|
Now that we have a new thread, in order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a complete and thorough read before posting! NOTE: When providing a source, please provide a very brief summary on what it's about and what purpose it adds to the discussion. The supporting statement should clearly explain why the subject is relevant and needs to be discussed. Please follow this rule especially for tweets.
Your supporting statement should always come BEFORE you provide the source.If you have any questions, comments, concern, or feedback regarding the USPMT, then please use this thread: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/website-feedback/510156-us-politics-thread |
United States42007 Posts
On December 19 2021 06:29 Husyelt wrote:Show nested quote +On December 19 2021 03:53 Sermokala wrote:On December 19 2021 03:19 Husyelt wrote:On December 19 2021 01:28 Sermokala wrote:On December 19 2021 01:19 Husyelt wrote:
I do find some of Musk detestable, but at least he’s putting his life’s work into actual products like electric cars, solar power and reusable rockets.
“Making life multiplanetary” won’t happen for a few hundred years, but it wasn’t even worth talking about before SpaceX. By 2030 we might have literal unmanned buildings landing on Mars beginning the ISRU process for future NASA astronauts stays. But this isn't his life's work the only way tesla and spacex exists is because of the billions and billions the government has thrown into those companies. Neither of them produce any sort of value to sustain their costs on their own. Those are just empty talking points that don’t hold up under the most basic of scrutiny. Yes SpaceX got funding during some crucial moments. They earned those awards over competitors. And as of right now, SpaceX has saved NASA literal billions of dollars for their cheaper, better launch capabilities. And continues to. A few weeks ago they launched IXPE and Dart missions for bargain prices, and in the case of IXPE the fairing size on Falcon9 allowed the X-ray telescope to be loaded with the solar panels already out, compared to the Pegasus which would have forced the satellite to unfold in space which is always terrifying. SpaceX didn’t just get free fucking money, they had to fight all of the entrenched political power that the other companies had over NASA. ULA had a monopoly on military launches. All of the big boys on the block wanted to squeeze out SpaceX from the beginning. The same can be said of Tesla vs the auto industry. Spacex didn't win anything until a decade of subsidies and tax breaks while exploiting it's workers to this day. That they are paying back that investment is nothing more than what should be expected. Ula had a monopoly on launches because the government spent decades pursuing a different reusable strategy that failed. If the investments had gone into the ula at the same pace and lack of oversight there is nothing to say they wouldn't have reached the same end. Tesla operates as a wonderland making terribly reliable and wildly expensive to maintain built by non union workers in a horribly inefficient and dangerous environment. They are also so wildly subsidized by the government who have thrown money at them and yet are worth more to the market than every other car maker in the world. Car makers that are union shops who produce a real amount of cars that regular people can buy and get repaired by small business for a reasonable rate. All led by people who have the dignity and self respect not to be a massive dick to the people who gave him the money and opportunity to do what he does from his apartheid inheritance. And don't even start on the way he treats his wives and children. If you want to a good comparison between two companies receiving the same awards from NASA, look further than Crew Dragon vs Boeing's Starliner. 4.2 billion for Starliner 2.6 billion for Dragon You're welcome to google around and see which is actively flying back and forth from the ISS... It's gotten so bad that Dragon is taking Starliners unused spots. While Boeing is trying to figure out one of their 70 flight issues, SpaceX launched Dragon into space for charity with Inspiration4. Ah yes, those poor voluntary rocket engineers, can't think for themselves, maybe you can show them their folly! Show nested quote +Car makers that are union shops who produce a real amount of cars that regular people can buy and get repaired by small business for a reasonable rate. American stagnation in the car industry has been well documented. But you probably didn't want electric vehicles on the road as soon as possible, unless they were union made only, while we wait until the rest of the world lept over us in technology? Also, Tesla open sourced their technology / patents so everyone could catch up, seems like that's pretty fucking great no?
The patent thing is good business. They didn’t give away the rights to them and didn’t give away their proprietary tech, they offered to let other people build things to their standard. With electric vehicles being a transformative tech vs the internal combustion engine there are huge problems of infrastructure and standardization to be addressed for it to be successful (imagine if gas stations didn’t already exist everywhere and vehicles all needed a special blend of gasoline that wasn’t widely available). Tesla invited their competitors to share in the cost of creating standardized Tesla infrastructure with a Tesla still owning the standard.
Musk doesn’t employ idiots.
|
United Kingdom13775 Posts
On December 19 2021 10:41 WombaT wrote:
My issue with Musk is that, he has a certain skillset.
True - that talent is generally marketing and hype. He's impressively good at exploiting feedback loops in a cheap-money market to raise stock price and using that to make giant cash raises. He's also really good at astroturfing - creating really convenient but utterly biased narratives (often with pretty pictures!) that are easy to pass around to internet fanboys and legislators alike, having a couple paid employees spread that info around, and laying enough of a groundwork for some bizarrely obsessed fanboys to do the rest. I'll also give him that he seems to have an innate sense for government subsidy programs with incentives badly misaligned with their intended goals, and how to create businesses (often fly-by-night operations a la SolarCity) to take advantage of those. In these fields, he's clearly world class.
Some people think he's good at running a business, some sort of super-genius, or not a terrible human being. They would be wrong on all accounts.
On December 19 2021 10:55 Husyelt wrote:
They weren't on equal terms, see above. ULA is Boeing and Lockheed joining forces to be a monopoly.
Your obsession with ULA as some sort of evil monopoly entity is downright farcical and probably based entirely on Musk propaganda from almost a decade ago. Ironic given your hostile insistence on that you're the one with "facts and data" rather than unfounded assertions.
As one fairly famous former ULA employee writes up, it's a joint venture that is owned by Lockheed and Boeing, but an entirely separate company. That happened because there wasn't a market for two launch providers and both lost a lot of money (but the government got two providers for a dirt-cheap $1.2 billion, an excellent investment in 1994). It became briefly expensive in 2010 or so after the entire industry collapsed due to the retirement of the Shuttle, but that was resolved in something like five years with a couple of bulk orders and new entrants to stabilize the situation of most of the suppliers in the space industry.
