Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Musk-Trump dispute includes threats to SpaceX contracts

spacenews.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 799 posts

Re: Musk-Trump dispute includes threats to SpaceX contracts

#32

Post by coffeemug »

jmyeet wrote: post #18

It's wild to me how many conspiracy theories I've seen about how this is all staged, like it's a distraction or it's just Elon repairing his image and trying to rescue Tesla (whose sales are cratering). Psychologically, I think this is reflective of cognitive dissonance. The two conflicting ideas are that two people with much to lose would get in the dumbest fight imaginable and the myth of meritocracy [1]. You see,…

There is no myth. Both Trump and Elon have generational talent in their respective domains. This is the kind of talent that’s so unique, it creates its own domain that didn’t exist before, and that no one will be able to replicate after.

But they’re both unstable, and have many other negative features.

One can have an extraordinary talent in starting generational companies, and have a social media addiction (among possibly other addictions and problems) that makes one unstable. These aren’t mutually exclusive.

Re: Musk-Trump dispute includes threats to SpaceX contracts

#33

Post by Applejinx »

BirAdam wrote: post #24

So, the government would do what, lean on Russia with whom the USA is currently engaged in a proxy war? Also, for Boeing or Blue Origin, the cost would currently be higher per launch, and as far as I know, no one has the kind of satellite network that SpaceX does. Of course, those are sane considerations. I suppose I shouldn’t accuse the Donald of any kind of rational thinking.

[flagged]

Re: Musk-Trump dispute includes threats to SpaceX contracts

#34

Post by steveBK123 »

username223 wrote: post #28
mystified5016 wrote: post #6

This reads like pretty classic infighting between a dictator and one of his more powerful cronies. I am surprised at how fast it happened, though. Usually this comes towards the end of a dictatorship. Maybe our dear leader is just as incompetent at being a dictator as he is everything else.

> Usually this comes towards the end of a dictatorship. It doesn't seem that way to me, e.g. Putin arrested Khodorkovsky (the richest man in Russia) in 2003. The way I see it, the politician needs the oligarch's money to gain political power, but then he has actual state power, including guns and the judicial system. At that point the oligarch has no purpose -- after all, the politician can just make new ones -- so i…

> If Elon thought he was buying the presidency in exchange for favors, he wasn't thinking things through.

This is the funniest part to me, in the context of THIS president. The guy that demands fully loyalty but gives none?

I can't imagine being the richest guy in the world, and embarrassing myself to such a degree all for.. what? He paid maybe $300M to help elect the guy, wore all the stupid hates, lavished orange man with praise.. and for what. What was ever the upside? The possible downside was obviously asymmetric to any clear eyed viewer.

And so that asymmetric downside now begins.

Re: Musk-Trump dispute includes threats to SpaceX contracts

#35

Post by [deleted] »

Applejinx wrote: post #33
BirAdam wrote: post #24

So, the government would do what, lean on Russia with whom the USA is currently engaged in a proxy war? Also, for Boeing or Blue Origin, the cost would currently be higher per launch, and as far as I know, no one has the kind of satellite network that SpaceX does. Of course, those are sane considerations. I suppose I shouldn’t accuse the Donald of any kind of rational thinking.

[flagged]

[deleted]

Re: Musk-Trump dispute includes threats to SpaceX contracts

#36

Post by kaonwarb »

state_less wrote: post #23

What does SpaceX have to do with the Musk/Trump spat? Shouldn't those SpaceX contracts be based on how well the country is served by them and at what price. Trump needs to take his lumps on his BBB. That bill is full of pork for billionaires and cuts funding for poor folks. It should come as no surprise that people don't like it.

I fear you materially overestimate Trump's rationality.

Re: Musk-Trump dispute includes threats to SpaceX contracts

#37

Post by marcosdumay »

yb6677 wrote: post #17

[dead]

> Trump is a deal maker and knows he doesn’t have the cards.

That contradicts almost everything we've seen on his government. He doesn't seem to be a deal maker, doesn't seem to even grasp the concept of deals, and doesn't seem to care if he has the cards or not.

Re: Musk-Trump dispute includes threats to SpaceX contracts

#38

Post by jmyeet »

BirAdam wrote: post #24

So, the government would do what, lean on Russia with whom the USA is currently engaged in a proxy war? Also, for Boeing or Blue Origin, the cost would currently be higher per launch, and as far as I know, no one has the kind of satellite network that SpaceX does. Of course, those are sane considerations. I suppose I shouldn’t accuse the Donald of any kind of rational thinking.

SpaceX is critical infrastructure to the US at this point and its continued availability and operation is of national security interest.

That may sound like it gives Elon power. It's the opposite, actually. No US administration will take lightly threats to national security infrastructure like this. The nuclear option for any administration is to nationalize SpaceX, which they absolutely could do.

Less nuclear: the US has a lot of control over what SpaceX does. The FAA (and to a lesser extent the NOAA) has to approve every launch. They could simply gorund SpaceX.

If you think SpaceX could simply move operations elsewhere, think again, The US prohibits ASML, a Dutch company, from selling EUV lithography machines to China.

Apart from all of that, SpaceX is absolutely dependant on US government funding and contracts. Withdrawing those, or even the threat of such, allows the US to wield a lot of power over SpaceX.

What's rather surprising about this feud is that Trump is currently the adult and has been uncharacteristically restrained in his response thus far. Of course, all that could change. It was Elon who heavily implied that Trump was a pedophile, which is an absolutely insane thing to do.

Re: Musk-Trump dispute includes threats to SpaceX contracts

#39

Post by dahart »

mystified5016 wrote: post #7
Neil44 wrote: post #2

This feud is just a pantomime for the crowd in my opinion. There's a bigger play here.

That's giving these people far too much credit.

Are you sure? You know that Trump constantly talks about his TV ratings? I forget who it was, but I remember there being a story last year or the year before, of someone who was publicly criticizing Trump met with him and was expecting to be absolutely whipped and scolded, instead behind the scenes Trump thanked them for making good television. The financial impact on Musk’s companies do make this seem real, but somehow I wouldn’t be surprised if this drama was fake. It did occur to me, and I can tell I’m not the only one... the top Google autocomplete for me for “is the trump” is “is the trump musk feud real”.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-news/president-trump...

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/28/us/politics/television-tr...

Post reply on HN