The neoliberal repressive state sees its opportunity to take out Musk, making an example of the arrogant huckster’s huckster. I do not applaud those taking apart Musk but I cannot feel sorry for him, given the givens. I think he is right that “free speech” is at an end politically, but it was already burnt toast. He is an unsympathetic figure for people like me who might actually care for idealistic reasons. And that is by design, I suspect.
Cancelling Twitter and with it Musk is a spectacle.
Of course, there is no giant neoliberal conspiracy to take out Elon Musk. What’s happening with Twitter is completely the consequences of his own actions.
Musk made a huge deal of how, as soon as he took over Twitter, it was going to be complete “free speech” and anyone could say whatever they wanted. Right-wingers responded by saying what they want to say, which for them is spamming the N-word and other racial slurs all over the place (the use of racial slurs on Twitter went up by 500% after Musk took over).
Advertisers of course noticed this and decided that the risk of their ad appearing in a screenshot of a tweet with the N-word in it was too great, and so decided to pause their spending on Twitter until this mess gets sorted out. That’s it. That’s literally all that happened. Poor old Elon isn’t being “cancelled.” It’s just the consequences of his own actions. If he had bought Twitter without all the spectacle and signaling that he was going to let it become a free-for-all, none of this would be happening right now.
It’s not “cancelling Twitter and with it Musk” when Cheerios decides they don’t want to go viral for having their ad appear next to a neo-Nazi tweet.
I am not a financial professional, or even a financial amateur. So how can I possibly know whether Musk did or didn’t buy Twitter with the secret agenda reason of using it for massive tax “losses” to set against his other money? How do I know killing Twitter wasn’t the secret Musk plan all along?
Twitter died the day Musk bought it. It is a dead man walking. He will do whatever he has to in order to burn Twitter all the way down to the ground.
Can the skilled Twitter layoffees reverse-engineer another “Twitterform” company which does something similar enough to Twitter that all the Twitter fans and Twitter zombies will like and use that new “Twitterform” company just as much? They could call their new company “Cricket” and call its little posts and replies and messages “Chirps”.
how is the “neoliberal repressive state” cancelling Musk, when they’ve essentially bankrolled him through funding and MIC contracts ever since he made his first few mil (after daddy bought him mansions in college and he had emeralds falling out of his pockets as a child) and almost all of his resultant wealth is due to the BigGov and essentially stock fraud via tweeting?
i would really like to be cancelled like that. wouldn’t you all?
While I think little of Elon Musk as a corporate welfare bum and a peddler of greenwashing and interstellar consumerism, I do however see his point on free speech. Try using Google to search for a controversial (to liberals) opinion on, for example, drugs, gender or capital punishment, and you will see how censored we are in the West.
Right-wingers get boosted and amplified today, but of course they have to claim they’re being censored because they love playing the perpetual victims.
“From acquiring the coveted blue checkmark to chasing virality, social media’s impact on society continues to increase. Likes, notifications, and comments pull users in with each ding and buzz. LX news storyteller Cody Broadway follows five social media influencers to get their insight on the rise of picture-perfect feeds and life beyond the grids.”
Having a Media dependent on corporate business advertising has a profound effect on what is “allowed” in the public discourse. I saw the Mars, Inc. television blacklist once. I do not think having billionaire candy makers or Cheerios or Jeff Bezos shape the discourse is benign, but it is what it is. Of course, no one is to blame but the victims in NR’s fantasy. Nothing to see here. Move along.
how is the “neoliberal repressive state” cancelling Musk, when they’ve essentially bankrolled him through funding and MIC contracts ever since he made his first few mil (after daddy bought him mansions in college and he had emeralds falling out of his pockets as a child) and almost all of his resultant wealth is due to the BigGov and essentially stock fraud via tweeting?
