Today we are starting a two-parter for y’all because there is just too much bullshit going on.
Don Trump’s new bff Elon Musk has certainly changed gears over the years. I believe words matter and that people like zebras don’t change their stripes as it was interesting to read the Inverse’s piece written by Alasdair Wilkins, “Perhaps Musk’s earliest public statements on Trump came in October 2015, four months after the latter kicked off his campaign and still a couple months before the primaries began. Asked about Trump’s chances as part of a larger public forum on the future of tech, a visibly uncomfortable Musk picked his words carefully.
“I don’t really have strong feelings except that hopefully Trump doesn’t get the nomination of the Republican party, because I think that’s, yeah… that wouldn’t be good,” Musk said. “I think at most he would get the Republican nomination, but I think that would still be a bit embarrassing.” He also offered tepid affirmation to fellow panelist and Y Combinator president Sam Altman’s assertion it wouldn’t be surprising if Trump got the nomination. Asked about his political involvement by panel host Andrew Ross Sorkin, Musk laid out his largely neutral approach. “I get involved in politics as little as possible,” he said, explaining politics mattered to him solely in terms of government contracts. “There’s some amount I have to get involved in, mostly because SpaceX has to battle Boeing and Lockheed for national security and civil space launch contracts. If we don’t battle them, then we’ll lose.”… According to the Federal Elections Commission, Musk did not donate to any campaigns during 2016 itself, though he did donate $5,000 to the Hillary Clinton campaign in May 2015, before Trump had entered the race. Musk’s contributions to presidential campaigns have historically come in the year prior to the election or still during the primary. Apart from giving money to George W. Bush in 2003, Musk has only donated to Democrats in presidential campaigns; in the 2004 election he donated to John Kerry…On November 4, just days before election day, Musk was asked about the two candidates during an appearance on CNBC’s fascinatingly named Squawk Alley. Musk again sounded uncertain throughout, offering an endorsement of Clinton and a condemnation of Trump that somehow reads as both unequivocal and guarded.
“Obviously I think Hillary’s economic policies, her environmental policies in particular, are the right ones, but, yeah,” he said. “Also I don’t think this is the finest moment in our democracy in general.” When pressed on his thoughts on Trump, Musk added, “I feel a bit stronger that probably he’s not the right guy. He just doesn’t seem, he doesn’t seem to have the sort of character that reflects well on the United States. I don’t know… no.”
Now Trump was what 70 then? How did his character change? Now Musk is on stage jumping around like a school girl supporting his new pal? What changed? Well, as always follow the money.
Tesla has benefitted immensely from its first mover advantage into the EV space. Musk doesn’t care about Trump, he wants to make money so he can play with rockets and send people to their deaths heading toward Mars. He needs money to play in these sand boxes. He needs government contracts to go his way, he just said as much in the article. There is nothing surprising about this, it is just business being played at the highest level. But shifting the playing field is hypocritical to someone that says he is socially ambivalent about capitalism and he is doing this for humanity when in fact he is very capitalistic. How have these credits helped him? They have been the lifeline keeping Tesla afloat and Tesla would have bombed out long ago without them.
This from James Gilboy in The Drive “Tesla has revealed in an annual filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission that it raked in almost $1.8 billion in 2023 from selling regulatory credits to automakers lagging on electrification. Whether this important source of income will remain viable much longer, though, is in doubt.
Tesla’s income from zero-emissions vehicle regulatory credits was disclosed in its Form 10-K for calendar year 2023, where it reported $17.66 billion in gross profit. $1.79B came from said credits, up from $1.776B in 2022, and further from $1.465B in 2021. That means credit sales make up more than 10 percent of Tesla‘s gross profit, and potentially a larger proportion of its $14.974B in net income. Over the years, Tesla’s revenue from this source has totaled $9B according to Transport Topics…Historically, one of Tesla’s major customers has been Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (now Stellantis), whose credit purchases financed Tesla’s Berlin factory.”
So the guy that has had government tax credits build his factories around the globe and ensure that his company didn’t go bankrupt has now reached the scale where he wants to do away with tax credits and make America great again? Right, what a charlatan, but good business. Too bad most people can’t see this for what it really is, at least ZeroHedge is calling it out…
This from ZeroHedge, “The final chapter of the electric vehicle price war, sparked by Tesla’s Elon Musk, hinges on President-elect Donald Trump’s plan to eliminate the $7,500 consumer tax credit. Sources with direct knowledge told Reuters that the Trump team has discussed ending the EV tax credit as part of broader tax reform legislation…
We knew the playbook in July. Here it is again: “Musk’s strategy to win the EV price war: Build the largest EV business with taxpayer dollars, popularize EVs, allow other startups and OEMs to enter the market, and then support politicians who want to end EV subsidies, crushing the competition and leaving Tesla reigning supreme.”
