Elon Musk (No Politics)

[Matrix_Glitch]

And let's don't forget one other thing, that this gave Musk the opportunity to view data that he definitely should not have been allowed to see, like the bidding data for Pentagon projects his companies were involved in. The term "unfair advantage" comes to mind here (and in fact he may have been in statutory violation in some cases, but hey, who's gonna prosecute him?).

RLY ?
So, let's not forget that, but then let's go full blown Alzheimers on that "Uncle Joe" was HOARDING TONS  OF HIGHLY CLASSIFIED DOCUMENTS IN HIS GARAGE ?
Or that his family used to sell their influence abroad ?
Or that they ran "business", owning whole Ukraine as their bitch, all of its agencies included ?
Or their "deals" with China ?
Or their predecessors "deals" with China, highly sensitive info included ?
Or their deals with Israel ?
Or ...

Fun trivia: After X started disclosing account origin, DOJ's account got disclosed as having its origin - IN ISRAEL !
Ofcourse, nanosecond later, this feature was turned off on "sensitive" accounts... 🤣

So, let's ignore all that, but "let's not forget" some trivia about Elon, you say ?

How much of "Selective Justice" covers your daily needs ?🤣

[EEVblog]

I recommend finding other people to carry water for, Dave.  This one isn't the right one.

Sorry if you find it inconvenient that DOGE had no power at all to fire anyone.
I liken it to today's drama in Australian politics where the government wasted $96M on a new weather website that everyone hates, it's like blaming the web contractor who recommended this is what it costs. Nope, sorry, the government is 100% to blame.

[Cyclotron]

Somehow, the existence of this thread and its content go beyond my understanding. This forum, mostly fed by, hopefully, people with a sense of rationale, is now becoming a place for some Elon drama. Do some of you find some kind of weird satisfaction in bashing a billionaire for him being a billionaire?

All this talk was on the forum before, because it's inevitable, it was just spread out across various threads.
Now it's in one place, people can chose to put it on their ignore list.

Elon isn't really someone I'm interested in other than the vitriol I see thrown his way. But to be fair, I also don't understand people that are fayboys of him.  I'm pretty much down the middle of the road on most topics. I lean one way or another; depends. But you can't talk about some topics that are EE interesting without this Mad Elon Disease seeping in. 

It's a decent way to handle the administration of a board. Anyone that want to wade into the dumpster can, and if folk talk about it in other threads they can be shunted to the dumpster.

Now that I think about it, maybe such threads get "DF" or "Dumpster-Fire" in the title. I guess folks that didn't want to wade in here didn't need that label though. I just think its amusing.

[KE5FX]

I recommend finding other people to carry water for, Dave.  This one isn't the right one.

Sorry if you find it inconvenient that DOGE had no power at all to fire anyone.
I liken it to today's drama in Australian politics where the government wasted $96M on a new weather website that everyone hates, it's like blaming the web contractor who recommended this is what it costs. Nope, sorry, the government is 100% to blame.

So in your book, it's legitimate for them to claim they saved money, but not legitimate to claim they did it by recommending that a large number of people be fired.  I see.

How exactly did they save all that money, if their recommendations to the government didn't result in people being fired?  Did they organize a bake sale, or put a bunch of stuff up on eBay?

[Analog Kid]

I recommend finding other people to carry water for, Dave.  This one isn't the right one.

Sorry if you find it inconvenient that DOGE had no power at all to fire anyone.

Oh, c'mon, Dave; you're a smart guy. You don't really believe that, do you?
I mean, it's a distinction without a difference.
Sure, DOGE had absolutely zero statutory power to fire anyone.
But their "suggestions" were used--directly--by those who definitely did have that power. And wielded it.

[EEVblog]

Oh, c'mon, Dave; you're a smart guy. You don't really believe that, do you?
I mean, it's a distinction without a difference.
Sure, DOGE had absolutely zero statutory power to fire anyone.
But their "suggestions" were used--directly--by those who definitely did have that power. And wielded it.

