Elon Musk’s financial interests put him in a position of having his own personal foreign policy, but new reporting shows that whether it’s manufacturing in China or the Starlink network being used in Ukraine, Musk’s decisions can run counter to stated US policy.

    • Lexam@lemmy.ca
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      1 year ago

      They should exist, but we are not utilizing them correctly. Once someone has reached a billion dollar networth then they are thrown a big party and then sacrificed to a valcono. I believe this would curb emissions and fix climate change.

      • doggle@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        1 year ago

        Maybe we just seize all their assets, nationalize them and make them start over with nothing. Call it new game +.

        • Corkyskog@sh.itjust.works
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          They just need to make a point system. The incredibly wealthy don’t care about money itself, those are already just points to them. So once you get to say 100 M, you get a trophy saying you won capitalism. After that amount 99% is taxed, you get a penny on the dollar. But all of that taxed money gets you Capitalism points. Capitalism points have no real value and can only be exchanged/traded/gambled with other winners of capitalism. Those with most points will be published each month in the top 100. And the top 10 each year get the prestigous title if honorary economic leader. They can get a medal and a pat on the back by the president.

          You can also donate extra money for more capitalism points at a 10:1 exchange rate to get people to play the game even harder and further drive down wealth.

          (I believe there are slightly less than 10,000 people in the US who would currently get their capitalism trophy. There are >140,000 people worth more than $50M, is 100 to high?)

          Oh and the 100M amount is pegged to minimum wage. Any increase to the capitalism cap has to be matched to the same percent increase to minimum wage.

      • Blaiz0r@lemmy.ml
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        There was a native American tribe that every ten years had individuals return all personal wealth back to the tribe and the threw a big party, then start it all over again

    • jonne@infosec.pub
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      Just too much power for one person. Even if they’re not in charge of a global internet provider, your average billionaire can singlehandedly affect the lives of millions of people (employees, customers, bystanders) with no democratic oversight at all. It’s just not something that should exist.

    • zephyreks@programming.dev
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      1 year ago

      China seems to do a pretty good job of keeping their billionaires in check. Maybe we should take notes?

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      1 year ago

      You: Want to abolish billionaires because they do not support the war enough.

      Me: Want to abolish billionaires because they exploit and oppress the working class.

      We are not the same.

      • Blaiz0r@lemmy.ml
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        Well you’ve jumped to conclusions there, I’m not talking about the war but Billionaires in general and their respective countries in general.

        Billionaires have too much power, live outside the existing system of government and laws, gained their money and power through exploitation and in general are undemocratic.

        So I agree with your second statement, but not the first

            • gnuhaut@lemmy.ml
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              “Patriotic socialist”, someone who claims to be a champion of the working class, but is actually more of nationalist. They only care about the working class of a certain nationality or racial group, and are generally bigoted in their view towards marginalized groups. Real socialists are internationalist. You wanting to get rid of Musk, because he’s not sufficiently gung-ho about a war fought between capitalists on the back of workers, implies you consider the national interest more important than the lives of workers. This is anti-worker class collaborator shit, which is what patsocs are really.

              • Varixable@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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                1 year ago

                Lol what the fuck is this? “You’re an enemy of the working class because you don’t support Elon Musk!”

                This is some brain worm shit my dude.

              • dumdum666@kbin.social
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                What the fuck are you even talking about? Russia is throwing thousands of „working class“ lives away, since it wants to expand its territory in aggressive moves since decades. They are forcing Ukraine to defend itself and yes, those are also working class people.

                So you, as a good socialist, are probably on the barricades because of this unprovoked attack on the Ukrainian working class. How are you fighting to defend them from getting killed? Please don’t answer something in the likes of „Ukraine should give up“ because then everyone would only see that you are actually advocating the Murder of the Ukrainian people.

      • Fushuan [he/him]@lemm.ee
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        Meanwhile, until he was supporting USA and Ukraine, he was the good white hero for your ilk.