It speaks volumes about the MIC (military Industrial complex), CIA supported Silicon Valley/Seattle (Meritocratic, Blue Left Coast™, my ass) Tech Billionaires that it took so very, very long for the Emerald Mine reality to see the light of day. It also speaks volumes about California’s vulgar, mostly millionaire politicians (from Local Governments through Federal) (1) and the repulsive California Fourth Estate in the wealth infested , Bluest™ Counties, who apparently worshiped the Pay Pal Mafia (along with Oracle, Microsoft, Apple; Amazon, eBay, Google, Facebook, Twitter, Uber, Airbnb, and so on) whose Billionaire members, like Musk and Thiel, have caused seemingly irreversible harm all over the world, let alone in their own back yards. Those counties are now teeming with exploding and suffering homeless, many who once made livable wages; could once afford the rent, and paid it on time.
(1) E.g. California Governor Gavin Newsom (who owns 2 Teslas, last I heard), was part of subsidizing the hell out of Tesla, so wealthy people would get a break they don’t at all need on an unaffordable to most, electricity HOG. Yet Newsom couldn’t be bothered to discuss property or sales tax subsidies regarding the exploding homeless receiving decent housing. In September, Governor Newsom sadistically vetoed exempting the homeless from parking fines (Assembly Bill AB1685) despite no nay votes from the Bipartisan 80 Assembly Members and only 3 (Republicans) of the Bipartisan 40 Senators voting nay. The 10 absentees among both houses were 50/50 Democrat and Republican. See https://legiscan.com/CA/votes/AB1685/2021.
Then there’s Ro Khanna, arguably the wealthiest Federal House Member. Khanna’s California district includes Musk’s notorious Fremont Nummi Tesla Plant; yet, to my knowledge, Khanna has never had a bad word to say about it. I’ve followed Khanna’s actions and lack of actions significantly, he still wants to spread Silicon Valleys all over the U.S., no doubt right along with ever more teeming homeless. For anyone wanting to @me about RO, please don’t, unless you actually live in Silicon Valley and have spent hours and hours ‘vetting’ him, knowing one day soon, he’ll almost surely run for vice president, or president. His two very active twitter feeds alone (RepRoKhanna, and Ro Khanna), particularly the responses from locals, speak volumes about him.
Congressman Ro Khanna represents California’s 17th Congressional District, located in the heart of Silicon Valley, and is serving in his third term. Rep. Khanna sits on the House Agriculture, Armed Services, and Oversight and Reform committees, where he chairs the Environmental Subcommittee. Additionally, Rep. Khanna is the Deputy Whip of the Congressional Progressive Caucus; serves […]
Congressman Ro Khanna represents California’s 17th Congressional District, located in the heart of Silicon Valley, and is serving in his third term. Rep. Khanna sits on the House Agriculture, Armed Services, and Oversight and Reform committees, where he chairs the Environmental Subcommittee.
Additionally, Rep. Khanna is the Deputy Whip of the Congressional Progressive Caucus; serves as an Assistant Whip for the Democratic Caucus and is the Democratic Vice Chair of the House Caucus on India and Indian Americans. Rep. Khanna is committed to representing the people and ideas rooted in Silicon Valley to the nation and throughout the world.
I like NRs comments. I’ve never come away confused (unlike with a couple others here).
By all observations, most neoliberal corporations want everybody addicted to their products, and not just a Nazi few. Surely a “capitalist genius” like Musk would know that Twitter gains almost 90% of its revenue from corporate advertising and would want to remain on good terms with those feeding hands. But then I’ve heard that a large share of his takeover funding was Saudi.
Could it be that Nazis are far more likely to become addicted to mindless consumption than those dangblasted neoliberal Jews are? Could it be that the GOP and their neoliberal corporate henchmen haven’t completed their mass-Nazification project yet, and that meddling kid Musk keeps getting in their way? I’ll let smarter minds decide.
Nicholas Eberhardt has been going around everywhere, particularly on rightist platforms, warning about the coming demographic crash in the United States, the Anglosphere in general, as well as China, Russia and the Ukraine, well pretty much everywhere except the global south — which faces other population and economic problems.