So who gets the blame?

[EEVblog]

So in your book, it's legitimate for them to claim they saved money, but not legitimate to claim they did it by recommending that a large number of people be fired.  I see.

Do not put words into my mouth.

[Cyclotron]

I recommend finding other people to carry water for, Dave.  This one isn't the right one.

Sorry if you find it inconvenient that DOGE had no power at all to fire anyone.
I liken it to today's drama in Australian politics where the government wasted $96M on a new weather website that everyone hates, it's like blaming the web contractor who recommended this is what it costs. Nope, sorry, the government is 100% to blame.

Given that DOGE only did math(s) its more like blaming the Excel spreadsheet. But you know, no savings were had, no positive outcomes were seen. It's 100% negative.

I'm going to tell folks a secret, the US government was shut down for 40 days and other than those that suffered with their families over lost income, not much of anyone noticed. Obviously there's some savings that can be had somewhere. I fly all the time and didn't even get a delayed flight.

[brucehoult]

It's why all the negative DOGE attack stuff was about him getting 'access' to things instead of DOGE doing things.

Didn't stop people from blaming him, like this:

I only watched the first five minutes, but he seems to mostly be playing it up and making jokes.

Also, interesting to see he's happy to have spend $2k on electricity in the Model 3 for driving a distance that would use $12k of fuel in a comparable performance Subaru (which is what I drive Outback 2.5xt, which cost me US$6k in the first place, 80k km ago), while the Model 3 has depreciated $50k and the Subaru $10k.  Good math.

[Analog Kid]

Oh, c'mon, Dave; you're a smart guy. You don't really believe that, do you?
I mean, it's a distinction without a difference.
Sure, DOGE had absolutely zero statutory power to fire anyone.
But their "suggestions" were used--directly--by those who definitely did have that power. And wielded it.

So who gets the blame?

All of 'em!
It's not like DOGE was sleepwalking through their jobs, blissfully unaware of what the ultimate effect of their "recommendations" would be.

It's like in the Third Reich: how do you apportion blame among 1) the snitch next door who turned you in, 2) the bureaucrats who processed the charges, 3) the firing squad and 4) those at the top?

[EEVblog]

It's why all the negative DOGE attack stuff was about him getting 'access' to things instead of DOGE doing things.

Didn't stop people from blaming him, like this:

I only watched the first five minutes, but he seems to mostly be playing it up and making jokes.

He is, and it was funny. But he also blamed Elon directly for firing his wife and sold his Tesla as a result. The point was there are countless examples like this were people blame Musk directly and exclusively for firing people.

[Psi]

Oh, c'mon, Dave; you're a smart guy. You don't really believe that, do you?
I mean, it's a distinction without a difference.
Sure, DOGE had absolutely zero statutory power to fire anyone.
But their "suggestions" were used--directly--by those who definitely did have that power. And wielded it.

So who gets the blame?

All of 'em!
It's not like DOGE was sleepwalking through their jobs, blissfully unaware of what the ultimate effect of their "recommendations" would be.

They expected that the ultimate effect of their "recommendations" was that the fraud would be stopped.

Was there some collaterally damage, sure and that sucks and isn't fair to anyone affected.
Could they maybe have done a better job to investigate each example of fraud to confirm it wasn't a false positive. Probably. But if they did that it would slow things down a lot.  Sometimes you can't do a perfect job in the time you have and you have to accept some collaterally damage to achieve the best overall outcome. 
That doesn't make the collaterally damage is acceptable, it's still wrong and shouldn't have happened. But it's also the best possible outcome overall to get rid of as much fraud as possible as fast as possible because the people benefiting from the fraud will absolutely try to stop you.

[EEVblog]

FYI Matrix_Glitch is banned. Was obviously only here to antagonise.

[Analog Kid]

Oh, c'mon, Dave; you're a smart guy. You don't really believe that, do you?
I mean, it's a distinction without a difference.
Sure, DOGE had absolutely zero statutory power to fire anyone.
But their "suggestions" were used--directly--by those who definitely did have that power. And wielded it.

