Dem
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GOP
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We have not read Walter Isaacson's book on Elon Musk. Maybe one day we will, and we will find out if Isaacson knows what is behind the dramatic change in Musk's public persona in the last few years. He's gone from being center-left-but-kind-of-agnostic to being pretty hard-right.
Yesterday, sources close to Musk told The Wall Street Journal that the multi-billionaire is planning to give $45 million a month to a super PAC backing Trump's candidacy. If so, that would be a pretty big chunk of change. Of course, you never know if these rich folks will follow through on their promises (see Bankman-Fried, Sam), but even $200 million (or so) is small potatoes to Musk. The bigger question is what he hopes to achieve in electing a president who wants to get rid of electric vehicles. You know, like Teslas.
One possible explanation for Musk's behavior is that, particularly since ensconcing himself in the bubble that is eX-Twitter, he's become swept up in the culture wars. On that front, Musk was incensed by California's passage of a law on Monday that prohibits schools from forcing teachers to report students' gender identities to parents. The point of the law, of course, is to protect children who may have anti-LGBTQ parents.
This seems pretty commonsense to us: Essentially, leave the decision about whether to talk to parents or not to the teachers/staff, who should be best positioned to know whether that is what is best-suited to the needs and safety of the child. We read numerous stories about the law, and could not get a clear idea of why people oppose it, beyond vague claims of "transparency" and "trust between schools and parents." Doesn't it seem to put teachers/staff in a really terrible place if they are REQUIRED to talk to parents, but know it will put the child at risk?
Anyhow Musk is furious. He described the new law as the "final straw," and said that "laws of this nature [will] force families and companies to leave California to protect their children." Again, we don't really grasp the reasoning, since even the opponents of the law appear to be talking about harm to parents, not children. But, in any case, Musk really believes it. So, he announced yesterday that he's moving the headquarters of SpaceX and eX-Twitter from California to Texas. That does not represent all that many jobs, especially in a state with 33 million people. And note that he's not moving Tesla's California production facilities, which would be rather more difficult and costly. So, this is more about making a statement than significantly changing the operations of his businesses. Still, it speaks to his move in an aggressively Trumpy direction. (Z)