From that brief period of 2006 (the company's formation) to 2015 (the time it took for several New Space companies to mature), ULA was the owner of the only viable US rockets capable of launching "heavy-class" rockets that could take several-ton payloads to high orbits. Plenty of international options for the same, and several up-and-comers in the US that just weren't ready to be trusted with billion-dollar cargoes, so it made sense to keep things down to a single supplier for a short time. Nothing sinister about any of that, especially when the government was funding plenty of programs like EELV/NSSL and COTS over those same years.
In the grand scheme of things, it's a pretty small company ($1-2 billion dollars a year is pennies compared to any big aerospace giant), that briefly was the only supplier of one specific class of one small aerospace industry (heavy-class rockets in the US), that did its job well. Nothing particularly evil about it beyond the fact that Musk had a lot of temper tantrums about them because SpaceX wanted in on EELV. And despite the cries of "monopoly, monopoly!" they certainly are disadvantaged in not being able to bankroll years of operating losses by just raising billions of dollars on the financial markets. Unequal terms of doing business indeed - but, as Serm points out, largely in SpaceX's favor on all acounts.
|
+ Show Spoiler +On December 19 2021 11:45 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On December 19 2021 10:41 WombaT wrote:
My issue with Musk is that, he has a certain skillset. True - that talent is generally marketing and hype. He's impressively good at exploiting feedback loops in a cheap-money market to raise stock price and using that to make giant cash raises. He's also really good at astroturfing - creating really convenient but utterly biased narratives (often with pretty pictures!) that are easy to pass around to internet fanboys and legislators alike, having a couple paid employees spread that info around, and laying enough of a groundwork for some bizarrely obsessed fanboys to do the rest. I'll also give him that he seems to have an innate sense for government subsidy programs with incentives badly misaligned with their intended goals, and how to create businesses (often fly-by-night operations a la SolarCity) to take advantage of those. In these fields, he's clearly world class. Some people think he's good at running a business, some sort of super-genius, or not a terrible human being. They would be wrong on all accounts. Show nested quote +On December 19 2021 10:55 Husyelt wrote:
They weren't on equal terms, see above. ULA is Boeing and Lockheed joining forces to be a monopoly. Your obsession with ULA as some sort of evil monopoly entity is downright farcical and probably based entirely on Musk propaganda from almost a decade ago. Ironic given your hostile insistence on that you're the one with "facts and data" rather than unfounded assertions. As one fairly famous former ULA employee writes up, it's a joint venture that is owned by Lockheed and Boeing, but an entirely separate company. That happened because there wasn't a market for two launch providers and both lost a lot of money (but the government got two providers for a dirt-cheap $1.2 billion, an excellent investment in 1994). It became briefly expensive in 2010 or so after the entire industry collapsed due to the retirement of the Shuttle, but that was resolved in something like five years with a couple of bulk orders and new entrants to stabilize the situation of most of the suppliers in the space industry. From that brief period of 2006 (the company's formation) to 2015 (the time it took for several New Space companies to mature), ULA was the owner of the only viable US rockets capable of launching "heavy-class" rockets that could take several-ton payloads to high orbits. Plenty of international options for the same, and several up-and-comers in the US that just weren't ready to be trusted with billion-dollar cargoes, so it made sense to keep things down to a single supplier for a short time. Nothing sinister about any of that, especially when the government was funding plenty of programs like EELV/NSSL and COTS over those same years. In the grand scheme of things, it's a pretty small company ($1-2 billion dollars a year is pennies compared to any big aerospace giant), that briefly was the only supplier of one specific class of one small aerospace industry (heavy-class rockets in the US), that did its job well. Nothing particularly evil about it beyond the fact that Musk had a lot of temper tantrums about them because SpaceX wanted in on EELV. And despite the cries of "monopoly, monopoly!" they certainly are disadvantaged in not being able to bankroll years of operating losses by just raising billions of dollars on the financial markets. Unequal terms of doing business indeed - but, as Serm points out, largely in SpaceX's favor on all acounts.
Ironic given your hostile insistence on that you're the one with "facts and data" rather than unfounded assertions.
I was referring to Sermokala for that hostility. You bring forth actual discussion. I knew ULA formed over some various legal lawsuits over stealing industry secrets or what not. And while it's true they are a small player, Boeing / Lockheed are not small companies, and did have and still have a lot of political sway lobbying to Congress. I don't think they are an evil monopoly, they are unbelievably reliable and were needed. They do however use Russian engines on the Atlas rockets I believe. Which is all SpaceX needed to argue for their stranglehold on government launches.
|
I don't, I think he is very fallible as a human, and in some cases as I said, detestable. I can however set aside the man personally, and recognize that he is a titan of industry.
I'm glad we agree he's a titan of grifting and sucking off the teat of government subsidy and wall street insanity. You aren't engaging in anything I'm saying so I'm going to move onto something else.