        Yeah, because of that. This isn’t the gotcha you think it is, you aren’t uncovering a double standard. People deem helping Ukraine righteous, and helping Russia treasonous, this is no secret.

        • TheAnonymouseJoker@lemmy.ml
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          People deem helping Ukraine righteous, and helping Russia treasonous, this is no secret.

          Only Anglo people and white worshippers. The rest of the world has over 6 billion people, that you conveniently choose to disrespect and ignore.

            • TheAnonymouseJoker@lemmy.ml
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              It has to. You generalised that all people hate Russia and love Ukraine. A lot of the world is NOT what you imply to be the whole world, and is a mere 10-15% of the world’s population. Rest of the world fears the Nazi disease brewing in Ukraine, having the potential to travel around to Asia and Middle East. We do not want America-funded Mujahideen clones. Russia is helping us.

          • Fushuan [he/him]@lemm.ee
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            1 year ago

            No I didn’t, I didn’t ignore anyone. I am answering your statement. We are talking in the context of whom was considering him a “good white hero”. As per your statement:

            he was the good white hero for your ilk.

            I’m not going to specify the whole context of the conversation when it’s clear whom I’m talking about. You established the group of people that worshipped him in your original comment, I explained why.

            • TheAnonymouseJoker@lemmy.ml
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              People deem helping Ukraine righteous, and helping Russia treasonous, this is no secret.

              Oh you did ignore over 6 billion people that condemn Ukraine’s Nazism issues on the UN voting, and their support for Russia. Anglosphere consists of merely ~12% of the world’s population, and their Russia bashing undemocratic stance is NOT representative of what the whole world thinks. What white people think or say is not that important.

              • Fushuan [he/him]@lemm.ee
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                You seem to not understand how context in a conversation works. Look, The original comment said the following in a post about how Elon is acting agaisnt US interest:

                This is why billionaires shouldn’t exist they are treasonous

                So they are probably american. Then you answered them with:

                he was the good white hero for your ilk.

                Then I said the following, to you, after your comment:

                People deem helping Ukraine righteous, and helping Russia treasonous, this is no secret.

                In this context, “People” can mean everybody, yes, but can also mean the subset of people we are talking about already, which I obviously was mentioning. I don’t really get why you are being so confrontational because I didn’t include the opinion of everybody in the world when trying to explain why americans or the west now think that Elon is a traitor.

                Let me give you an example in good faith. When there’s a meeting between neighbours, they vote on X, and the president of the community states “The people have talked”, are they also ignoring the other 8 billion people that exist in the world? No, because it’s obvious that “pople” in that context refers to the subset of people only referring to the neighbours.

                I really can’t explain to you more how context works, if you are that hellbent in chastisizing me for explaining to you why “those people” think like that in general, we have nothing more to talk about.

      • Blaiz0r@lemmy.ml
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        1 year ago

        My ilk?

        You’re jumping to conclusions.

        Billionaires are treasonous because they live outside the laws of their country, hold power over the government there and gain their money through exploitation

        • TheAnonymouseJoker@lemmy.ml
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          Were you opposing Musk and billionaires since forever, or are you one of the fresh new liberal “converts” that hate Musk just because he shat upon the toilet of the town square?

          • Blaiz0r@lemmy.ml
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            Yes since forever, they’ve always been a problem for the same reasons I mentioned above, same story with oligarchs.

            I don’t care about Musk, I feel the same way about Bezos, Gates and whomever else

            • TheAnonymouseJoker@lemmy.ml
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              I am usually skeptical of people calling out on posts with such polarised headlines and hypocritical standard. My bad, perhaps you are not one of those people.

  • ShaggySnacks@lemmy.myserv.one
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    Remember folks, the rich only care about one thing and one thing only, getting richer. A bunch of these shit heads got together and started actively planning on overthrowing the US government because the election of FDR was going to affect their interests.

    The Business Plot

    • Storksforlegs@beehaw.org
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      Kind of the same thing thats happening right now, only instead of plotting they are spreading conspiracy theories and rage bating people into supporting them.

