We Are in the 5th or 6th Inning of Elon Musk
Signs point to a shift
One thing we know about Trump is he doesn’t keep people around for long. How many people from his first cabinet are returning? One — Linda McMahon, Secretary of the Department of Education, and her directive from Trump is to shut down the agency she leads! Other than that, think of the long list of names from the first regime who Trump tired of — Stephen Bannon, Reince Preibus, Kellyanne Conway, Mike Pence, Mike Pompeo and so on. Other than Stephen Miller, he didn’t keep many around in his inner circle — most just orbit around.
Which brings me to this merry marriage of convenience between two men who are really quite similar. I wrote about this in December 2022 when Musk took over Twitter: I look at Elon Musk, and I see Donald Trump. You can read in more detail about why, but suffice it to say for our purposes that they both started life on third base, and have autocratic tendencies to their core, including a desire to be the center of attention, and the number one guy. There can only be one number one guy.
But Musk brings things that Trump can use, like money! Hundreds of millions spent to get Trump elected, and now to help muscle Trump’s enemies with a threat of primary challenges. Musk also brought a nice little made-for-TV entertainment show, like “The Apprentice,” called DOGE, complete with theatrics like bringing beds into the office, and young men with black knapsacks and so on. DOGE could also accomplish some of what Trump promised in his campaign with no work for Trump. And if it doesn’t turn out well, as is happening now, Trump will distance himself and blame Musk.
Here’s my prediction: one day in the coming months, Trump will tell reporters something like this: Elon did an amazing job here and we have a big, beautiful blah blah blah, but now he has such important things to do with his own companies. We’ll be sad to see him go, but….
In other words, Trump will kick him to the curb, but will do it in such a lovely and gracious way that Musk will still give him what he wants from him — .
Why do I think this?