|
United Kingdom13775 Posts
On December 19 2021 12:01 Husyelt wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On December 19 2021 11:45 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On December 19 2021 10:41 WombaT wrote:
My issue with Musk is that, he has a certain skillset. True - that talent is generally marketing and hype. He's impressively good at exploiting feedback loops in a cheap-money market to raise stock price and using that to make giant cash raises. He's also really good at astroturfing - creating really convenient but utterly biased narratives (often with pretty pictures!) that are easy to pass around to internet fanboys and legislators alike, having a couple paid employees spread that info around, and laying enough of a groundwork for some bizarrely obsessed fanboys to do the rest. I'll also give him that he seems to have an innate sense for government subsidy programs with incentives badly misaligned with their intended goals, and how to create businesses (often fly-by-night operations a la SolarCity) to take advantage of those. In these fields, he's clearly world class. Some people think he's good at running a business, some sort of super-genius, or not a terrible human being. They would be wrong on all accounts. Show nested quote +On December 19 2021 10:55 Husyelt wrote:
They weren't on equal terms, see above. ULA is Boeing and Lockheed joining forces to be a monopoly. Your obsession with ULA as some sort of evil monopoly entity is downright farcical and probably based entirely on Musk propaganda from almost a decade ago. Ironic given your hostile insistence on that you're the one with "facts and data" rather than unfounded assertions. As one fairly famous former ULA employee writes up, it's a joint venture that is owned by Lockheed and Boeing, but an entirely separate company. That happened because there wasn't a market for two launch providers and both lost a lot of money (but the government got two providers for a dirt-cheap $1.2 billion, an excellent investment in 1994). It became briefly expensive in 2010 or so after the entire industry collapsed due to the retirement of the Shuttle, but that was resolved in something like five years with a couple of bulk orders and new entrants to stabilize the situation of most of the suppliers in the space industry. From that brief period of 2006 (the company's formation) to 2015 (the time it took for several New Space companies to mature), ULA was the owner of the only viable US rockets capable of launching "heavy-class" rockets that could take several-ton payloads to high orbits. Plenty of international options for the same, and several up-and-comers in the US that just weren't ready to be trusted with billion-dollar cargoes, so it made sense to keep things down to a single supplier for a short time. Nothing sinister about any of that, especially when the government was funding plenty of programs like EELV/NSSL and COTS over those same years. In the grand scheme of things, it's a pretty small company ($1-2 billion dollars a year is pennies compared to any big aerospace giant), that briefly was the only supplier of one specific class of one small aerospace industry (heavy-class rockets in the US), that did its job well. Nothing particularly evil about it beyond the fact that Musk had a lot of temper tantrums about them because SpaceX wanted in on EELV. And despite the cries of "monopoly, monopoly!" they certainly are disadvantaged in not being able to bankroll years of operating losses by just raising billions of dollars on the financial markets. Unequal terms of doing business indeed - but, as Serm points out, largely in SpaceX's favor on all acounts. Show nested quote +Ironic given your hostile insistence on that you're the one with "facts and data" rather than unfounded assertions. I was referring to Sermokala for that hostility. You bring forth actual discussion. I knew ULA formed over some various legal lawsuits over stealing industry secrets or what not. And while it's true they are a small player, Boeing / Lockheed are not small companies, and did have and still have a lot of political sway lobbying to Congress. I don't think they are an evil monopoly, they are unbelievably reliable and were needed. They do however use Russian engines on the Atlas rockets I believe. Which is all SpaceX needed to argue for their stranglehold on government launches.
Even without the Atlas RD-180 engine situation, SpaceX was going to get in on EELV (just more quietly and with less cost to the government on funding several billions of dollars worth of RD-180 replacements). They were in the process of doing so, it's just that the Air Force's certification process is not a simple thing - it takes time and effort to ensure that they aren't going to send their billion-dollar payloads on a one-way ticket to crashing into the ground on a shoddy rocket. Given that SpaceX had total failures in both 2015 and 2016, a little bit of prudence on that front looks to have been warranted. But the Air Force spent several hundred millions of its own dollars over the years to support that certification effort, not exactly the sign of SpaceX being treated unfairly.
The real reason that Musk made such a big show over this was that, in that 2014 timeframe when SpaceX was almost-but-not-quite ready to be able to launch government payloads, ULA won a big bulk order of rockets - something like 35 launches in one big order. Might have seemed odd to the uninitiated observer, but a big order like that was pretty much a necessity to provide stability to a rocket parts supply industry that was falling apart after the Space Shuttle retired. Knowing that they had a customer for years to come did help - prices dropped something like 30-40% by doing that block buy.
As far as lobbying goes - it's true that Lockheed and Boeing are big entities, but their lobbying budget isn't really spent on ULA. They have much bigger programs to lobby for, like fighter jets, that are worth way more to them than mere rockets. In fact, in most years you will find that SpaceX has spent significantly more than ULA on lobbying operations and managed to pursue plenty of its own rent-seeking legislation over the years. Sure, ULA has allies that lobby on their behalf - these are mostly their suppliers and unions such as their aerospace machinists. But the reason SpaceX doesn't have these allies is not some sort of corporate conspiracy; it's because they screw over their vendors and are known for their union-busting tendencies.
Although, I do want to say that all of this is quite besides the point to the original topic - a very personal Twitter spat between Musk and Elizabeth Warren. Given that Musk's personal fortune is not at all used to bankroll these companies directly, and is instead used to pay for his five (?) mansions and private jets, he mostly avoids taxes via the very common "buy borrow die" strategy that the ultra-wealthy do, and the entirety of the Twitter interactions that are relevant are just personal insults by Musk directed towards progressives (Warren, but also Bernie Sanders) who say some variation on "person of the year should pay his fair share of taxes" - why does any of the history of these companies come up? The progressives believe he's not paying enough personal taxes and he gets into shitty Twitter tirades over it; none of the rest of any of this is relevant at all.