The only part they left out was blocking BYD which we covered last week which is why he needs Trump’s tariffs. This is one half of the Doge taskforce? Is it starting to become clear now?
We know the playbook, but let’s bask in the back and forth between these two a little more courtesy of the NYmag.com Intelligencer written by Margaret Hartman,
This when Musk left Trump’s presidential council over Trump pulling out of the Paris Climate accord, “Am departing presidential councils. Climate change is real. Leaving Paris is not good for America or the world.” Jun 1, 2017
When Tesla Owners Silicon Valley asked Musk who he was leaning toward and he replied, “Desantis.” Jun 15, 2022
Trump calls Elon another bullshit artist at a rally in Anchorage Alaska, July 9, 2022.
Two days later, Musk tweets, “Trump would be 82 at end of term, which is too old to be chief executive of anything, let alone the United States of America. If DeSantis runs against Biden in 2024, then DeSantis will easily win – he doesn’t even need to campaign.”
The next day Trump tweets “When Elon Musk came to the White House asking me for help on all of his many subsidized projects, whether it’s electric cars that don’t drive long enough, driverless cars that crash, or rocket ships to nowhere, without which subsidies he’d be worthless, and telling me how he was a big Trump fan and Republican, I could have said, “drop to your knees and beg, and he would have done it. Now Elon should focus on getting himself out of the Twitter mess because he could owe $44 billion for something that’s perhaps worthless. Also, lots of competition for electric cars.”
Musk has publicly criticized President Biden and his policies multiple times, and he recently posted, “Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS) is a very real disease” in response to a clip of Bill Maher saying he would vote for anyone but Trump in 2024.
But Musk quickly poured cold water on the idea that he’d be funding Trump, writing on X: “Just to be super clear, I am not donating money to either candidate for US President. “
This was 7 months ago and 2 months ago he was jumping on stage like he won a showcase showdown. Margaret did a wonderful job documenting it all and showing everyone just how god damned dumb this whole thing is.
When will the bromance be over?
Speaking of bromances, Elon and Vivek Ramaswamy are going to be leading the new department of government efficiency task force. But, alas let’s find out how Vivek is tied to this whole ball of yarn.
We have an old Harvard days video of Vivek and Pothole Pete Buttigieg asking questions of Al Sharpton on Chris Matthew’s hardball show. Vivek asked Al Sharpton of all people. “Of all the Democratic candidates out there why should I vote for the one with the least experience?” I might forgive an undergraduate for falling prey to the old line, If you aren’t a Democrat at 18 you don’t have a heart, if you aren’t a Republican by the age of 35 you don’t have a brain. It gets worse as Vivek won the Paul and Daisy Soros Fellowships for New Americans scholarship. It was a $50,000 award.
Then we have the transcript and the video of Vivek on the Mehdi Hasan show, “Hasan: You say you’re anti-identity politics, anti-affirmative action in a party that hates the Soros name, yet you accepted a Paul and Daisy Soros scholarship at law school that was specifically set up for the children of immigrants. It was an affirmative action scholarship and your defense for that is that you didn’t have the money to pay for law school even though you’d already made over a million dollars at the time.
Ramaswamy: That’s not true. My defense of that is […] if someone gives you a merit scholarship at the age of 24, you take it. […] I didn’t say I didn’t have the money, I said at a time when I had a lot less money than I have now, $50,000 was still useful money to make.”
Hasan: “Did you not make 750,000 dollars?”
Vivek Ramaswamy: “Not at the time I had applied for the [Soros] scholarship.”
Me: “Yes you did Vivek. This is awkward for you because you did. I’ve got the tax returns in front of my face.”
Now there is plenty of evidence that Paul and George did plenty of business together, but after making almost a $1M the kid is on financial aid. Here is what he has advocated for according to snopes.com on the fact check of his receiving money from George Soros which they concluded he did not, “Vivek Ramaswamy, a U.S. Republican 2024 candidate for president, has long been in the news for holding controversial views — including his advocacy of eliminating birthright citizenship for children of undocumented immigrants and “gutting” the H-1B visa system to hire skilled foreign workers. He has taken other right-leaning positions over the course of his campaign for the Republican Party nomination, including criticizing university affirmative action policies that consider race as a factor in admissions, and encouraging a race-blind meritocracy instead.” There is something blurry in my curry here Vivek. It has the smell of musk, Elon Musk.
