Musk has pretty regularly stressed that this is an alpha design, and that he welcomes feedback and improvements. It may be true that he trashes HSR and that it

Musk has pretty regularly stressed that this is an alpha design, and that he welcomes feedback and improvements. It may be true that he trashes HSR and that it competes with Tesla. HSR is also stupidly expensive and arguably too slow. Regardless of your feelings on HSR, it's also impossible to argue that the CA government is likely not to screw it up somehow. It's possible that he could both benefit from HSR failing and also be benevolently proposing that we actually try something new. Don't forget, he's pledged his own money to this, and now seems to be leaning towards developing a prototype. I wonder if putting up the cash for a prototype will quiet the critics down. I, for one, am a big fan of rich people spending their money on cool things that they like, from Mark Cuban pushing the limits of analytics in basketball to Musk with Tesla/SpaceX/Hyperloop to Bill Gates' humanitarian efforts.