is watching his back and about to send him some checks.
- taeric 2y agoHard to really say Elon was ever liberal, though. Rather, he was always opportunistic. And the hilarious saga of his gaming skills really calls into question all of his general decision making. Which, fair, you can point to his giant bankroll. Hard to square that with his public persona over the years. Easy to say he has declined recently. But, I'm starting to question how long it was always there.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- MichaelZuo 2y agoI can’t imagine he would have had enough free time to develop any “gaming skills” whatsoever past the PS1 generation.
- taeric 2y agoSimilarly, I can't imagine he has enough free time to do much of anything with how often he is tweeting nowadays. Still, none of that stopped him from claiming this quite strongly. Which, it would be fine if this was offhand statements. Because, yeah, who cares? But it seems he has pushed this idea for many years, whenever he could. Not exactly the sign of a healthy person. :(
- rqtwteye 2y agoThe only conviction of these guys is money and power. They are not liberal or conservative, they go with whatever gives them an advantage at the time.
- ben_w 2y ago> The only conviction of these guys is money and power. They are not liberal or conservative, they go with whatever gives them an advantage at the time. The parties, or the billionaires? (Or both?) Because I've spent most of my adult life being mildly perplexed why the Democrats are called "liberal" when they're pretty conservative, and more recently the Republican party today is about as far from "conservative" as it's possible to get.
- notatoad 2y agosam is a billionaire who supports some liberal causes sometimes. those causes are obviously far far less important to him that being a billionaire. calling him a liberal as though that's any part of his identity at all seems wrong.
- bigyabai 2y ago> as though that's any part of his identity Quoting this for posterity, I did get a good laugh out of it. Should we say the same for Mr. Tim "Courage" Apple?
- torlok 2y agoLibertarian taking government money and liberal are two different things. I doubt there's any liberals in Sam Altman circles. It's hard to even call people like Sam Altman libertarians when they have no regard for other people's intellectual property.
- dragonwriter 2y ago> Libertarian taking government money and liberal are two different things. There are many different uses of “liberal” in discussing politics, and some of them (including those used by what there is of an American Left) completely include what in the US are often referred to as “libertarians”. “Liberal” is quite possibly the most heavily overloaded political descriptor in existence.
- RealityVoid 2y agoIt is so be cause of a sustained campaign to turn it into a slur.
- dragonwriter 2y agoNo, that's not really the main reason. The main reason is that almost every modern Western political ideology is either a development from 18th Century liberalism [the more common case] or a reactionary response against it or some subset of its descendants [excluding the overlap, the less common case], and some are both descendants of 18th Century liberalism and reactions against other descendants.) As a result, most ideologies in the West have some claim to the name “liberalism” and an even larger majority have deep seated opposition to one or more things with an association with that name.
- RealityVoid 2y agoI posit you can successfully be libertarian while disregarding the institution of intellectual property. I, for one, think it's a deeply flawed way we look at it in our society today and this does not need to be so. There are many many ways we could have perceived and handled intellectual property. I see knowledge a common good that once it's out there, it's out there.
- tombert 2y agoThere's probably exceptions, but a part of me thinks that these "more-money-than-they-could-spend-in-ten-lifetimes" billionaires are all sociopaths, who have no true convictions outside of what enriches them. Their politics serve as glorified marketing in addition to the normal bribery that campaign contributions have always been. I think it's a fallacy to think that they experience the same kind of emotions or convictions that you or I do. The Diablo cheater was left-leaning until he realized that it was more profitable to start getting a conservative audience.
- tasty_freeze 2y agoI don't care if it is raising money for a democrat/republican/green/independent. The problem for a long time has been too much money in politics, but Citizens United made it worse, and the events of the most recent election should have made it transparent to everyone who was in denial that this is the case. If I donate more than $2900 to a candidate I get in trouble. If I create a PAC, then I'm able to donate $290M dollars without issue. Yes, we still have one person/one vote, but voters who donate millions of dollars are the ones who get heard.
- jdminhbg 2y agoThe candidate who spent more money lost, though.
- amarcheschi 2y agoGiven the status of Russia interference in USA affairs, I think their expenses as well for the campaign can't not be counted
- hmmokidk 2y agoYep you gotta include the Kremlin budget for destroying the world’s super power. Otherwise the comparison is simply not fair.
- taeric 2y agoWell, you have to ignore the purchase and rather rapid weaponization of twitter?
- throwaway48476 2y agoHe's more of a predator if his sisters allegations are true.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]