After you folks get rich using these programs, that’s when you volunteer to eliminate these programs? I don’t care what Soros the money came from Vivek, George, Paul or Ringo. You took the money and then you paid to have Wikipedia scrubbed to remove that? This is one half of the DOGE taskforce?
Don’t take my word for it, this is from a Newsweek article written by Sam Nunberg, a lawyer and political consultant, “Vivek Ramaswamy’s artful narrative, meticulously tailored for the GOP primary voter, weaves a tale of principled sacrifice and success. According to his version, he helmed the leadership of Roivant, a multi-billion-dollar American pharmaceutical company he founded, and gallantly relinquished his CEO role in 2021 due to his unwavering stance against ESG principles, despite facing opposition from his liberal workforce. While this narrative might seem appealing, it is akin to the endless “flip-flops” that have plagued his campaign—an elaborate work of fiction that unravels upon a modicum of scrutiny.
Let’s start with the basics. Ramaswamy has funded his campaign through the sale of over $32 million in Roivant stock options in February of this year. This could lead one to believe that Roivant, based in Bermuda, is thriving and that Ramaswamy is a great entrepreneur. Except the company reported staggering losses of $1.2 billion in its financial report of March 2023. This isn’t a one-time slump: In March 2022, when Ramaswamy was still Roivant’s chairman and a major shareholder, the company reported an annual loss of $924.1 million.
Ramaswamy’s defenders may argue that Roivant performed better during his tenure as CEO in 2021, but alas, the numbers tell a different story. The reality is that Roivant’s finances were abysmal under Ramaswamy’s watch. During his tenure in 2019, the company’s net operating loss exceeded $530 million. By 2020, the losses had doubled to over $1 billion, accompanied by a 65 percent decline in revenue. These numbers raise a puzzling question: How can a company consistently bleeding billions trade at over $10 a share?
Yet this irony is not the worst of it. In 2015, there was another sordid affair involving Ramaswamy, over Axovant Sciences Alzheimer’s drug. In June 2015, Ramaswamy appeared on CNBC to praise the Axovant IPO, which soared to over $30 a share based on expectations surrounding its Alzheimer’s drug, Intepirdine. The drug was touted as a “breakthrough,” yet upon closer examination, this development fell apart.
Axovant had acquired the drug for $5 million in December 2014, six months before the IPO, after the majority of Phase 2 trials had “failed to meet their primary endpoints” in 2010. Ramaswamy devised a solution: His mother, Dr. Geetha Ramaswamy, conducted a new Phase 2 trial in 2015 involving “684 subjects.” This trial conveniently claimed to demonstrate sufficient improvement to “support Phase 3” trials.
The aftermath was a triumphant $350 million IPO in 2015, followed by a drastic fall. By September 2017, the stock had plummeted 75 percent after Ramaswamy and his mother announced the Phase 3 trial’s failure. Subsequent trials continued to disappoint, culminating in a 99 percent loss in value and a name change for the company.
While investors suffered significant losses, Ramaswamy profited from a higher media profile, IPO payouts, and the sale of remaining Axovant assets in 2020.”
His mommy conducted a new trial that got them to phase 3 trials? Then he gets serious IPO money and then the stock, the mommy trials, turn out phase 3 failure and the stock falls apart. I’ll let Sam have the last word since this was written during the 2023 Republican primaries, “ Both parties are already led by scandal-plagued octogenarians. The last thing we need is a millennial conman pretending to be a presidential candidate.”
I know you are thinking that liberal Newsweek wrote a hit piece on the new young star of the Republican party. No, quite the contrary. Sam Nunberg is a lawyer and political consultant based in West Palm Beach, Fla. He previously served as an advisor to former President Donald Trump. He was hired and fired four times and then sued by Don Trump. After this he still managed to say this about Trump regarding the 2016 election, “Donald Trump won this election on his own. He campaigned his ass off. And there is nobody who hates him more than me.”
So now Bernadette Trump is going to hire a conman billionaire and join him with a conman 300 billionaire to cut government inefficiency when all three are some of the biggest beneficiaries of government and legal shenanigans in the history of this country. Why don’t we just dig up Bernie Madoff and put him in charge of the treasury.
Folks, I am not an investigative journalist, but I do have google. If these headlines are fakes, shame on me. But they aren’t. That’s enough with the bromancing, let’s try to figure out some whys by looking at the makeovers and rebrandings in part II.
Sincerely Yours,
C Thomas Printer
On this date in history… 97 years ago to be exact, the first Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade was held in New York City.
Also born on this date… the man who always keeps it 100, Swede Anders Celsius.
Thank you for listening today and you can find all of our articles and more on our website cthomasprinter.com.