    • exploding_whale@lemmy.ml
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      The irony of this is FDR wasn’t exactly lacking in wealth or at least access to it at any point in his life.

    • cobra89@beehaw.org
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      I’d argue Musk cared more about being able to bloviate on Twitter than he did about getting richer from that transaction.

      Of course there’s the very real possibility that he was foolish enough to believe he could make money on the deal.

  • s20@lemmy.ml
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    What the hell? Look, man, I hate the guy but he’s remarkably consistent: he works for his interests. Even when he does dumbshit things like buy Twitter, the thinks he’s operating in his interests.

    He’s not complicated. He’s a self absorbed piece of shit. That’s really all you ever need to know about the fucker.

    • Hot Saucerman@lemmy.ml
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      “Elon desperately wants the world to be saved. But only if he can be the one to save it,” Altman added.

      From an interview with Sam Altman. It’s grandoise narcissism, plain and simple.

      • d-RLY?@lemmy.ml
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        Which he is also pretty consistent about. Yet somehow these children’s cartoon evil/greedy businessmen are just handed power and trusted by such a shocking amount of people. It is kind of impressive in a “we’re fucked” kind of way.

    • dangblingus@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      He bought Twitter WITH $22B OF SAUDI MONEY. Should tell you everything you need to know about the purchase, the motivation, and why he’s “doing so badly” with it.

  • Burn_The_Right@lemmy.world
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    He’s juggling fire. His money can only do so much to protect him if he makes enough mistakes fucking with these dangerous governments.

    • taladar@sh.itjust.works
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      I disagree. Every other billionaire out there also has a shared interest in governments leaving the super-rich alone and not punishing them. That is a powerful lobby.

      • Burn_The_Right@lemmy.world
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        Interesting. I was unaware billionaires were so coordinated with one another, especially with regard to foreign governments.

        In oligarchies like Russia, the ultra-wealthy (who often own small armies) are usually in dangerous competition with one another.

        • BrokebackHampton@kbin.social
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          One of the reasons billionaires managed to gather so much power and influence in our current system is because they are more coordinated and way better at class warfare than us workers.

          I’d say that and the obvious mind-boggling amounts of hoarded wealth are the two main ones. And never forget those billions are, for the most part, stolen from workers through wage theft, which circles back to billionaires waging class war on us.

  • arc@lemm.ee
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    He posted the other day about being proud American etc. and yet he’s actively giving comfort to hostile adversaries like Russia and screwing US allies. I think if I were the US federal government I wouldn’t touch SpaceX or Starlink with a shitty stick given the mercurial, manchild in charge of them with his own agenda.

  • gnuhaut@lemmy.ml
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    Elon Musk is a US interest. The US is a bunch of business interests in a trench coat, and they don’t always agree on everything. Some want to do business with China, some want the Chinese competition destroyed, and some want to create tension so they can sell more weapons.

    The idea that Musk is “counter” to US interests is wrong, he just represents a faction of the ruling class that’s not on board with the (trade) war on China. Since it’s not in the interest of the working class to have a US-China (trade) war, neither in the US nor anywhere really, he is inadvertently aligned with the interests of the majority of humanity on this one.

    • Honytawk@lemmy.zip
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      The only person capable of settling peace is that dictator Putin just stopping their illegal invasion into a sovereign nation.

    • sunbeam60@lemmy.one
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      Said no one ever, until you just did it right there.

      As they say in Danish “talk about shooting sparrows with cannon-balls”.

  • Asymptote@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    The past half century has been moving production out of the west and into China but it’s somehow just bad when it’s Musk?

    Come on, this circle jerk is getting more retarded by the day.

    • fosforus@sopuli.xyz
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      Also in a time of moving everything to cheapo countries, Musk founded new car factories in the US and Europe. Also a couple in China, but those were as late as 2019 and 2021.

  • gnuhaut@lemmy.ml
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    You’re mad at Musk for this???