|
+ Show Spoiler +On December 19 2021 12:33 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On December 19 2021 12:01 Husyelt wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On December 19 2021 11:45 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On December 19 2021 10:41 WombaT wrote:
My issue with Musk is that, he has a certain skillset. True - that talent is generally marketing and hype. He's impressively good at exploiting feedback loops in a cheap-money market to raise stock price and using that to make giant cash raises. He's also really good at astroturfing - creating really convenient but utterly biased narratives (often with pretty pictures!) that are easy to pass around to internet fanboys and legislators alike, having a couple paid employees spread that info around, and laying enough of a groundwork for some bizarrely obsessed fanboys to do the rest. I'll also give him that he seems to have an innate sense for government subsidy programs with incentives badly misaligned with their intended goals, and how to create businesses (often fly-by-night operations a la SolarCity) to take advantage of those. In these fields, he's clearly world class. Some people think he's good at running a business, some sort of super-genius, or not a terrible human being. They would be wrong on all accounts. Show nested quote +On December 19 2021 10:55 Husyelt wrote:
They weren't on equal terms, see above. ULA is Boeing and Lockheed joining forces to be a monopoly. Your obsession with ULA as some sort of evil monopoly entity is downright farcical and probably based entirely on Musk propaganda from almost a decade ago. Ironic given your hostile insistence on that you're the one with "facts and data" rather than unfounded assertions. As one fairly famous former ULA employee writes up, it's a joint venture that is owned by Lockheed and Boeing, but an entirely separate company. That happened because there wasn't a market for two launch providers and both lost a lot of money (but the government got two providers for a dirt-cheap $1.2 billion, an excellent investment in 1994). It became briefly expensive in 2010 or so after the entire industry collapsed due to the retirement of the Shuttle, but that was resolved in something like five years with a couple of bulk orders and new entrants to stabilize the situation of most of the suppliers in the space industry. From that brief period of 2006 (the company's formation) to 2015 (the time it took for several New Space companies to mature), ULA was the owner of the only viable US rockets capable of launching "heavy-class" rockets that could take several-ton payloads to high orbits. Plenty of international options for the same, and several up-and-comers in the US that just weren't ready to be trusted with billion-dollar cargoes, so it made sense to keep things down to a single supplier for a short time. Nothing sinister about any of that, especially when the government was funding plenty of programs like EELV/NSSL and COTS over those same years. In the grand scheme of things, it's a pretty small company ($1-2 billion dollars a year is pennies compared to any big aerospace giant), that briefly was the only supplier of one specific class of one small aerospace industry (heavy-class rockets in the US), that did its job well. Nothing particularly evil about it beyond the fact that Musk had a lot of temper tantrums about them because SpaceX wanted in on EELV. And despite the cries of "monopoly, monopoly!" they certainly are disadvantaged in not being able to bankroll years of operating losses by just raising billions of dollars on the financial markets. Unequal terms of doing business indeed - but, as Serm points out, largely in SpaceX's favor on all acounts. Ironic given your hostile insistence on that you're the one with "facts and data" rather than unfounded assertions. I was referring to Sermokala for that hostility. You bring forth actual discussion. I knew ULA formed over some various legal lawsuits over stealing industry secrets or what not. And while it's true they are a small player, Boeing / Lockheed are not small companies, and did have and still have a lot of political sway lobbying to Congress. I don't think they are an evil monopoly, they are unbelievably reliable and were needed. They do however use Russian engines on the Atlas rockets I believe. Which is all SpaceX needed to argue for their stranglehold on government launches. Even without the Atlas RD-180 engine situation, SpaceX was going to get in on EELV (just more quietly and with less cost to the government on funding several billions of dollars worth of RD-180 replacements). They were in the process of doing so, it's just that the Air Force's certification process is not a simple thing - it takes time and effort to ensure that they aren't going to send their billion-dollar payloads on a one-way ticket to crashing into the ground on a shoddy rocket. Given that SpaceX had total failures in both 2015 and 2016, a little bit of prudence on that front looks to have been warranted. But the Air Force spent several hundred millions of its own dollars over the years to support that certification effort, not exactly the sign of SpaceX being treated unfairly. The real reason that Musk made such a big show over this was that, in that 2014 timeframe when SpaceX was almost-but-not-quite ready to be able to launch government payloads, ULA won a big bulk order of rockets - something like 35 launches in one big order. Might have seemed odd to the uninitiated observer, but a big order like that was pretty much a necessity to provide stability to a rocket parts supply industry that was falling apart after the Space Shuttle retired. Knowing that they had a customer for years to come did help - prices dropped something like 30-40% by doing that block buy. As far as lobbying goes - it's true that Lockheed and Boeing are big entities, but their lobbying budget isn't really spent on ULA. They have much bigger programs to lobby for, like fighter jets, that are worth way more to them than mere rockets. In fact, in most years you will find that SpaceX has spent significantly more than ULA on lobbying operations and managed to pursue plenty of its own rent-seeking legislation over the years. Sure, ULA has allies that lobby on their behalf - these are mostly their suppliers and unions such as their aerospace machinists. But the reason SpaceX doesn't have these allies is not some sort of corporate conspiracy; it's because they screw over their vendors and are known for their union-busting tendencies. Although, I do want to say that all of this is quite besides the point to the original topic - a very personal Twitter spat between Musk and Elizabeth Warren. Given that Musk's personal fortune is not at all used to bankroll these companies directly, and is instead used to pay for his five (?) mansions and private jets, he mostly avoids taxes via the very common "buy borrow die" strategy that the ultra-wealthy do, and the entirety of the Twitter interactions that are relevant are just personal insults by Musk directed towards progressives (Warren, but also Bernie Sanders) who say some variation on "person of the year should pay his fair share of taxes" - why does any of the history of these companies come up? The progressives believe he's not paying enough personal taxes and he gets into shitty Twitter tirades over it; none of the rest of any of this is relevant at all.
Although, I do want to say that all of this is quite besides the point to the original topic - a very personal Twitter spat between Musk and Elizabeth Warren. Given that Musk's personal fortune is not at all used to bankroll these companies directly, and is instead used to pay for his five (?) mansions and private jets, he mostly avoids taxes via the very common "buy borrow die" strategy that the ultra-wealthy do, and the entirety of the Twitter interactions that are relevant are just personal insults by Musk directed towards progressives (Warren, but also Bernie Sanders) who say some variation on "person of the year should pay his fair share of taxes" - why does any of the history of these companies come up? The progressives believe he's not paying enough personal taxes and he gets into shitty Twitter tirades over it; none of the rest of any of this is relevant at all.
Musk sold his five houses, he lives next to a gigafactory or starbase, don't remember which one, but no he sold off his entire real estate. I bring it up because clearly people think Musk sits on companies that he barely built and unfairly! reaps the billions of dollars without paying taxes... which none of that is true. He doesn't own anything from his 100 billion + stocks until he sells is, which he then pays taxes 40-60%. He's only worth near 200 billion because Tesla is overvalued like a mother fucker. Meanwhile Warren and Bernie are multimillionaires in their own right with many houses and can't even get Pelosi on board to stop insider trading.