So who gets the blame?

All of 'em!
It's not like DOGE was sleepwalking through their jobs, blissfully unaware of what the ultimate effect of their "recommendations" would be.

They expected that the ultimate effect of their "recommendations" was that the fraud would be stopped.

Don't even go there.
That whole "fraud" thing was always just a pretext for what they were doing, and mainly bullshit.
First of all: does fraud exist? Yes, it always does. The question is, how much?
Turns out that the level of fraud in the high-profile places DOGE was looking--Social Security, the IRS, in other words all the usual places where people might be tempted to cheat--was non-zero but very manageable.
Turns out also that each of those agencies already has divisions set up to deal with fraud. So if one were really interested in tamping down fraud, the way to do it would be to buttress those divisions, help them with their job. Not kneecap the agencies, which is what ended up happening.

The whole "fraud and waste" thing was the same shit going back to Reagan, with the aim of cutting down the "gubmint" to where it could be drowned in a bathtub. Different day, same shit.

It's not like the US is Ukraine in this regard, for chrissakes.

[Analog Kid]

FYI Matrix_Glitch is banned. Was obviously only here to antagonise.

Dang. I was hoping they'd tell me what set them off about my post (in the "jicama" thread in cooking).
Oh, well.

[KE5FX]

So in your book, it's legitimate for them to claim they saved money, but not legitimate to claim they did it by recommending that a large number of people be fired.  I see.

Do not put words into my mouth.

Apologies, you're right - I can't find your post in defense of DOGE that I thought I saw earlier, which means that if I did see it, somebody else wrote it.

So to clarify (and please correct me if I'm still paraphrasing things you didn't actually say): DOGE under Musk did not save any money, and they also were not responsible for anyone being fired. 

What did they accomplish, then, in your view?  What specifically did we gain from having a literal raiding party infiltrate our government?

Anyone else, feel free to jump in as well.  I'd like to hear the steelman case.  It doesn't appear that they found much if any actual fraud, at least that they didn't bring with them.

[Psi]

They expected that the ultimate effect of their "recommendations" was that the fraud would be stopped.

That whole "fraud" thing was always just a pretext for what they were doing, and mainly bullshit.

Ok, so our views of what DOGE actually did is different. That's totally fine. I can't be 100% sure that my view is correct so I have to accept that I could be wrong. But my view is that they were finding and getting lots of fraud removed that was being intentionally ignored internally.

[Cyclotron]

So in your book, it's legitimate for them to claim they saved money, but not legitimate to claim they did it by recommending that a large number of people be fired.  I see.

Do not put words into my mouth.

Apologies, you're right - I can't find your post in defense of DOGE that I thought I saw earlier, which means that if I did see it, somebody else wrote it.

So to clarify (and please correct me if I'm still paraphrasing things you didn't actually say): DOGE under Musk did not save any money, and they also were not responsible for anyone being fired. 

What did they accomplish, then, in your view?  What specifically did we gain from having a literal raiding party infiltrate our government?

Anyone else, feel free to jump in as well.  I'd like to hear the steelman case.  It doesn't appear that they found much if any actual fraud, at least that they didn't bring with them.

I'm not sure what your argument is to offer a steel man case to.  You flat out state that they brought fraud with them so there's no argument that can't be hand waved away.

Are you arguing that we should be convinced there's no fraud and waste in the US government?

There's an enormous Donkey claiming DODGE only did harm and are lining up a lynching mob. An the huge Elephant has been praising them and offering examples.

Are you arguing that DOGE's intent was evil/no good?

I'm apt to argue, even sides that I don't agree with if I have the data set and clear examples of what the opposing argument is.

[KE5FX]

I honestly can't speculate as to their motives.  The effects appear to be have been net-negative, and there are very strong questions to be asked about conflicts of interest given Musk's commercial positions, but I'm also (perhaps thankfully) not a position to judge either of those personally.

