4 ms·

It's not like I didn't call Musk crazy before, but I think now he is truly, really nuts. Like, clinically insane. This isn't about the Dragon, of course, but ab

by krick 1y ago

It's not like I didn't call Musk crazy before, but I think now he is truly, really nuts. Like, clinically insane. This isn't about the Dragon, of course, but about the whole thing. Very curious to see how it ends and if he is as untouchable as he clearly thinks he is.

Yizahi 1y ago
Despite my antipathy to Elon, I hope he will take down a peg first a true untouchable Demented Don, who usurped legislative branch and is now eyeing judicial. USA turning autocratic is way scarier than any tehnobro megacorp.
- ben_w 1y ago
  I can but hope for this fictional reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jarndyce_and_Jarndyce https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jarndyce_and_Jarndyce I'm not sure which of the two is more dangerous. While Trump has the power of a government (and has a terrifying combination of narcissism and incompetence), I believe that if Musk had actually done the $2T cuts he was talking about, this would have ultimately killed around a million or so Americans — the number may seem surprising, I pick it because this scale cannot be reached without cuts to a significant subset of medicare, medicaid, social security, and the military. Here's the graph from 2023, take your pick on how you'd cut $2T and then consider the implications in terms of lives: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2023_US_Federal_Budget_Infographic.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2023_US_Federal_Budget_In... But again, you get that kind of scale disaster even if such things are done competently, and Musk/DOGE was doing all this stuff with unqualified people fresh from university and no experience is much worse… and unfortunately Trump is fine with unqualified people so long as they're sycophants or fawns.
  - Yizahi 1y ago
    I would argue that 2T$ cut (btw, I completely agree, it would be a disaster) is function of a government. I.e. neither Musk operation as an oligarch, not any other similar guy like Bezos or Tiel etc. can't really do that amount of damage on their own. It was only when Musk was given that power by Trump and instructed to act the way he did, then he could start doing damage. And the whole idea of doing cuts that way came probably not from Musk (or maybe he just had the same views) but from the likes of Bessent and Miran, actual Trump's advisors, planning all this chaos. tl;dr - 2T$ disaster cuts should be attributed to Trump, along with most of the responsibility for the aftermath.

by krick 1y ago

Yizahi 1y ago

Despite my antipathy to Elon, I hope he will take down a peg first a true untouchable Demented Don, who usurped legislative branch and is now eyeing judicial. USA turning autocratic is way scarier than any tehnobro megacorp.

ben_w 1y ago
I can but hope for this fictional reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jarndyce_and_Jarndyce https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jarndyce_and_Jarndyce I'm not sure which of the two is more dangerous. While Trump has the power of a government (and has a terrifying combination of narcissism and incompetence), I believe that if Musk had actually done the $2T cuts he was talking about, this would have ultimately killed around a million or so Americans — the number may seem surprising, I pick it because this scale cannot be reached without cuts to a significant subset of medicare, medicaid, social security, and the military. Here's the graph from 2023, take your pick on how you'd cut $2T and then consider the implications in terms of lives: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2023_US_Federal_Budget_Infographic.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2023_US_Federal_Budget_In... But again, you get that kind of scale disaster even if such things are done competently, and Musk/DOGE was doing all this stuff with unqualified people fresh from university and no experience is much worse… and unfortunately Trump is fine with unqualified people so long as they're sycophants or fawns.
- Yizahi 1y ago
  I would argue that 2T$ cut (btw, I completely agree, it would be a disaster) is function of a government. I.e. neither Musk operation as an oligarch, not any other similar guy like Bezos or Tiel etc. can't really do that amount of damage on their own. It was only when Musk was given that power by Trump and instructed to act the way he did, then he could start doing damage. And the whole idea of doing cuts that way came probably not from Musk (or maybe he just had the same views) but from the likes of Bessent and Miran, actual Trump's advisors, planning all this chaos. tl;dr - 2T$ disaster cuts should be attributed to Trump, along with most of the responsibility for the aftermath.