But the reason SpaceX doesn't have these allies is not some sort of corporate conspiracy; it's because they screw over their vendors and are known for their union-busting tendencies.
Yeah that's awesome. They make nearly 80% of their rockets in house. Very little bloat and do not worry about one hundred separate vendors, all with different unions, or bosses that might hold up their progress over some trivial issue.
|
United Kingdom13775 Posts
On December 19 2021 12:54 Husyelt wrote:Show nested quote +But the reason SpaceX doesn't have these allies is not some sort of corporate conspiracy; it's because they screw over their vendors and are known for their union-busting tendencies. Yeah that's awesome. They make nearly 80% of their rockets in house. Very little bloat and do not worry about one hundred separate vendors, all with different unions, or bosses that might hold up their progress over some trivial issue.
It's a strategy with some advantages and some downsides, and they can feel free to do that I suppose. But again, it's not a corporate conspiracy if they don't have allies when they screw over anyone who might have been an ally in the lobbying game. They will just have to rely on their own outsized lobbying budget alone for that.
On December 19 2021 12:54 Husyelt wrote:Show nested quote +Although, I do want to say that all of this is quite besides the point to the original topic - a very personal Twitter spat between Musk and Elizabeth Warren. Given that Musk's personal fortune is not at all used to bankroll these companies directly, and is instead used to pay for his five (?) mansions and private jets, he mostly avoids taxes via the very common "buy borrow die" strategy that the ultra-wealthy do, and the entirety of the Twitter interactions that are relevant are just personal insults by Musk directed towards progressives (Warren, but also Bernie Sanders) who say some variation on "person of the year should pay his fair share of taxes" - why does any of the history of these companies come up? The progressives believe he's not paying enough personal taxes and he gets into shitty Twitter tirades over it; none of the rest of any of this is relevant at all. Musk sold his five houses, he lives next to a gigafactory or starbase, don't remember which one, but no he sold off his entire real estate. I bring it up because clearly people think Musk sits on companies that he barely built and unfairly! reaps the billions of dollars without paying taxes... which none of that is true. He doesn't own anything from his 100 billion + stocks until he sells is, which he then pays taxes 40-60%. He's only worth near 200 billion because Tesla is overvalued like a mother fucker. Meanwhile Warren and Bernie are multimillionaires in their own right with many houses and can't even get Pelosi on board to stop insider trading.
Talking about Pelosi is a complete and utter whataboutism that has no bearing whatsoever on the "billionaires should pay their fair share" talking point. Pelosi, Warren, Sanders, Musk, Bezos, etc., should all pay their fair share, and no amount of waxing philosophical about PR stunts like selling mansions (definitely not houses) changes that. The multimillionaire progressives seem to agree that they themselves should pay more.
Again, the very wealthy use buy borrow die for tax evasion. It's a loophole for accessing billions of dollars of cash by taking loans out on these overpriced assets, making use of the fact that loans don't get taxed and lots of tax obligations expire with death. Clever way of avoiding a tax bill, certainly, but lets you make use of ultra-wealth without having to pay taxes. Perhaps a tax on wealth that is able to be mortgaged to support living large could be a good thing to tax to avoid this strange loophole? And perhaps even if there's some nuance or policy implications to work through there, the idea of being supportive of a Twitter temper tantrum disagreeing with that is absolutely absurd?
|
https://truthout.org/articles/young-voters-say-they-disapprove-of-bidens-performance-by-nearly-2-to-1-margin/
This is a death sentence for 2022. Young voters have very nimble perspectives and enthusiasm. This can completely flip. But it will require hard, actual changes. All student loan interest needs to be wiped at the absolute minimum. I currently do not plan to vote in 2022. I won’t vote for a republican, but I am actually going to not vote in 2022 if student loans actually go back to what they were or if they only toss us a tiny bone. Trump vastly outperforming democrats in middle class financial relief is an abomination and a disgrace. I can’t support this party right now.
As it stands, Trump was significantly better for the lower and middle class than Biden. Student loans pause and child tax credit both going away is a really giant change in the amount of money people have. It’s honestly crazy to realize what a big difference it is.
Edit: the big thing that kinda sealed the deal for me was Pelosi openly saying she ought to be able to insider trade. That contextualized why nothing I want is getting done: utter and complete arrogance. It really does come down to arrogance, not being out of touch. They have teams of data scientists nowadays. The party isn’t relying on town hall meetings to figure out what people want. They don’t care.
