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Elon Musk's Demolition Crew

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Re: Elon Musk's Demolition Crew

#361

Post by insane_dreamer »

spicyusername wrote: post #80

I want to believe these changes can be positive, but the people in charge of enacting them have done nothing but disabuse me of trust and good faith.

If the change was _technical_ (streamline systems for greater efficiency) I would be supporting it.

But it's clear the change is _ideological_. And even if you think that one ideology is better than the other, ideological purges of civil servants (who may hold personal political views but whose offices are apolitical and usually there for decades regardless of the party in power), are very dangerous -- just two steps away from fascism.

Re: Elon Musk's Demolition Crew

#362

Post by insane_dreamer »

tmikaeld wrote: post #293

As an outsider trying to make sense of all this. Is America taking the hammer down on all types of spending because America is desperate to bring down debt from 120% of GDP?

Not really. It's about cutting expenses so that he can pass a large tax cut (primarily benefiting corporations and the wealthy). No one is worried about the deficit anymore.

Re: Elon Musk's Demolition Crew

#363

Post by insane_dreamer »

adamtaylor_13 wrote: post #67
chris_wot wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet you allowed a grifter like Trump who bankrupted pretty much all his businesses to become President. Got it.

I didn’t allow anything. But compared with the folks running against him? Yeah, I’d pick him every day of the week and twice on Sunday. Get us a real candidate from the Democratic Party and we could have a discussion but Kamala was even less qualified than trump and what many non-Americans seem to miss is that Americans care about policy A LOT. We generally don’t give a shit if our president is a meanie head or says…

Trump supported a violent attempt to overturn the results of an election. In other democratic countries that's called an attempted coup. Not to mention Trump's own attempts to pressure states not to certify the results.

I don't care if Trump has amazing plans or is Mother Teresa and Henry Ford and Benjamin Franklin rolled into one, he is anti-democracy and that automatically disqualifies him, and those who support him should be ashamed of themselves for not caring. (and that's before we get into his character; I kind of liked Trump way back at the beginning, thought he might be a Ross Perot type of guy; but once that recording of him talking about women came out (before the 2016 elections), I lost all respect for him. And all of his actions since then have been completely self-serving. There is no way someone like that should have so much power, not just over the country but as commander in chief of the military.)

So when you have someone who is such a poor character, and who is anti-democracy, policy doesn't really matter.

Re: Elon Musk's Demolition Crew

#364

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

sidibe wrote: post #351
wrfrmers wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems as good a time as any to point out that the environment in which people like this are making decisions is the one in which equal opportunity/affirmative action/DEI become tenable, if not necessary. For those of you whinging about how unfair scope-broadening to force decision makers to at least consider marginalized people for opportunities is, the problem is not these initiatives, it's these people, who make…

What I've learned recently from these meritocracy advocates is competence is about your skin color. Black person working on a plane = disaster waiting to happen, no further evidence needed, but if you've got a nice and competent skin color and no other relevant credentials you're good to go at Andreessen Horowitz

My favorite example of this is Pete Hegseth. The fact that a man with zero qualifications, experience, or demonstrated aptitude to run an organization with 3.4 million employees and an $850 billion annual budget can go on and rail about how "woke hiring" allows unqualified people to rise to positions of prominence in government just shows that some people are completely incapable of shame or introspection.

Re: Elon Musk's Demolition Crew

#365

Post by Quarrelsome »

insane_dreamer wrote: post #357
Quarrelsome wrote: post #130

Elez, the guy who pushed the changes the devs were not allowed to review to the production payment system, is the guy that has just resigned because of hyper racist comments he made in the past that have come to light. If in doubt, I recommend checking them out because they're incredibly awful, to the extent that it makes you wonder if the payment system he pushed to had ethnic information attached to it.

He's been reinstated. Racism totally OK now! Woohoo!

and Musk now calls for the firing of the journalist that reported on those social media posts. Is this a dream?

Re: Elon Musk's Demolition Crew

#366

Post by notfed »

gman83 wrote: post #303
wnevets wrote: post #69

Expect a lot more fake stories about fraud and other nefarious doings from these guys to justify their crimes. The exact something happened with twitter.

Yeah, it's probably a fishing expedition to uncover some "scandal": https://www.techdirt.com/2025/02/03/the-twitter-files-playbo...

And the fisherman definitely isn't controlling for selection bias.

Re: Elon Musk's Demolition Crew

#367

Post by notfed »

insane_dreamer wrote: post #358
purplezooey wrote: post #268

"Demolition Crew"? That's a very kind euphemism for a collection of sycophant clowns that have no experience in government. Indeed I could not find a single one that had any experience.

Destroying is easy. Building is hard.

We're going through a "rewrite the gov as microservices" phase.

Re: Elon Musk's Demolition Crew

#368

Post by ianburrell »

tmikaeld wrote: post #293

As an outsider trying to make sense of all this. Is America taking the hammer down on all types of spending because America is desperate to bring down debt from 120% of GDP?

There isn't enough spending for them to cut the $2 trillion deficit. The federal spending is $6.75 trillion. Discretionary spending is $1.7 trillion, that is most of the departments and all of the military. The rest is entitlement spending that hard to be touched.

The only way to balance budget is to cut taxes, but Trump wants tax cuts.

Re: Elon Musk's Demolition Crew

#369

Post by _DeadFred_ »

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #350
wrfrmers wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems as good a time as any to point out that the environment in which people like this are making decisions is the one in which equal opportunity/affirmative action/DEI become tenable, if not necessary. For those of you whinging about how unfair scope-broadening to force decision makers to at least consider marginalized people for opportunities is, the problem is not these initiatives, it's these people, who make…

Elon and JD Vance are currently campaigning on Twitter to bring him back. Amazing since Vance has an Indian wife and children that he's throwing under the bus for someone who made a public call to normalize hating Indians.

So the same people who are trying to fire the federal workforce is complaining about firing people (for cause no less)?

Re: Elon Musk's Demolition Crew

#370

Post by consteval »

tmikaeld wrote: post #293

As an outsider trying to make sense of all this. Is America taking the hammer down on all types of spending because America is desperate to bring down debt from 120% of GDP?

It has nothing to do with cutting expenses or even optics as other's have said.

It's about power, and how much you can have. This presidency is pushing the limits well past where they are, with the intention they will be reeled back, but not all the way. "Shoot for the moon, you'll land among the stars" strategy.

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