He frets incessantly that not only is the US (among other English-speaking countries) facing a demographic apocalypse — because white people aren’t breeding at replacement levels any more — but in the midst of it, white men aren’t “working” at levels they should be, not even at levels comparable to 1940 when he says unemployment was at 15%.
He’s happy that Russia and China are facing huge population decline now or very soon, while he’s unhappy that the West — except Israel (Arab populations are crashing, tho) — is facing similar declines.
He seems to have no idea at all that disastrous economic policies of the neo-liberals that rule us are even partially responsible for declines in the West. No, it’s all due to women who refuse to breed, and couples who refuse to marry.
Or are they deliberate policies to ensure populations cease growing and eventually decline?
He seems to want to force white women to breed (abortion bans anyone?) and force white men to work (hmmm.) Or there’s something else on his mind. Something else? What could it be?
His message is geared to the upper and ruling classes. Not really for the rest of us at all. But what is that message?
Let’s recap what happened with the whole Twitter fiasco, shall we?
– Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, signs a deal to buy Twitter. In doing so, he massively overvalues the company and pays tens of billions of dollars more than it’s actually worth. He takes on tremendous debt to buy it and transfers that debt to Twitter once he takes ownership. Twitter’s yearly interest payment on debt skyrockets from $50 million to $1 billion.
– Musk makes a huge deal of how, one he takes over Twitter, anyone will be able to say anything they want. Right-wingers and other garbage human beings react predictably to this, and the use of racial slurs on Twitter goes up by 500%.
– Musk fires half of Twitter’s workforce, including a big chunk of the content moderation team, further exacerbating the company’s problems.
– Advertisers look at the shitshow Twitter has become and make the sensible decision to pause their spending on the platform while they wait and see if it will get sorted out. The loss of revenue, combined with the fact that Twitter’s burn rate has tripled due to the interest payments on the debt Musk saddled the company with, results in the company losing $4 million every day.
So Bruce, please enlighten us as to how poor ol’ Elon is the victim in this scenario.
I do not think having billionaire candy makers or Cheerios or Jeff Bezos shape the discourse is benign, but it is what it is. Of course, no one is to blame but the victims in NR’s fantasy.
Yeah, billionaires are true “victims” while the targets of Nazis are not. Right Bruce?
By contrast, people in countries who actually were governed by Nazis realize how horrible they were, and thus ban their speech and their symbols. I have a book on my shelf, given to me by one of my high school teachers, titled The Education of T. C. Mits. It dates from the 1930s, when my high school teacher was a young man. (My high school teacher refused to pledge allegiance to the flag, and was openly a ‘humanist’, which raised eyebrows in my small Southern home town). He ended up serving in WWII.
Anyway, I recall one of the arguments in that book is “that it is not logical to allow the enemies of democracy and free speech to use free speech to destroy both”. That part didn’t resound with my ACLU-friendly sensibility back then, but I have come to appreciate why many progressives of that era felt that way, with our own fascists getting ready to beat down the doors.
Alleged “non-interventionist” Tulsi Gabbard has endorsed Chuck Grassley. When questioned on the apparent misalignment between her heretofore views on war and military spending versus those of Grassley, Gabbard said she just assumed Grassley watched her marathon interview with Joe Rogan.
Gabbard also said she hopes to “push Grassley left” on issues she recently claimed to care about, such as Medicare for All.
“We all know now that Bernie couldn’t push Biden left, so we have to try something different.
I have voted for every defense package to Ukraine. Calling for exploring every diplomatic avenue to avoid nuclear war & seek a ceasefire while upholding Ukraine sovereignty is what many constituents seek. Our nation should never silence or shout down debate. The Admin does not.