|
On December 19 2021 13:16 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On December 19 2021 12:54 Husyelt wrote:But the reason SpaceX doesn't have these allies is not some sort of corporate conspiracy; it's because they screw over their vendors and are known for their union-busting tendencies. Yeah that's awesome. They make nearly 80% of their rockets in house. Very little bloat and do not worry about one hundred separate vendors, all with different unions, or bosses that might hold up their progress over some trivial issue. It's a strategy with some advantages and some downsides, and they can feel free to do that I suppose. But again, it's not a corporate conspiracy if they don't have allies when they screw over anyone who might have been an ally in the lobbying game. They will just have to rely on their own outsized lobbying budget alone for that. Show nested quote +On December 19 2021 12:54 Husyelt wrote:Although, I do want to say that all of this is quite besides the point to the original topic - a very personal Twitter spat between Musk and Elizabeth Warren. Given that Musk's personal fortune is not at all used to bankroll these companies directly, and is instead used to pay for his five (?) mansions and private jets, he mostly avoids taxes via the very common "buy borrow die" strategy that the ultra-wealthy do, and the entirety of the Twitter interactions that are relevant are just personal insults by Musk directed towards progressives (Warren, but also Bernie Sanders) who say some variation on "person of the year should pay his fair share of taxes" - why does any of the history of these companies come up? The progressives believe he's not paying enough personal taxes and he gets into shitty Twitter tirades over it; none of the rest of any of this is relevant at all. Musk sold his five houses, he lives next to a gigafactory or starbase, don't remember which one, but no he sold off his entire real estate. I bring it up because clearly people think Musk sits on companies that he barely built and unfairly! reaps the billions of dollars without paying taxes... which none of that is true. He doesn't own anything from his 100 billion + stocks until he sells is, which he then pays taxes 40-60%. He's only worth near 200 billion because Tesla is overvalued like a mother fucker. Meanwhile Warren and Bernie are multimillionaires in their own right with many houses and can't even get Pelosi on board to stop insider trading. Talking about Pelosi is a complete and utter whataboutism that has no bearing whatsoever on the "billionaires should pay their fair share" talking point. Pelosi, Warren, Sanders, Musk, Bezos, etc., should all pay their fair share, and no amount of waxing philosophical about PR stunts like selling mansions (definitely not houses) changes that. The multimillionaire progressives seem to agree that they themselves should pay more. Again, the very wealthy use buy borrow die for tax evasion. It's a loophole for accessing billions of dollars of cash by taking loans out on these overpriced assets, making use of the fact that loans don't get taxed and lots of tax obligations expire with death. Clever way of avoiding a tax bill, certainly, but lets you make use of ultra-wealth without having to pay taxes. Perhaps a tax on wealth that is able to be mortgaged to support living large could be a good thing to tax to avoid this strange loophole? And perhaps even if there's some nuance or policy implications to work through there, the idea of being supportive of a Twitter temper tantrum disagreeing with that is absolutely absurd?
SpaceX doesn’t need to rely on their lobbying, their actual service and products completely dominate on their own now.
“SpaceX's market share increased rapidly. In 2016, SpaceX had 30% global market share for newly awarded commercial launch contracts, in 2017 the market share reached 45%,[90] and 65% in 2018” -wiki.
Just yesterday one of their reusable orbital boosters landed for the 11th time on a drone ship. You don’t need massive lobbying when not a single country or other company has yet to land an orbital booster and proceeds to toss their rocket carcasses into the ocean.
As for Pelosi whataboutism, that’s a fair criticism. However, from my POV people like Warren and Sanders exist in the actual factory that sets up the rules. So for them to go after Musk or whoever and complain about them “breaking the rules” is where I find them lacking. Fix your own shit.
|
Manchin went on Fox and says he won't vote for BBB because he's concerned about adding to the national debt. This is probably the deathblow to the bill and what was going to be Biden's signature legislation. This was despite the White House saying a few days ago that talks were still going on, Manchin didn't entirely thumb it down and they believed it could pass by early next year. Either there's a newfound scramble for negotiations and they let Manchin write the bill or it goes down in flames entirely. Biden really can't afford to let this bill falter.
|
"fix your own shit" He says to the people trying to fix the shit in support of the person attacking them for trying to fix the shit.
Manchin went on fox news to tell the republicans that they're going to win in 2022 and 2024 and that he doesn't care about pretending to be a democrat anymore.
|
On December 18 2021 07:04 Elroi wrote:Read the post again. If you don't understand it, I can't explain it to you. Hint: it's not climate denialism. Sure, I can provide a link. Here are, for example, some scientists on BBC in late 2007 predicting that North Polar ice cap would be gone by 2013. In fact, they even saw that as a conservative estimate: Show nested quote +"Our projection of 2013 for the removal of ice in summer is not accounting for the last two minima, in 2005 and 2007," the researcher from the Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, California, explained to the BBC. "So given that fact, you can argue that may be our projection of 2013 is already too conservative." http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7139797.stmThe guy I was talking about who keeps track of those predictions is a Danish political scientist (not economist as I said before), Bjørn Lomborg.
Your point is still unclear.
And unless you state it directly will be up to interpretation.
I interpret that you dodge to commit to a statement, trying to obfuscate and sow doubt about the credibility of climate science.
|
United Kingdom13775 Posts
One last response to the irrelevant side-points:
+ Show Spoiler +On December 19 2021 23:27 Husyelt wrote:
SpaceX doesn’t need to rely on their lobbying, their actual service and products completely dominate on their own now. A cute platitude, but objectively untrue. Their involvement in lobbying is extensive when compared to other players in the space industry. It is a pretty impressive lobbying operation, but one obviously built for rent-seeking on contract awards and government subsidies, given that that's exactly what they've pushed for for years and years with the help of their lobbying apparatus. I believe the standard fanboy line these days is "it's fine because it's all for the mission" rather than denying that it happens wholesale, because the latter is quite obviously untrue. But maybe you should scale back the Pelosi hate - sure, she might be doing some questionable profiteering from her position in Congress, but some of it is in Tesla's favor. For the glory of "the mission" after all!
and back to the actual main point. To be entirely clear, you are defending the long, pathetic chain of Twitter replies to this tweet:
+ Show Spoiler +
or in other words, that this is the side that is in the right:
+ Show Spoiler +
That's the only way to really interpret the original post you made:
On December 18 2021 14:54 Husyelt wrote:https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1471990054415446024?s=20Musk vs Warren is not on my 2021 Bingo card. Going to have to go with someone who open sourced Tesla's technology and halved the price of getting to orbit... Warren is a grifter who, all things considered would have been a solid candidate had Clinton not been a thing. Elon doesn't pay taxes on his salary yes. Because he has no salary. But he does pays 50-60% on his stocks when taking them out. He pays his taxes Lizbeth. Go after your girl Pelosi and her "Stock market trading as a congress member is totes fine".