Mostly I'm pushing back on Dave's "Well, technically they couldn't actually fire anyone" line of argument.  Who respects that kind of wishy-washiness?  Either you think they did good things, you think they did bad things, or you admit that you don't know.  I can safely be classified in the second group, at the moment, but I'll keep one foot in the third group.

[Analog Kid]

Are you arguing that DOGE's intent was evil/no good?

[raises hand]
I'm arguing that!

Now if DOGE's intent really was what they were saying it was--rooting out "waste and fraud" in the U.S.. gov't. (who could argue against that?), that would be one thing.

But the intention was to simply slash and burn at a "gubmint" that those doing the slashing and burning perceived as bloated, over-entitled and, worst of all, "woke". So they were pretty much just mindlessly doing as much damage as they could in the time they were able to act. Close down Social Security offices because they cost too much money? Sure! Let those seniors hobble to some other office, or better yet learn to use a damn computer!

I can't prove this, of course, and I'm not going to waste pages and pages here on the forum posting walls-o'text defending it. But I'm certain this was the case.

I wonder if we'll ever get a believable, accurate analysis of what DOGE did and didn't accomplish here ...

[special_K]

Somehow, the existence of this thread and its content go beyond my understanding. This forum, mostly fed by, hopefully, people with a sense of rationale, is now becoming a place for some Elon drama. Do some of you find some kind of weird satisfaction in bashing a billionaire for him being a billionaire?

If you want to talk drama, consider dissecting some real crises. We have more than enough to choose from. If you don't like Elon then you don't buy a T car. It is your choice. Unless you can buy a ticket to go to Mars, exposure to chemical pollution is not a choice, and one for which we are all paying in more than one way.

Elon funds white nationalists in my country. He beams himself onto giant video screens on their hate marches. I consider him a real crisis.

[wraper]

Somehow, the existence of this thread and its content go beyond my understanding. This forum, mostly fed by, hopefully, people with a sense of rationale, is now becoming a place for some Elon drama. Do some of you find some kind of weird satisfaction in bashing a billionaire for him being a billionaire?

If you want to talk drama, consider dissecting some real crises. We have more than enough to choose from. If you don't like Elon then you don't buy a T car. It is your choice. Unless you can buy a ticket to go to Mars, exposure to chemical pollution is not a choice, and one for which we are all paying in more than one way.

Elon funds white nationalists in my country. He beams himself onto giant video screens on their hate marches. I consider him a real crisis.

Because opposing taxpayer funded illegal immigration is a white nationalism these days?

[special_K]

There is no such thing. The very claim is an oxymoron. If anyone is here illegally they have no recourse to public funds and are arrested and deported. The home office is quite active when it comes to this.

I note though that your flag says Latvia. Tell me, do you often come to England, spray paint roundabouts, hang around shouting at moldy old hotels full of refugees who are trapped there until their paperwork goes through? Maybe you were in Southport the other summer, rioting in front of a mosque because Elon's website falsely claimed that a child killer was a muslim?

That is the kind of idiotic, hatefilled shit he promotes here.

[Cyclotron]

Elon and X are exposing the true sources of some MAGA social influencer accounts. I'm sure this is for no good as nothing Musk does is good per what I've been reading in some posts here.

[EEVblog]

Apologies, you're right - I can't find your post in defense of DOGE that I thought I saw earlier, which means that if I did see it, somebody else wrote it.
So to clarify (and please correct me if I'm still paraphrasing things you didn't actually say): DOGE under Musk did not save any money, and they also were not responsible for anyone being fired. 

You're doing it again. I have said nothing at all about DOGE except that they had no power to fire anyone, in response to someone that said they did.

What did they accomplish, then, in your view?  What specifically did we gain from having a literal raiding party infiltrate our government?

I have no desire to be dragged into this conversation.
In case you can't figure out why, it's because I want the discussion to stop so I'm setting an example here. Whilst DOGE is Musk related, and essentially on-topic to this thread, it's also essentially 100% politics, and we know where that leads.