(I use nitter.net when I feel the need to see what someone twitted, as I’m no longer able to read official twitter pages, since about a year ago, nitter’s somewhat limited as to copying and pasting, so if someone can access twitter, they may find more regarding that twit at https://twitter.com/RoKhanna/status/1584749697566052353 )
For me, one of the events that so epitomized the Obama Biden, vast populace (along with world wide) betrayal years, was African American/Black Citizen—64 year old, well loved by neighbors and (most likely) family, faithfully married, family man—John Constantino.
John Constantino calmly immolated himself in broad daylight at the National Mall (an historic DC landmark for Public Protest)—in full view of the US Capitol—on Friday, October 4th, 2013, as a reported hundreds at the National Mall stood witness.
I suspect John Contantino may have felt that it would result in a US Spring Uprising, like the Arab Spring Uprising (a little under three years earlier) which was brought on by a series of immolations, the first noted being that of Tunisian, Mohamed Bouazizi, who died on January 4th, 2011. Even per wiki (which I actually hate, for countless reasons, the main being scumbag Billionaire, grifter deceiver, Jimmy Whales; but it’s become increasingly impossible to access far better commentary written at the time of an event), it’s currently noted:
The catalyst for the escalation of protests was the self-immolation of Tunisian Mohamed Bouazizi. Unable to find work and selling fruit at a roadside stand, Bouazizi had his wares confiscated by a municipal inspector on 17 December 2010. An hour later he doused himself with gasoline and set himself afire. His death on 4 January 2011[85] brought together various groups dissatisfied with the existing system, including many unemployed persons, political and human rights activists, labor and trade unionists, students, professors, lawyers, and others to begin the Tunisian Revolution.[77]
Back to John Constantino and Friday, October fourth, 2013
For lack of time and a better phraseology I would put it as the most historically photographed in the US, Asian style Protest Immolation, calmly sitting position he was in (see https://www.nydailynews.com/resizer/woEZPzcNKmialhgDA83eMI7pcrA=/800×0/filters:format(jpg):quality(70)/arc-anglerfish-arc2-prod-tronc.s3.amazonaws.com/public/FSJ3NFHNYO2MYLHRCS5LQWV3AI.jpg ). Well God knows the US won’t allow any such honesty regarding that event except immediately headlining that he was Mentally Ill™, and not protesting at all, after all, there was no more Racism, or an other ism, under Obama/Biden.
The best piece I found on that (I read numerous of them at the time it happened, and 99.9999% of them were too lame to note that he was an upstanding US African American/Black male citizen, of which there are millions), which the above linked photo affirming he was African American/Black, is from , (but which also failed to highlight in the text that John Constantino was an African American/Black male who was highly offended by the US Government) has been the one I found the other day, which did not appear during a search at the time: 10/08/10 By Rich Schapiro and Corky Siemaszko Neighbor says man who set himself on fire at National Mall had railed against America (though the URL sucks: https://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/mental-illness-made-man-burn-national-mall-family-article-1.1479401 ):
Neighbor says man who set himself on fire at National Mall had railed against America
The New Jersey man who died after setting himself ablaze on the National Mall in Washington had railed against the government and told a neighbor “America is falling apart.”
John Constantino “didn’t like the government for some reason,” neighbor Joe Horner told The Daily News.
“He said they were a waste of time, effort and money,” Horner, 56, said. “He said to me, ‘They’re no good. They don’t look out for us and they don’t care about anything but their own pockets.'”
Horner spoke out after Constantino’s family lawyer issued a statement saying his dramatic death Friday “was not a political act or statement, but the result of his long battle with mental illness.”
Horner said he saw his 64-year-old friend on Thursday and he showed no signs of being insane.
“He was his happy self,” said Horner, who lives on a few doors down from modest, two-story, book-filled townhouse in Mt. Laurel, N.J., that Constantino shared with his wife.
“There was no evidence, no sign of anything that would make you think he’d even be considering a think like that,” he said.
“People who are sad and depressed don’t do that,” he said. “I’m baffled.”
Constantino, a father of three grown children who once lived in Queens, was friendly, outgoing, and a member of the neighborhood association, neighbors said.