To be clear, none of what Warren said had any mention of "let's stop awarding contracts to SpaceX" or "let's punish Tesla for their anti-union practices" - this is entirely about personal taxes about personal wealth. Your mention of these other things is entirely a means by which to divert from the actual exchange that happened. Let's not let the defense of the pettiest and least defensible personality traits, which you notionally claim to disapprove of, get buried behind several layers of misdirection. The "Senator Karen" line of personal insults is what you're really defending by making it a "Musk vs Warren" consideration.
|
On December 19 2021 14:22 Mohdoo wrote:https://truthout.org/articles/young-voters-say-they-disapprove-of-bidens-performance-by-nearly-2-to-1-margin/This is a death sentence for 2022. Young voters have very nimble perspectives and enthusiasm. This can completely flip. But it will require hard, actual changes. All student loan interest needs to be wiped at the absolute minimum. I currently do not plan to vote in 2022. I won’t vote for a republican, but I am actually going to not vote in 2022 if student loans actually go back to what they were or if they only toss us a tiny bone. Trump vastly outperforming democrats in middle class financial relief is an abomination and a disgrace. I can’t support this party right now. As it stands, Trump was significantly better for the lower and middle class than Biden. Student loans pause and child tax credit both going away is a really giant change in the amount of money people have. It’s honestly crazy to realize what a big difference it is. Edit: the big thing that kinda sealed the deal for me was Pelosi openly saying she ought to be able to insider trade. That contextualized why nothing I want is getting done: utter and complete arrogance. It really does come down to arrogance, not being out of touch. They have teams of data scientists nowadays. The party isn’t relying on town hall meetings to figure out what people want. They don’t care.
On December 20 2021 00:09 PhoenixVoid wrote:
Manchin went on Fox and says he won't vote for BBB because he's concerned about adding to the national debt. This is probably the deathblow to the bill and what was going to be Biden's signature legislation. This was despite the White House saying a few days ago that talks were still going on, Manchin didn't entirely thumb it down and they believed it could pass by early next year. Either there's a newfound scramble for negotiations and they let Manchin write the bill or it goes down in flames entirely. Biden really can't afford to let this bill falter.
I generally agree with Mohdoo that democrats are a fucking disappointment and I hate them.
But also, Republicans are uncomfortably close (possibly in reach on a wave election, thanks for nothing Manchin) to controlling 3/4 of state legislatures and being able to unilaterally amend the constitution however they please, which is fucking terrifying and probably the end of the USA as a nation.
|
@LegalLord, I’m not defending all of Musk’s Twitter turn for the worse. I do think some of it is humorous. And it’s Twitter for fucksake, it’s not real life.
And they are only using the current punching bag of “worlds richest man and person of the year” because it plays to their voters and it’s hip right now. Nothing more.
On the lobbying front, apparently spending 1-2 million is a big deal for you. That’s fine. It’s not to me. The real lobbying comes in from deals and moves that rarely get made public. Which we can only assume each company does, and perhaps SpaceX does lobby harder here now that they are the dominant player. That still doesn’t exclude that they have the best product, (which is what matters in the end.) When Texas politicians start backing up SpaceX and Tesla in the same way that a certain members back Boeing jobs for SLS we can call both out. Because as of right now republicans don’t like Tesla and SpaceX, although they are warming to them.
And the “mission” does matter. I believe in moving some of humanity off world. We can repair Climate Change and move to the Moon and Mars at the same time. By mastering other planets, we can better defend our own. Might be naive and optimistic, but it’s better than being a doomer in my opinion. Edit: that’s enough defending musk and Twitter for a while. He only pays me minimum wage and sometimes I get burnt out!
|
On December 20 2021 02:46 Kyadytim wrote:Show nested quote +On December 19 2021 14:22 Mohdoo wrote:https://truthout.org/articles/young-voters-say-they-disapprove-of-bidens-performance-by-nearly-2-to-1-margin/This is a death sentence for 2022. Young voters have very nimble perspectives and enthusiasm. This can completely flip. But it will require hard, actual changes. All student loan interest needs to be wiped at the absolute minimum. I currently do not plan to vote in 2022. I won’t vote for a republican, but I am actually going to not vote in 2022 if student loans actually go back to what they were or if they only toss us a tiny bone. Trump vastly outperforming democrats in middle class financial relief is an abomination and a disgrace. I can’t support this party right now. As it stands, Trump was significantly better for the lower and middle class than Biden. Student loans pause and child tax credit both going away is a really giant change in the amount of money people have. It’s honestly crazy to realize what a big difference it is. Edit: the big thing that kinda sealed the deal for me was Pelosi openly saying she ought to be able to insider trade. That contextualized why nothing I want is getting done: utter and complete arrogance. It really does come down to arrogance, not being out of touch. They have teams of data scientists nowadays. The party isn’t relying on town hall meetings to figure out what people want. They don’t care. Show nested quote +On December 20 2021 00:09 PhoenixVoid wrote:
Manchin went on Fox and says he won't vote for BBB because he's concerned about adding to the national debt. This is probably the deathblow to the bill and what was going to be Biden's signature legislation. This was despite the White House saying a few days ago that talks were still going on, Manchin didn't entirely thumb it down and they believed it could pass by early next year. Either there's a newfound scramble for negotiations and they let Manchin write the bill or it goes down in flames entirely. Biden really can't afford to let this bill falter. I generally agree with Mohdoo that democrats are a fucking disappointment and I hate them. But also, Republicans are uncomfortably close (possibly in reach on a wave election, thanks for nothing Manchin) to controlling 3/4 of state legislatures and being able to unilaterally amend the constitution however they please, which is fucking terrifying and probably the end of the USA as a nation.
