He disabled it to (ostensibly) prevent nuclear war. I really don't feel that was his decision to make. It's really bizarre that anyone thinks it is. He's not a politician, he's not part of the UN, he's just a fucking businessman and a former software engineer. He does not have any credentials for war strategy, he doesn't have any experience leading a military, he doesn't know anything about politics, he doesn't know anything about foreign policy. He just decided he is going to intervene. That is weird, it's obviously weird, it's unambiguously weird, it would be weird if I did it, it would be weird if you did it, it would be weird if any civilian did it.
And to be clear, he claimed it was to prevent nuclear war. As I've stated multiple times, he lies all the time. I cannot know the inner machinations of his brain, but I do think it's worth the DHS investigating to see if Russia is secretly bribing Musk.
[1] https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/13/politics/elon-musk-spacex-sta...
ETA:
> Tom, stick to software and steer clear of geo-politics, it's obviously not your thing.
You added this after the fact, but I feel the need to reply to it.
You're absolutely right, it is really weird for software engineers to intervene in politics. I absolutely agree that civilians have no place in figuring out foreign policy. It would be extremely bizarre for a civilian to do that. I cannot think of any reason for that not to be the case.
So why exactly are you defending Musk on this?
It's 100% his decision to make as CEO and majority owner of SpaceX. You may not agree w/ the decision, and it may not be good for the network or the company, but the decision is still his.
If the Biden administration disagreed, they could have used executive power to force him to do whatever they wanted, he said as much publicly. The government has done this before in the past.
What would probably be illegal is taking money from Russian in exchange for disabling it, and then claiming it was to prevent nuclear war, which is why I think it might be worth investigating bank accounts. I'm not a lawyer, though, so it might just be "gross", and not illegal.
This isn't even getting into the fact that he tweeted multiple times about how he would solve the Ukraine conflict, around the same time, basically just saying "Ukraine should surrender to Russia cuz it'll save lives".
> If the Biden administration disagreed, they could have used executive power to force him to do whatever they wanted, he said as much publicly. The government has done this before in the past.
The US isn't officially directly involved with the conflict so I don't actually know that they could force him. They're providing funding and the like, but I don't know that they could use any kind of wartime acts without direct involvement into the war.
I know he says that the Biden administration could force it, but, for the millionth time, he lies an awful lot, and never takes responsibility for anything, so it's hard to know if that's actually true.
I don't really see how you can agree with that. What is the fundamental difference between a civillian and a professional politician?
>basically just saying "Ukraine should surrender to Russia cuz it'll save lives".
I think most Ukrainians would agree with that. There's a reason, why Zelensky banned men from leaving the country, why he conduct forced conscription and why he canceled the elections. I mean, it seems like Musk voices a rather popular point of view
The United States is a representational republic. We elect people to make decisions in regards to war effort, or delegate that to certain agencies. It's not the job of civilians to take this into our own hands. When civilian does try and intervene in a war effort directly, like for example turning off communication infrastructure, that's weird. I think it's worth investigating.
There's no "difference" from, like, a DNA level if you're trying to get super-pedantic, but a professional politician is someone that we've elected to handle these kinds of situations. It's not the job of the world's richest human to arbitrarily insert themselves into it.
> I mean, it seems like Musk voices a rather popular point of view
I don't know enough about the mentalities of the Ukrainian people to say one way or another. I just thought it was weird that he started trying to intervene in the conflict and basically went public with a "compromise" that basically said to "negotiate with Russia and give them what they want".
Why is that matter? USA - is not a part of the conflict
> It's not the job of civilians to take this into our own hands
It is literally the job of civilians. In this war both sides forcefully conscripting civilians to conduct the war with their own hands
> When civilian does try and intervene in a war effort directly, like for example turning off communication infrastructure, that's weird
So you are saying that job of civilians - is to die for what the cause big politicians seems fitting them to die for, but not to try to stop this war?
> but a professional politician is someone that we've elected to handle these kinds of situations.
They obviously failed
> I don't know enough about the mentalities of the Ukrainian people to say one way or another.
Banned men's leaving, forcefull conscription and cancelled elections speaks for themselves
Yes but Elon Musk is a US citizen, which is why I brought it up.
> It is literally the job of civilians. In this war both sides forcefully conscripting civilians to conduct the war with their own hands
I'm against forced conscriptions in any capacity regardless. That doesn't justify Elon injecting himself into the conflict.