“If you needed a helping hand, that guy would help you,” Horner said. “It breaks my heart that he did that. I would have done anything to help but I didn’t know.”
A second neighbor who only identified himself as John echoed Horner, calling the dead man “a good friend, a good neighbor.”
Constantino’s incident took place on the National Mall in between the National Gallery of Art and the Air and Space Museum.
“John will be missed,” the distraught neighbor said, his voice halting.
Further down in the piece:
Constantino’s dramatic self-immolation came as Washington was on edge day after a troubled [African American/Black-multitude of poors] Connecticut woman was killed by cops near the Capitol after a high-speed car chase — and as the nation remains in the grip of a partial government shutdown.
Constantino, who was described as a “loving father and husband,” doused himself with gasoline and lit himself on fire between the Air and Space Museum and the National Gallery — and in front of hundreds of shocked onlookers.
According to witnesses, Mr Constantino gave the Capitol building a crisp military salute, before igniting the fuel he had doused himself in and then setting the blaze using a lighter just before 4.30pm.
But empaths are clearly tagged as insane, and/or terrorists, by the bipartisan powers that be, in this focker.
For what it’s worth, my personal opinion is that it was one of many of millions of Venal, White Gloved US Murders—declared Mental Illness Suicides™—by The State™, much like our current Fentanyl overdose explosions among homeless, and nearing homeless, US residents.
rangoon78
Musk, In their masturbatory fantasy, is man who’s uses pure intellect to better the planet and become the world’s richest man. They dream of a meritocracy where if you want it badly enough and push hard enough, you can ‘grind’ for his level of success.
https://orwellsociety.com/bursary/2022-winning-submission-the-cult-of-personality-of-elon-musk-by-quincy-de-vries/
bruce wilder
The neoliberal repressive state sees its opportunity to take out Musk, making an example of the arrogant huckster’s huckster. I do not applaud those taking apart Musk but I cannot feel sorry for him, given the givens. I think he is right that “free speech” is at an end politically, but it was already burnt toast. He is an unsympathetic figure for people like me who might actually care for idealistic reasons. And that is by design, I suspect.
Cancelling Twitter and with it Musk is a spectacle.
NR
Of course, there is no giant neoliberal conspiracy to take out Elon Musk. What’s happening with Twitter is completely the consequences of his own actions.
Musk made a huge deal of how, as soon as he took over Twitter, it was going to be complete “free speech” and anyone could say whatever they wanted. Right-wingers responded by saying what they want to say, which for them is spamming the N-word and other racial slurs all over the place (the use of racial slurs on Twitter went up by 500% after Musk took over).
Advertisers of course noticed this and decided that the risk of their ad appearing in a screenshot of a tweet with the N-word in it was too great, and so decided to pause their spending on Twitter until this mess gets sorted out. That’s it. That’s literally all that happened. Poor old Elon isn’t being “cancelled.” It’s just the consequences of his own actions. If he had bought Twitter without all the spectacle and signaling that he was going to let it become a free-for-all, none of this would be happening right now.
It’s not “cancelling Twitter and with it Musk” when Cheerios decides they don’t want to go viral for having their ad appear next to a neo-Nazi tweet.
different clue
I am not a financial professional, or even a financial amateur. So how can I possibly know whether Musk did or didn’t buy Twitter with the secret agenda reason of using it for massive tax “losses” to set against his other money? How do I know killing Twitter wasn’t the secret Musk plan all along?
Twitter died the day Musk bought it. It is a dead man walking. He will do whatever he has to in order to burn Twitter all the way down to the ground.
Can the skilled Twitter layoffees reverse-engineer another “Twitterform” company which does something similar enough to Twitter that all the Twitter fans and Twitter zombies will like and use that new “Twitterform” company just as much? They could call their new company “Cricket” and call its little posts and replies and messages “Chirps”.
anon y'mouse
how is the “neoliberal repressive state” cancelling Musk, when they’ve essentially bankrolled him through funding and MIC contracts ever since he made his first few mil (after daddy bought him mansions in college and he had emeralds falling out of his pockets as a child) and almost all of his resultant wealth is due to the BigGov and essentially stock fraud via tweeting?
i would really like to be cancelled like that. wouldn’t you all?