Perhaps the US needs an ending of some sort before it or its people can begin doing what needs to be done. Whatever shakes out won’t be pretty, but the status quo cannot hold for much longer at this rate.
|
|
|
On December 20 2021 02:51 farvacola wrote:Show nested quote +On December 20 2021 02:46 Kyadytim wrote:On December 19 2021 14:22 Mohdoo wrote:https://truthout.org/articles/young-voters-say-they-disapprove-of-bidens-performance-by-nearly-2-to-1-margin/This is a death sentence for 2022. Young voters have very nimble perspectives and enthusiasm. This can completely flip. But it will require hard, actual changes. All student loan interest needs to be wiped at the absolute minimum. I currently do not plan to vote in 2022. I won’t vote for a republican, but I am actually going to not vote in 2022 if student loans actually go back to what they were or if they only toss us a tiny bone. Trump vastly outperforming democrats in middle class financial relief is an abomination and a disgrace. I can’t support this party right now. As it stands, Trump was significantly better for the lower and middle class than Biden. Student loans pause and child tax credit both going away is a really giant change in the amount of money people have. It’s honestly crazy to realize what a big difference it is. Edit: the big thing that kinda sealed the deal for me was Pelosi openly saying she ought to be able to insider trade. That contextualized why nothing I want is getting done: utter and complete arrogance. It really does come down to arrogance, not being out of touch. They have teams of data scientists nowadays. The party isn’t relying on town hall meetings to figure out what people want. They don’t care. On December 20 2021 00:09 PhoenixVoid wrote:
Manchin went on Fox and says he won't vote for BBB because he's concerned about adding to the national debt. This is probably the deathblow to the bill and what was going to be Biden's signature legislation. This was despite the White House saying a few days ago that talks were still going on, Manchin didn't entirely thumb it down and they believed it could pass by early next year. Either there's a newfound scramble for negotiations and they let Manchin write the bill or it goes down in flames entirely. Biden really can't afford to let this bill falter. I generally agree with Mohdoo that democrats are a fucking disappointment and I hate them. But also, Republicans are uncomfortably close (possibly in reach on a wave election, thanks for nothing Manchin) to controlling 3/4 of state legislatures and being able to unilaterally amend the constitution however they please, which is fucking terrifying and probably the end of the USA as a nation. Perhaps the US needs an ending of some sort before it or its people can begin doing what needs to be done. Whatever shakes out won’t be pretty, but the status quo cannot hold for much longer at this rate.
Whatever comes out of Republicans rewriting the constitution is going to be some sort of authoritarian Christian theocracy hellscape, where the rules of elections have been edited so that WASPs can never lose their grip on power again.
|
United Kingdom13775 Posts
On December 19 2021 14:22 Mohdoo wrote:https://truthout.org/articles/young-voters-say-they-disapprove-of-bidens-performance-by-nearly-2-to-1-margin/This is a death sentence for 2022. Young voters have very nimble perspectives and enthusiasm. This can completely flip. But it will require hard, actual changes. All student loan interest needs to be wiped at the absolute minimum. I currently do not plan to vote in 2022. I won’t vote for a republican, but I am actually going to not vote in 2022 if student loans actually go back to what they were or if they only toss us a tiny bone. Trump vastly outperforming democrats in middle class financial relief is an abomination and a disgrace. I can’t support this party right now. As it stands, Trump was significantly better for the lower and middle class than Biden. Student loans pause and child tax credit both going away is a really giant change in the amount of money people have. It’s honestly crazy to realize what a big difference it is. Edit: the big thing that kinda sealed the deal for me was Pelosi openly saying she ought to be able to insider trade. That contextualized why nothing I want is getting done: utter and complete arrogance. It really does come down to arrogance, not being out of touch. They have teams of data scientists nowadays. The party isn’t relying on town hall meetings to figure out what people want. They don’t care.
It's heartening to know that resuming student loan payments is "a priority" for Biden. Not so much any meaningful forms of governing, but the loan payments must flow.
|
On December 20 2021 02:46 Kyadytim wrote:Show nested quote +On December 19 2021 14:22 Mohdoo wrote:https://truthout.org/articles/young-voters-say-they-disapprove-of-bidens-performance-by-nearly-2-to-1-margin/This is a death sentence for 2022. Young voters have very nimble perspectives and enthusiasm. This can completely flip. But it will require hard, actual changes. All student loan interest needs to be wiped at the absolute minimum. I currently do not plan to vote in 2022. I won’t vote for a republican, but I am actually going to not vote in 2022 if student loans actually go back to what they were or if they only toss us a tiny bone. Trump vastly outperforming democrats in middle class financial relief is an abomination and a disgrace. I can’t support this party right now. As it stands, Trump was significantly better for the lower and middle class than Biden. Student loans pause and child tax credit both going away is a really giant change in the amount of money people have. It’s honestly crazy to realize what a big difference it is. Edit: the big thing that kinda sealed the deal for me was Pelosi openly saying she ought to be able to insider trade. That contextualized why nothing I want is getting done: utter and complete arrogance. It really does come down to arrogance, not being out of touch. They have teams of data scientists nowadays. The party isn’t relying on town hall meetings to figure out what people want. They don’t care. Show nested quote +On December 20 2021 00:09 PhoenixVoid wrote:
Manchin went on Fox and says he won't vote for BBB because he's concerned about adding to the national debt. This is probably the deathblow to the bill and what was going to be Biden's signature legislation. This was despite the White House saying a few days ago that talks were still going on, Manchin didn't entirely thumb it down and they believed it could pass by early next year. Either there's a newfound scramble for negotiations and they let Manchin write the bill or it goes down in flames entirely. Biden really can't afford to let this bill falter. I generally agree with Mohdoo that democrats are a fucking disappointment and I hate them. But also, Republicans are uncomfortably close (possibly in reach on a wave election, thanks for nothing Manchin) to controlling 3/4 of state legislatures and being able to unilaterally amend the constitution however they please, which is fucking terrifying and probably the end of the USA as a nation.
I’m numb to it and I’m a Canadian citizen who easily meets the requirements for immigration to most European countries. If the country goes the way you’re describing, it was never worth saving to begin with. I’ll move my family somewhere better long before anything actually bad happens. Oregon will likely have eroded in a way that I would have decided to (extremely sadly) left already.
Truthfully, I don’t think that’ll happen. But if it does, I have an easy time waving goodbye to the people who caused the problem to begin with.
Living in really poor communities, there is an implied shame of reaching beyond the community your parents lived in. Abandoning your underserved community because you want a better life for yourself is viewed as a betrayal in some parts of the country. It isn’t. No one should be a prisoner to a worse life. If the country really does erode into a lifted truck hellscape, it will be the fault of Cletus, not me.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT![[image loading]](https://i.imgur.com/nw97U5F.png)
