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I'm absolutely not a fan of Trump, but this is a highly questionable assumption. The much more likely hypothesis in my view is that he was helping Trump becaus
by myrmidon 1y ago
I'm absolutely not a fan of Trump, but this is a highly questionable assumption.
The much more likely hypothesis in my view is that he was helping Trump because of personal conviction (only in small parts motivated by naked self-interest).
You should expect rational billionaires to tend politically right out of pure self-interest and distorted perspective alone; because the universal thing that such parties reliably do when in power is cutting tax burden on the top end.
- antonvs 1y agoMusk is on record saying to Tucker Carlson that “If [Trump] loses, I’m fucked.” So this isn't so much of an assumption, as taking him at his word.
- unnamed76ri 1y agoThe Left was coming after Musk pretty hard before the election. I don’t know the context of the quote you pulled but it’s not hard to see how if Trump lost, there was going to be consequences for Musk.
- Swenrekcah 1y agoHe has committed a lot of fraud and was facing consequences for that. That has nothing to do with left or right.
- walls 1y agoIt does actually, because only one side is interested in finding or fighting fraud.
- Swenrekcah 1y agoCurrently yes, but it is not inherently so. The problem with the US regime is that it is compromised, corrupt and heading towards fascism. The problem is not that the republican party used to be a conservative right party. What I’m saying is this is not a sports competition where Musk is automatically an opponent of the Democratic party because he supported Trump. He supported Trump in order to improve his chances with the legal system because he knew Trump would be willing to be so corrupt. Another world might be imagined in which the Democratic party was taken over in 2016 but that is not the world we live in.
- terminalshort 1y agoBoth are interested in finding and fighting fraud, but only from the other side. Leticia James charged Trump with a rack of felonies for putting false info on a loan application. The Trump DOJ charged Leticia James for doing exactly the same. Both sides claim the charges against them are politically motivated and the charges against the other side are completely legitimate.
- walls 1y ago> Both sides claim the charges against them are politically motivated and the charges against the other side are completely legitimate. This is how conservatives keep people going 'both sides!' even though they manufacture whatever is required to be that way.
- terminalshort 1y agoPlease explain how one person lying on a loan application is manufactured and another person lying on a loan application is a serious felony.
- walls 1y agoScale, intent, history... so many things make two crimes that sound the same, not the same.
- unnamed76ri 1y agoFraud has nothing to do with vandalizing Tesla dealerships last I checked.
- Swenrekcah 1y agoYou are right it doesn’t. That is (wrongly) done by people who are (rightly) mad at him for making american life harder and global life more dangerous, in a self serving attempt to evade the justice system.
- throwway120385 1y agoWe were talking about Tesla's fraud cases, not some vandalism cases last time I checked.
- unnamed76ri 1y agoActually we were talking about personal consequences to Musk.
- terminalshort 1y agoCan you give an example of these many instances of fraud?
- scott_w 1y agoWe can start from the linked article?
- terminalshort 1y agoYeah, that's where I started, and I would recommend you do the same: > U.S. District Judge Beth Bloom, who presided over the case, said in an order that she did not find “sufficient evidence” that Tesla’s failure to initially produce the data was intentional.
- Swenrekcah 1y agoFor instance he has made fraudulent statements regarding the current and near future capabilities of Tesla in an effort to inflate stock prices numerous times. He was in fact ordered by a judge to stop making such statements but he didn’t obey that. He used to be quite charismatic, I believed him up until about 2017 or so. Then I figured he was just a bit greedy and maybe money got to his head but still a respectable innovator. However during 2020 or 2021 (I don’t exactly remember) he started to get quite unpleasant and making obviously short-term decisions, such as relying only on cameras for self driving because of chip shortages but dressing it up as an engineering decision.
- terminalshort 1y agoI just can't take the accusation of lying to increase stock price seriously because Elon has on occasion come right out and said the stock is overvalued https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1256239815256797184 https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1256239815256797184 You will basically never hear another CEO of another publicly traded company say this. I just don't believe that the same person who cares so little about his stock price that he sends a tweet like that (and the stock dropped 10% on it) also is making fraudulent statements to inflate the price. A better explanation is that he just says what he thinks without regard for the stock price, which is also something you won't see any other CEO of a publicly traded company do.
- immibis 1y agoWhy do you believe it has nothing to do with left or right? (Democrats aren't left btw)
- myrmidon 1y agoAll the context I have for this is that he was grandstanding in front of a rightwing audience (after Trump was shot at, notably) and playing the "surely I would get unjustly prosecuted for my political incorrectness under the democrats". What is your actual point? What would he stand in front of a judge for, right now, if Harris had won?
- antonvs 1y agoMy actual point is that when someone tells you who they are, you should consider believing them. You'd have to ask Musk what he feels so guilty about that he had to buy an election.
- rcpt 1y agoSomehow the right has this incredible ability where none of their words matter. On the left the details of your sentence structure get criticism for weeks from the public and the press (remember "garbage people"?)
- blizdiddy 1y agoThat’s insane. Do you remember DOGE or Elon taking his cronies into the same departments investigating him? Do you even remember?
- myrmidon 1y agoWhat would Elon even be in court for? Being a politically incorrect dumbass on ex-twitter is not punishable by law. Sending a bunch of scriptkiddies around and having them cut government funding and gut agencies is not really how you make evidence "vanish", how would that even work? And, lastly, jumping in front of an audience at every opportunity and running your mouth is the absolute last thing anyone would ever do if the goal was to avoid prosection. But it is perfectly in line with a person that has a very big ego and wants to achieve political goals.
- blizdiddy 1y agoLabor violations, taxes, National Highway traffic safety administration investigation Tesla.. are you willfully ignorant or a troll?
- myrmidon 1y agoI'm not a troll. I scrutinise beliefs and assumptions even if they are convenient, and you should, too. I don't believe that Musks main motivation to participate in the 2024 election was to avoid prosecution, because his actions are not really compatible with this, and there is a much more plausible alternative hypothesis that he preferred (possibly no longer) the republican platform for non-prosecution reasons/personal conviction instead, which his actions are very compatible with. > Labor violations, taxes, National Highway traffic safety administration investigation Tesla Let me say it like this: Billionaires generally don't have to care about minor infractions like this at all. The whole system is set up to shield them from liability, and wealth is an excellent buffer against effective prosection regardless of who is president. There have been a plethora of infinitely more serious infractions with zero real consequences for the CEOs involved, and this is not because they participated in past presidential election campaigns. See: the VW diesel emission fraud or much worse, leaded gas in the last century (and what associated industry did to keep that going).
- ikrenji 1y agothe rich already pay next to no tax thanks to loopholes aka living on loans.