Tallifer
While I think little of Elon Musk as a corporate welfare bum and a peddler of greenwashing and interstellar consumerism, I do however see his point on free speech. Try using Google to search for a controversial (to liberals) opinion on, for example, drugs, gender or capital punishment, and you will see how censored we are in the West.
NR
Tallifer:
Actually, Youtube (which is owned by Google) pushes right-wing content to its users, it doesn’t censor it.
https://www.theregister.com/2022/10/18/youtube_algorithm_conservative_content/
Right-wingers get boosted and amplified today, but of course they have to claim they’re being censored because they love playing the perpetual victims.
Chuck Mire
Powered by Likes:
https://www.lx.com/culture/social-media/powered-by-likes/59182/
“From acquiring the coveted blue checkmark to chasing virality, social media’s impact on society continues to increase. Likes, notifications, and comments pull users in with each ding and buzz. LX news storyteller Cody Broadway follows five social media influencers to get their insight on the rise of picture-perfect feeds and life beyond the grids.”
bruce wilder
Having a Media dependent on corporate business advertising has a profound effect on what is “allowed” in the public discourse. I saw the Mars, Inc. television blacklist once. I do not think having billionaire candy makers or Cheerios or Jeff Bezos shape the discourse is benign, but it is what it is. Of course, no one is to blame but the victims in NR’s fantasy. Nothing to see here. Move along.
multitude of poors
anon y’mouse re:
It speaks volumes about the MIC (military Industrial complex), CIA supported Silicon Valley/Seattle (Meritocratic, Blue Left Coast™, my ass) Tech Billionaires that it took so very, very long for the Emerald Mine reality to see the light of day. It also speaks volumes about California’s vulgar, mostly millionaire politicians (from Local Governments through Federal) (1) and the repulsive California Fourth Estate in the wealth infested , Bluest™ Counties, who apparently worshiped the Pay Pal Mafia (along with Oracle, Microsoft, Apple; Amazon, eBay, Google, Facebook, Twitter, Uber, Airbnb, and so on) whose Billionaire members, like Musk and Thiel, have caused seemingly irreversible harm all over the world, let alone in their own back yards. Those counties are now teeming with exploding and suffering homeless, many who once made livable wages; could once afford the rent, and paid it on time.
(1) E.g. California Governor Gavin Newsom (who owns 2 Teslas, last I heard), was part of subsidizing the hell out of Tesla, so wealthy people would get a break they don’t at all need on an unaffordable to most, electricity HOG. Yet Newsom couldn’t be bothered to discuss property or sales tax subsidies regarding the exploding homeless receiving decent housing. In September, Governor Newsom sadistically vetoed exempting the homeless from parking fines (Assembly Bill AB1685) despite no nay votes from the Bipartisan 80 Assembly Members and only 3 (Republicans) of the Bipartisan 40 Senators voting nay. The 10 absentees among both houses were 50/50 Democrat and Republican. See https://legiscan.com/CA/votes/AB1685/2021.
Then there’s Ro Khanna, arguably the wealthiest Federal House Member. Khanna’s California district includes Musk’s notorious Fremont Nummi Tesla Plant; yet, to my knowledge, Khanna has never had a bad word to say about it. I’ve followed Khanna’s actions and lack of actions significantly, he still wants to spread Silicon Valleys all over the U.S., no doubt right along with ever more teeming homeless. For anyone wanting to @me about RO, please don’t, unless you actually live in Silicon Valley and have spent hours and hours ‘vetting’ him, knowing one day soon, he’ll almost surely run for vice president, or president. His two very active twitter feeds alone (RepRoKhanna, and Ro Khanna), particularly the responses from locals, speak volumes about him.