> So you are saying that job of civilians - is to die for what the cause big politicians seems fitting them to die for, but not to try to stop this war?
Elon isn't at any risk of dying from the Ukraine conflict, so it's not an apples to apples comparison, but I generally don't think civilians should be the ones to stop or start wars.
> They obviously failed
It's a complicated situation, so I don't really know how you define "failure". Moreover, there's no reason to think that Elon knows better.
> Banned men's leaving, forcefull conscription and cancelled elections speaks for themselves
I agree that all those things are bad, but I have no idea why it's Elon's job to stop it.
All of the things that matter.
Authority. Advisors. Indemnity. An army to back them up. An economy to back up the army.
If you want to draw equivalence between individuals and nations due to the things Musk has control over, then even as the richest person in the world, his entire operation is somewhere around Somalia or Malawi.
Opinions are very divided with regard to how much Musk actually listens to his advisors, but there's also no reason for him to have hired any of the people who might be relevant to this kind of question (what with them being busy advising the actual governments).
> I think most Ukrainians would agree with that. There's a reason, why Zelensky banned men from leaving the country, why he conduct forced conscription and why he canceled the elections. I mean, it seems like Musk voices a rather popular point of view
Those things are not evidence either way. Churchill did most of that (leaving the country was hard, unaffordable for most, and dangerous so not actually banned), yet very popular.
Furthermore, actual polling says that most don't even want to negotiate, and even of those who are willing to, the number willing to accept even their current territorial control as the cost of peace is tiny:
https://theconversation.com/what-latest-polling-says-about-t...
There is no actual polling. You just can't have polls when for "wrong" answers people may be imprisoned, sent to war or killed. This polls have nothing to do with reality, they only show what the government considering as the "wrong answers". So we can only judge about people's opinion by indirect evidence. And banned leaving, forced conscription and canceled elections - are pretty strong evidence
https://www.ndi.org/sites/default/files/November%202023%20wa...
They trust the armed forces and Zelensky without having to trust the government, see slide 26.
> And banned leaving, forced conscription and canceled elections - are pretty strong evidence
Churchill demonstrated otherwise.
Also, you keep saying "forced" conscriptions like conscription isn't forced by definition. And also like it's not really common when nations fear or are at war, which is why Israel and Finland also have it:
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription_in_Finland
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription_in_Israel
and why the US had it from 1940 until 1973: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription_in_the_United_Sta...
You can't believe anything Elon says because he is a liar and lies "all the time", but you can can also accuse of being a Russian asset based on no evidence ?
He didn't say surrender, he said negotiate a peace deal (in Istanbul), and as controversial that was a year ago, it's clear as day today that it is correct.
https://www.politico.eu/article/ukraine-great-risk-front-lin...
Apparently the US media convinced people like you that Ukraine could actually win the war, when common sense and basic math should have shown you there was never a chance. How many innocent Ukraine were sent to the death as cannon fodder, we will never know. Musk stance was right about Ukraine, we certainly know that now.
>based on no evidence
An investigation is a process in which evidence is gathered.
> You can't believe anything Elon says because he is a liar and lies "all the time
The liar part doesn't really need me to document it, you can look at nearly any keynote he's given and see a million cases where he just makes shit up. The easiest example is him talking about when self-driving cars are going to be here, or when he says "this is something we can do now".
ETA:
It's kind of uncool to add multiple paragraphs of extra text without disclosing it.
> Apparently the US media convinced people like you that Ukraine could actually win the war,
What in the fuck are you actually talking about? It's not about "winning" or "losing", where did I say that it was about Ukraine "winning" anything?
I said it was very concerning that a civilian decided to intervene in a war effort. This isn't hard, and what you're saying is verging on dishonesty, I think because you're having trouble trying to figure out justification for Elon's actions.
I am not religious, and I don’t typically watch the news. I do not know how I am a “partisan conspiracy theorist” because I think civilians intervening in foreign conflicts should be investigated. I “enjoy life” just fine, I am just a crazy crazy person who thinks that a single unelected person should not be attempting to unilaterally make decisions involved in regards to war.
You can say something like “Tom, that’s what the US government does!” and then give me a list of articles where the US gov intervened where they shouldn’t have, but it’s not apples to apples. There’s at least an attempt at accountability for elected government officials. It’s not perfect, and I am not trying to defend awful stuff like MK Ultra, but it’s still better than being at the whim of some whiny billionaire.
And the Biden government refused to derisk things for him?