    Musk has done so many terrible things. Treats his workers like shit, destroys the environment, platforms racists (he’s a racist pos himself), false advertising, siphons government subsidies, scams investors (including pension funds, I don’t particularly care about scamming venture capitalist and the like), lobbies against public transport and god knows what I forgot right now.

    But oh no! He only supports the war effort up to a point, and he doesn’t want to have a cold war with China. For once he’s kinda reasonable, and for that the libs are calling him a traitor.

    • drewdarko@kbin.social
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      We are calling him a traitor for having Starlink turned off in Ukraine to protect Russia from a counter attack.

      • FaceDeer@kbin.social
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        Last I heard, he simply didn’t turn it on when Ukraine asked him to, before the DoD had explicitly contracted him to support Ukraine’s military. The narrative of him throwing a switch mid-attack and laughing maniacally as Ukrainian drones drifted helplessly to shore has been spreading like wildfire but that seems to be based on a quote from one guy who has since walked it back.

        Is there some Fediverse equivalent to /r/enoughmuskspam? My feed is starting to get flooded with these five-minute-hates of Elon Musk and it’s wearying.

        • drewdarko@kbin.social
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          Nope, Starlink was already in use. Musk used his position as CEO of Starlink to cut off service to Ukraine. But only long enough to interrupt a counter attack on the Russian fleet. Once the opportunity had passed he had it turned back on.

          His intentions are obvious.

        • Honytawk@lemmy.zip
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          The country he lives in, and the military that paid to have the service of his business to be used … by the military.

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        That’s because you identify with the US empire, which is not, and never was, on your team. And neither was Musk.

        Musk isn’t even against the US empire, he just didn’t want to escalate. The White House regularly does (not) do a thing because they don’t want to escalate. They’re all traitors to the US too, are they?

        Treason is not wanting total war, got it.

        • drewdarko@kbin.social
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          If Musk really wants to prevent escalation then he should help the US and it’s allies stop Russia from invading other countries as they have been doing for decades.

          Russia is starting total war. Musk is helping them continue by preventing efforts to stop Russia.

          • gnuhaut@lemmy.ml
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            help the US and it’s allies stop Russia from invading other countries as they have been doing for decades

            Wait, you think the country that has by far done the most invasions should be supported to stop *checks notes* an invasion? This is like putting the fox in charge of the henhouse. And apparently by any means necessary too.

            I wonder what would have happened if the US’s whole Mediterranean fleet were destroyed thanks to Russian help during one of their “humanitarian interventions”. I wonder if you were also moralizing about the need to start WW3 in those situations?

            • Honytawk@lemmy.zip
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              Just because the US is doing illegal invasions of sovereign nations, doesn’t mean Russia is allowed to.

            • mrnotoriousman@kbin.social
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              Yes, Russia should stop invading and get the fuck back to their own country. Whatever you want to whine about someone else doing is irrelevant. Russia invaded and can gtfo or die.

      • mwguy@infosec.pub
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        Civilian space assets cannot be used for warfare or they become legitimate targets in a war. When the US commits to defending and replenishing starlink satellites lost in conflict I’ll blame Musk for not enabling his network to be used for warfare.

        • drewdarko@kbin.social
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          The Ukraine military was already using starlink. Starlink agreed to provide their service to the Ukraine military as a US military contractor with the US paying the bill.

          So they can do that because they have already done that.

          The US has committed to defending and replenishing Starlink because they’ve been doing that by protecting the antennas and replacing them as they get attacked.

          Again. Starlink already agreed to be used in Ukraine and at the time that Musk interrupted service to the Ukrainian military it had been in use for a long time.

          Musk only interrupted service long enough to prevent the counter attack on Russia. Then agreed to turn it back on after the opportunity for a counter attack had passed.

          Seems pretty obvious that Musk stepped in to help Russia as a traitor to the US.

          • mwguy@infosec.pub
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            If Congress declared war or maybe an Authorization for Use of Force (like Iraq/Afghanistan) it would be fair to consider him a traitor. Until then not really.