Source: https://commondefense.us/endorsements/ro-khanna/
gotta run …..
Willy
I like NRs comments. I’ve never come away confused (unlike with a couple others here).
By all observations, most neoliberal corporations want everybody addicted to their products, and not just a Nazi few. Surely a “capitalist genius” like Musk would know that Twitter gains almost 90% of its revenue from corporate advertising and would want to remain on good terms with those feeding hands. But then I’ve heard that a large share of his takeover funding was Saudi.
Could it be that Nazis are far more likely to become addicted to mindless consumption than those dangblasted neoliberal Jews are? Could it be that the GOP and their neoliberal corporate henchmen haven’t completed their mass-Nazification project yet, and that meddling kid Musk keeps getting in their way? I’ll let smarter minds decide.
Ché Pasa
So about demographics:
Nicholas Eberhardt has been going around everywhere, particularly on rightist platforms, warning about the coming demographic crash in the United States, the Anglosphere in general, as well as China, Russia and the Ukraine, well pretty much everywhere except the global south — which faces other population and economic problems.
He frets incessantly that not only is the US (among other English-speaking countries) facing a demographic apocalypse — because white people aren’t breeding at replacement levels any more — but in the midst of it, white men aren’t “working” at levels they should be, not even at levels comparable to 1940 when he says unemployment was at 15%.
He’s happy that Russia and China are facing huge population decline now or very soon, while he’s unhappy that the West — except Israel (Arab populations are crashing, tho) — is facing similar declines.
He seems to have no idea at all that disastrous economic policies of the neo-liberals that rule us are even partially responsible for declines in the West. No, it’s all due to women who refuse to breed, and couples who refuse to marry.
Or are they deliberate policies to ensure populations cease growing and eventually decline?
He seems to want to force white women to breed (abortion bans anyone?) and force white men to work (hmmm.) Or there’s something else on his mind. Something else? What could it be?
His message is geared to the upper and ruling classes. Not really for the rest of us at all. But what is that message?
A hint:
The De-Population Bomb
Ché Pasa
Sorry, it’s Nicholas Eberstadt.
NR
Let’s recap what happened with the whole Twitter fiasco, shall we?
– Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, signs a deal to buy Twitter. In doing so, he massively overvalues the company and pays tens of billions of dollars more than it’s actually worth. He takes on tremendous debt to buy it and transfers that debt to Twitter once he takes ownership. Twitter’s yearly interest payment on debt skyrockets from $50 million to $1 billion.
– Musk makes a huge deal of how, one he takes over Twitter, anyone will be able to say anything they want. Right-wingers and other garbage human beings react predictably to this, and the use of racial slurs on Twitter goes up by 500%.
– Musk fires half of Twitter’s workforce, including a big chunk of the content moderation team, further exacerbating the company’s problems.
– Advertisers look at the shitshow Twitter has become and make the sensible decision to pause their spending on the platform while they wait and see if it will get sorted out. The loss of revenue, combined with the fact that Twitter’s burn rate has tripled due to the interest payments on the debt Musk saddled the company with, results in the company losing $4 million every day.
So Bruce, please enlighten us as to how poor ol’ Elon is the victim in this scenario.
StewartM
I do not think having billionaire candy makers or Cheerios or Jeff Bezos shape the discourse is benign, but it is what it is. Of course, no one is to blame but the victims in NR’s fantasy.
Yeah, billionaires are true “victims” while the targets of Nazis are not. Right Bruce?
By contrast, people in countries who actually were governed by Nazis realize how horrible they were, and thus ban their speech and their symbols. I have a book on my shelf, given to me by one of my high school teachers, titled The Education of T. C. Mits. It dates from the 1930s, when my high school teacher was a young man. (My high school teacher refused to pledge allegiance to the flag, and was openly a ‘humanist’, which raised eyebrows in my small Southern home town). He ended up serving in WWII.
