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Elon Musk revealed as one of the largest donors for a House Republican PAC (salon.com)
12 points by fahd777 2902 days ago
4 comments

This headline is misleading. Nate Silver writes:

"It's extremely misleading not to mention Musk has a long history of also donating to Democrats, including in this political cycle."

https://twitter.com/NateSilver538/status/1018211558835404800

It’s selective outrage to score brownie points with followers and to one up your other virtue signaling wrestlers.

Anyone in any major industry is donating to multiple parties and candidates. Who are they going to bug from now, Ford? Oh, noes! They donate to Republican too.

Meanwhile he donated 20x to the Sierra Club and for some reason that’s totally ignored.

The CEO of Ford doesn't claim to be a socialist of any flavor. Nearly all of Hackett's contributions have gone to Republicans, with only a couple to Democrats. (According to opensecrets.org .)

It is indeed a fact that a company may donate to both Democrats and Republicans to garner influence with whomever wins. Quoting from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elon_Musk : "Musk further stated, "in order to have your voice be heard in Washington, you have to make some little contribution"". Quoting from https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1018333202140680192 "a reasonable amount to maintain an open dialogue".

That may be true. If so, isn't it a sign of how the system is rigged in favor of rich? The complaint for decades has been that both major parties are in the pocket of large businesses and rich people - doesn't this support that view?

Who listens to those of us who can't drop tens of thousands dollars to participate in the dialogue?

FWIW, the Sierra Club number is more like 150x, not 20x - https://thinkprogress.org/elon-musk-house-gop-contributions-... says "Michael Brune, said on Twitter that Musk has donated $6 million to Sierra Club’s climate advocacy."

It seems to me this "purity" test many progressives are using is getting too close to the kinds of tests a few bad movements which destroyed millions of lives and put civilization behind a few decades.

Basically any deviation is labeled as "not being Marxist enough". They are following this similar path. It's not good. Mao, Stalin and to a degree mr Xi is doing this. It's as if progressives who demand this purity are completely unawares of this.

Really? Do you have any solid basis for this hypothesis? Are you really calling me a supporter of totalitarian absolutism because I'm sympathetic with the expressed outrage against Musk?

To start, what does Marxism have to do with any of this?

Aren't there any number of closer equivalences you could have used, without the specter of government-run mass murder? What about RINO - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republican_In_Name_Only , or the other way, an appeal to the 'big tent'? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_tent ?

(The latter links to 'Multi-tendency', described as 'Multi-tendency political organisations, especially left-wing groups, accommodate members who are affiliated or identify with different political ideologies, agendas, interests or perspectives.' Odd, isn't it, that it highlights how left-wing groups are more accomodationist?)

Isn't it a pretty normal behavior to expect a higher standard from those one thinks are friends or allies?

Might it be that Musk's claims of being a socialist actually are based in a poor understanding of socialism, and that he makes a show of being left-leaning while his actions stay firmly in the middle of the Overton window?

It seems that any of those are a more likely interpretation than what you propose.

I don't get it, if you really care so much about renewable energy and the future of humankind, then why donate to a party that will remove all subsidies on electric cars, denies that climate change exists, escalates the nuclear arms race, etc etc etc?
Well this certainly is an interesting piece. I really dont know what to believe, especially considering I dont really know if I trust the source (salon.com? Never heard of em). I cant really say Im a huge Musk fan, considering I agree that the whole cave stunt was likely nothing more than a PR campaign for him, but this seems quite silly for him to do, if true.
I don't understand your concern about Salon.com. It's a synthesis from several different sources, and it provides links to the sources.

The donation information comes from ProPublica. Musk's $33,900 donation is at https://projects.propublica.org/itemizer/filing/1246378/sche... .

That in turn links to the primary information at http://docquery.fec.gov/cgi-bin/forms/C00669622/1246378/sa/A... , where you can see an entry for 33900.00. (The aggregate donation is 38900.00.)

Why did you need to trust Salon.com when the official information is so readily available for verification?

Or is there something else from the piece that you are hesitant about?

I stand corrected, I did not give my due diligence to following the source trail and verifying the veracity of the website.
Not defending him, but I would imagine people in his position play and pay to both parties.
I think it came out his payments are about 2 to 1 in favour of the R side.
Maybe because Democrat opinion is already on his side and needs less "persuasion"?
"Keep your friends close to you, but keep your enemies even closer."

As much as I generally like him, he denied being a top donor, which is not like denying any donation. He should clarify that.

Salon has been around for a while and they're not quite what you would call "fake news", but they are very Left leaning and "progressive". They also tend to focus a lot more opinion and analysis, so while the facts are probably correct, the context is entirely speculative and about as biased as you can get from the that end of the spectrum.
> (salon.com? Never heard of em)

Salon was pretty popular in the early days of the web. I used to read it in the mid-late 90s.

Why would it be quite silly for him to do? CEOs donate to political parties and PACs all the time.
"Reports that I am a top donor to GOP are categorically false. I am not a top donor to any political party." - Elon Musk on Twitter

Source: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1018330925384458240

Is there a tweet where he denies giving money to this particular PAC?

I imagine $35,000 puts you on a fairly short list.