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Musk is Destroying Us in Order to Get Revenge [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2025-02-08
When Donald Trump was campaigning in 2024, he made it very clear that one of his motives was revenge for mostly imagined wrongs — from being prosecuted (and convicted) for crimes he really did commit to people being insufficiently appreciative of his genius. Elon Musk stayed mostly in the background (if showing off his navel while jumping high in the air behind Trump counts as background), so he never talked much about his motivations. Yes, it’s clear he wants control, he wants all the money in the world, he wants the sweet feeling of making as many of us as possible jumping, or barking, or groveling, at his whim. But there is something else he also wants: revenge.
Transgender: Trump used MAGAs discomfort with and hatred of gender complexities as part of his campaign; some of this was probably tactical rather than personal, though with Trump one never knows. Musk, however, has long had a real antipathy toward LGBT — especially T — not just because it offends his hypermasculine sense of entitlement, but also because he has a trans child:
‘I lost my son’: Elon Musk on transgender daughter.
Also: What Elon Musk Has Said About Transgender People Amid Pronoun Dustup (2022).
So Musk switched from supporting Democrats to supporting Trump: 'People seem dumbstruck' - Inside Musk's race to upend government:
[U]nhappy with Biden's position on issues from labour laws to transgender rights, Musk began to look to the other side of the aisle in the run-up to the 2024 presidential election.
USAID: This agency has been a target of Republicans (though not all Republicans, including Marco Rubio at one time). A Washington Post story claims Musk only recently started noticing and attacking USAID, but I think he has a longer hatred of the agency. It goes back to USAID’s help in ending South Africa’s apartheid policies and supporting true democracy there. See American People’s Foreign Policy: USAID’s Role in Apartheid South Africa, What USAID does, and why Trump and Musk want to get rid of it, also Elon Musk’s Angry USAID Grudge Explained: Revenge for Ending South African Apartheid, and How Trump’s pledge to punish South Africa reflects Musk’s criticism of his homeland:
Many South Africans viewed Trump’s sudden pledge to punish America’s biggest trade partner in Africa as surprising and at least partly influenced by billionaire Tesla owner Musk, who was born in the South African capital of Pretoria but left for Canada after he completed high school. . . . Musk accused Ramaphosa’s government in 2023 of allowing a “genocide” to happen over the killings of some white farmers, which have happened for years. . . . Musk also waded into the issue Monday by replying to a post by Ramaphosa’s official account on X with the question: “Why do you have openly racist ownership laws?”
It’s not just USAID’s actions (real or imagined) in South Africa; USAID has been helping Ukraine in ways that Musk doesn’t like: PROJECT ANNOUNCEMENT: Inspection of USAID's Oversight of Starlink Terminals Provided to the Government of Ukraine (May 14,2024):
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https://www.dailykos.com/story/2025/2/8/2302364/-Musk-is-Destroying-Us-in-Order-to-Get-Revenge
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