Former President Donald Trump used a campaign rally in Alaska to demonize Tesla CEO Elon Musk, saying Musk lied to him after personally telling Trump that he voted for him in 2016. conversation they had adopted a different tactic. “He told me he voted for me!” said Trump. “So he’s another BS artist.”
Musk spoke during the All In Summit in Miami in May that he may never have voted Republican in his entire life and an overwhelming majority for Democrat. “I would classify myself as a moderate, neither Republican nor Democrat…I have voted overwhelmingly for Democrats historically. Like, I’m not sure, I may never have voted for a Republican, just to be clear.” Musk had previously tweeted similar statements.
Trump’s comments about Musk as a BS performer came amid a headliner rally in support of Sarah Palin’s bid for Congress and Kelly Tshibaka’s bid for primary Lisa Murkowski. (Trump has rejected Murkowski’s re-election campaign over the Republican senator’s failure to show sufficient loyalty to the former president.)
Musk gets hissy back from Trump
Not to be outdone in the little verbal battle, Musk has: beaten down that Trump should “hang up his hat,” that he is too old to run for president in 2024.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 12, 2022
Recent polls show that some Republicans agree.
“I don’t hate the man, but it’s time for Trump to hang up his hat and sail into the sunset,” Musk tweeted. Musk has expressed his support for Florida Governor Ron DeSantis as the Republican candidate in the 2024 presidential race, despite his views against taking climate action and the fact that his policies follow suit and not aimed at combating the growing crisis†
The New York Times has reported that a poll they conducted with Siena College shows Trump’s post-presidential quest to consolidate his support within the Republican Party is less strong than previously thought. Nearly half of the party’s primary voters would seek someone else for the presidency by 2024, and a significant number pledge to abandon him if he wins the nomination.
How quickly Trump forgot Musk’s loyalty. Musk has defended Trump’s right to post on Twitter even after all the evidence pointed to his full support for the January 6, 2021 Capitol attack.
In another example of siding with Trump, Musk tweeted that Democrats “should also call off the attack on the former president” for his part in the January 6 attack on the Capitol. Referring to the majority of the committee’s Democratic makeup, Musk failed to acknowledge that minority chairman Kevin McCarthy had turned down opportunities to bring additional Republicans into the investigation and that one of the committee’s leaders is Liz Cheney, a staunch conservative, daughter from former Vice President Dick Cheney, and someone who… voted with Trump on policy 93% of the time†
The BS Artist: Trump as a perfect liar
When the Washington Post The Fact Checker team began cataloging the false or misleading claims made by then-President Donald Trump, recording 492 suspicious claims in the first 100 days of his presidency. By the end of his term, Trump had amassed 30,573 falsehoods during his presidency — about 21 . on average false claims one day. He became a symbol of the climate crisis† scientific skepticismand the art of denial†
Trump made a 180-degree turn during Alaska’s insult, defending Musk’s decision to withdraw his offer to buy Twitter. “He has a pretty bad contract. I looked at his contract. Not a good contract.” While he said he knew as early as May that Musk’s Twitter takeover would collapse, Trump noted that he had said Musk would not buy Twitter at such a “ridiculous price.” Elon is not going to buy Twitter. Where have you heard that before? From me.”
Never one to miss an opportunity to manipulate a crowd, Trump added at the Anchorage meeting that, due to Twitter’s shaky status, all attendees should migrate to his social media company, Truth Social. Is that an example of Orwellian double talk, or what? In another instance of his thousands of public/private misstatements, Trump left the board of Truth Social. According to a June 8 filing with the Florida Department of State’s Division of Corporations, Trump was removed from his position as chairman of the Trump Media and Technology Group (TMTG). The move took place weeks before it was served on a federal subpoena, records show.
Musk as a social media manipulator
Musk’s use of Twitter to voice his displeasure with Trump is ironic, as his ill-fated quest to become Twitter’s new owner could cost the company its financial viability. “The reality is, right now, you know, Twitter has a very left-wing bias,” Musk defended at the Miami conference. At the time, Musk said his Twitter purchase would be a “moderate wing takeover.”
I think he protests too much.
Musk has filed a notice to withdraw his $44 billion bid to buy Twitter. He claims that the company has not provided sufficient evidence of less than 5% total fake and spam accounts. To complete the sale, Musk decided to sell a significant portion of Tesla’s stock; and after that, the value of Tesla stock plummeted, making the Twitter purchase price seem too high.
Musk’s purchase price for Twitter was set at $44 billion. However, late last week he informed the SEC that he would no longer acquire the social media company. Twitter responded by saying Musk is contractually obligated to go through with the purchase and that the company will take legal action to ensure he does just that.
Reuters reports that Musk’s bid to scrap his purchase from Twitter could leave the world’s richest person in a stronger financial position than before he unveiled the $44 billion deal, with billions of dollars in cash from Tesla stock sales now on the rise. standing on the couch.
Big Egos and the BS Artist
A book from 2022, Shifting the frame, tells how Donald Trump’s inauguration as the 45th President of the United States sparked the largest one-day and sustained protest movement in American history. On January 21, 2017, the Women’s March, along with organizers of the latest #MeToo movement, lit up the global digital visibility of the intersectional multidimensionality of misogyny. Four years later, Trump’s re-election defeat and “Big Lies” voter fraud sparked a violent uprising and sparked a movement to restrict access to vote across the country.
How can we as consumers get better at detecting BS? One way is to ask questions until you get to the first principles of the problem at hand. Ask yourself, is the answer to your question based on science or is it anecdotal? Is it an urban legend, a cliché, or is it based on peer-reviewed research?
Elon Musk has been quoted as saying, “To solve a problem, I always reason back to first principles instead of accepting analog thinking.” But have we insisted that Musk adhere to the first principles of critical thinking before making judgments, advice, or recommendations? His boast about unfounded new model release dates, his failed predictions about fully autonomous vehicles, his intransigence about a futuristic all-electric pickup, his constant buying and selling of Tesla stock—these may not be outright lies, but they fall under the category BS.
In fact, if we want to give Musk the honorary title of visionary, we must also ask him to shake off his tendency towards pettiness, paranoia and selfish thinking. We can take a leader who is vulnerable; what we cannot accept is someone whose public persona wavers between genius and vindictive.
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