Anyway, I recall one of the arguments in that book is “that it is not logical to allow the enemies of democracy and free speech to use free speech to destroy both”. That part didn’t resound with my ACLU-friendly sensibility back then, but I have come to appreciate why many progressives of that era felt that way, with our own fascists getting ready to beat down the doors.
Jason
Alleged “non-interventionist” Tulsi Gabbard has endorsed Chuck Grassley. When questioned on the apparent misalignment between her heretofore views on war and military spending versus those of Grassley, Gabbard said she just assumed Grassley watched her marathon interview with Joe Rogan.
Gabbard also said she hopes to “push Grassley left” on issues she recently claimed to care about, such as Medicare for All.
“We all know now that Bernie couldn’t push Biden left, so we have to try something different.
This comment has been a feeble attempt at satire.
multitude of poors
As to my above remarks re Khanna’s twit feeds, this was priceless:
(I use nitter.net when I feel the need to see what someone twitted, as I’m no longer able to read official twitter pages, since about a year ago, nitter’s somewhat limited as to copying and pasting, so if someone can access twitter, they may find more regarding that twit at https://twitter.com/RoKhanna/status/1584749697566052353 )
gotta run …..
multitude of poors
For me, one of the events that so epitomized the Obama Biden, vast populace (along with world wide) betrayal years, was African American/Black Citizen—64 year old, well loved by neighbors and (most likely) family, faithfully married, family man—John Constantino.
John Constantino calmly immolated himself in broad daylight at the National Mall (an historic DC landmark for Public Protest)—in full view of the US Capitol—on Friday, October 4th, 2013, as a reported hundreds at the National Mall stood witness.
I suspect John Contantino may have felt that it would result in a US Spring Uprising, like the Arab Spring Uprising (a little under three years earlier) which was brought on by a series of immolations, the first noted being that of Tunisian, Mohamed Bouazizi, who died on January 4th, 2011. Even per wiki (which I actually hate, for countless reasons, the main being scumbag Billionaire, grifter deceiver, Jimmy Whales; but it’s become increasingly impossible to access far better commentary written at the time of an event), it’s currently noted:
Back to John Constantino and Friday, October fourth, 2013
For lack of time and a better phraseology I would put it as the most historically photographed in the US, Asian style Protest Immolation, calmly sitting position he was in (see https://www.nydailynews.com/resizer/woEZPzcNKmialhgDA83eMI7pcrA=/800×0/filters:format(jpg):quality(70)/arc-anglerfish-arc2-prod-tronc.s3.amazonaws.com/public/FSJ3NFHNYO2MYLHRCS5LQWV3AI.jpg ). Well God knows the US won’t allow any such honesty regarding that event except immediately headlining that he was Mentally Ill™, and not protesting at all, after all, there was no more Racism, or an other ism, under Obama/Biden.
The best piece I found on that (I read numerous of them at the time it happened, and 99.9999% of them were too lame to note that he was an upstanding US African American/Black male citizen, of which there are millions), which the above linked photo affirming he was African American/Black, is from , (but which also failed to highlight in the text that John Constantino was an African American/Black male who was highly offended by the US Government) has been the one I found the other day, which did not appear during a search at the time: 10/08/10 By Rich Schapiro and Corky Siemaszko Neighbor says man who set himself on fire at National Mall had railed against America (though the URL sucks: https://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/mental-illness-made-man-burn-national-mall-family-article-1.1479401 ):
Further down in the piece:
Also, I feel that this sentence, from the Daily Mail piece at the time ( https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2449371/National-Mall-victim-John-Constantino-identified.html ) is relevant regarding his calm, deliberate protest (in my opinion) at the National Mall:
But empaths are clearly tagged as insane, and/or terrorists, by the bipartisan powers that be, in this focker.
For what it’s worth, my personal opinion is that it was one of many of millions of Venal, White Gloved US Murders—declared Mental Illness Suicides™—by The State™, much like our current Fentanyl overdose explosions among homeless, and nearing homeless, US residents.
gotta run …..