Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.
Speaker 2: Well, Elon Musk is now the richest person on the planet.
Speaker 2: More than half the satellites in space are owned and
Speaker 2: controlled by one man, starting his own artificial intelligence company.
Speaker 3: Well, he's a legitimate super genius.
Speaker 4: I mean legitimate.
Speaker 5: He says.
Speaker 3: He's always voted for Democrats, but this year it will
Speaker 3: be different.
Speaker 4: He'll vote Republican.
Speaker 6: There is a reason the US government is so reliant
Speaker 6: on him.
Speaker 2: Alon Musk is a scam artist and he's done nothing.
Speaker 7: Anything he does is fascinating the people.
Speaker 2: Welcome to Elon Inc. I'm Max Schafkin.
Speaker 6: It's the holiday season.
Speaker 2: Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, and here at Elon Inc.
Speaker 6: We have a very special two part set of shows
Speaker 6: for you today.
Speaker 2: And so you know, it's mid December when we're recording.
Speaker 2: This is the first of two. It's our episode of reflection.
Speaker 2: Think of this as your pre Christmas pre Honika ritual.
Speaker 2: You can gather with your family and think about the
Speaker 2: year that was for Elon Musk and when we think
Speaker 2: about it ourselves, to be honest, an enormous year, an
Speaker 2: epic year both for the guy and also for this
Speaker 2: podcast because we've been following it. The next week, we're
Speaker 2: gonna kick back for New Year's We're gonna crack open
Speaker 2: some champagne, eat some oysters, and play some games as
Speaker 2: we look forward to twenty twenty five.
Speaker 6: To do that, we've got some of.
Speaker 2: Our heavy hitters, Dana Hull, Bloomberg's Elon Musk reporter, and
Speaker 2: Sarah Fryar, the big tech boss here at Bloomberg News. Dana, Sarah, Welcome,
Speaker 2: Hey Max, Thanks for having me.
Speaker 6: Okay, and I'm so excited about this.
Speaker 2: We have a special guest, Ryan Broderick, who runs the
Speaker 2: newsletter Garbage Day, which I never miss and I know
Speaker 2: a lot of people on this podcast are big fans
Speaker 2: of and the podcast Panic World, which is about basically
Speaker 2: Internet related moral panics. Ryan is an expert in all
Speaker 2: things digital culture and kind of the way that intersects
Speaker 2: with business.
Speaker 6: Ryan, thank you for being on Elon Inc. Thank you.
Speaker 3: I'm for saying such as I say.
Speaker 6: Is it very uncomfortable? It's all true, and you know,
Speaker 6: happy holidays.
Speaker 2: Just before we get into the meat of the show,
Speaker 2: I just wanted to kind of get your perspective.
Speaker 6: I mean, you're.
Speaker 2: Writing I sort of quickly went through the last few
Speaker 2: episodes of Panic World, you know, mister Beast QAnon something
Speaker 2: called perfume talk and the possibility I guess that's it's
Speaker 2: moving to the right politically, which I didn't know was possible.
Speaker 2: But I'm kind of curious, like, in this kind of
Speaker 2: world of digital culture and influence, the kind of world
Speaker 2: you live in, how where does Elon Musk kind of
Speaker 2: figure and how is that changing.
Speaker 3: I like to think of him as sort of like
Speaker 3: the last germaining right wing influencer that has the juice.
Speaker 3: A lot of them have lost a lot of influence because,
Speaker 3: like you know, YouTube is changing up his algorithm. Facebook
Speaker 3: isn't as powerful as it used to be as.
Speaker 6: A publishing platform.
Speaker 3: But Elon Musk, because he owns x and because he
Speaker 3: has the money to kind of do ridiculous stuff NonStop
Speaker 3: and say crazy things and all the rest of it,
Speaker 3: he can still command attention and that makes him very valuable.
Speaker 3: So I sort of see him as sort of like
Speaker 3: the mega node for the right wing Internet right now.
Speaker 2: That's cool, well, and I assume you're paying attention to
Speaker 2: him to some extent, although I'm guessing maybe not as
Speaker 2: closely as the rest of us are or the rest
Speaker 2: of us on this podcasting it for a living.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I know, I can consider him one of my
Speaker 3: you know, one of the many cast of characters on
Speaker 3: the internet, but he's I try to keep him separate
Speaker 3: to make sure, like you know, I'm not writing about
Speaker 3: him too much.
Speaker 2: So like what would be like a non political equivalent
Speaker 2: in that cast of characters.
Speaker 3: Okay, you know how like in the early Game of
Speaker 3: Thrones episodes, Danny's like off in the desert doing like
Speaker 3: her own thing. I start to treat him like that,
Speaker 3: like he's always got something going on, and sometimes it matters,
Speaker 3: but I try to separate him out from the larger mix.
Speaker 6: Okay, got it? The Narest Mother of Dragons, Yes to
Speaker 6: the Game of Drones. That is our.
Speaker 2: World, all right? So okay, first question and listeners. These
Speaker 2: were submitted and I have them in front of me
Speaker 2: and we're gonna we're gonna go through them. But basically,
Speaker 2: we asked Dana, Sarah, and Ryan and me to answer
Speaker 2: a series of questions looking back in the year, and
Speaker 2: the first one was, and Dana, I'm gonna start with
Speaker 2: you a one word description of Elon's year twenty twenty
Speaker 2: four in a word go epic. I want you to
Speaker 2: tell me how it was more epic than previous years,
Speaker 2: because like every year is an epic year for Elon,
Speaker 2: So like why why why was this year particularly epic?
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I feel and I feel like I'm parroting
Speaker 1: the language that he himself loves to use, Like epic
Speaker 1: is not a word that like I floor throw around,
Speaker 1: but it's one that Elon likes a lot. But by
Speaker 1: all measures, he had an incredible year, Like Tesla's stock is,
Speaker 1: like the market cap of Tesla is above one point
Speaker 1: three trillion. SpaceX's evaluation is now three hundred and fifty billion,
Speaker 1: making it the most valuable private company in the world.
Speaker 1: He is by far the wealthiest person, like wealthier than ever,
Speaker 1: Like he's now above four hundred billion, and his companies
Speaker 1: are doing well. And then aside from all that, he
Speaker 1: basically is the de facto vice president. He helped elect
Speaker 1: President Trump, he went all in, he campaigned for Trump
Speaker 1: all across Pennsylvania. He's now basically enmeshed at mar A
Speaker 1: Lago has the year of the president, has been tapped
Speaker 1: to kind of lead this Doge Commission. Like he's at
Speaker 1: that kind of height of his wealth, his political influence,
Speaker 1: and his corporate power, because you know, this has also
Speaker 1: been a year where a lot of his rivals have
Speaker 1: had really crappy years. Boeing has had a horrible year.
Speaker 1: General Motors just basically announced that they are no longer
Speaker 1: pursuing their ROBOTAXI, like all of his competitors in the
Speaker 1: business arena have had really hard years, and his businesses
Speaker 1: are actually doing pretty well.
Speaker 2: Dan, I had almost the same answer as I wrote, triumph,
Speaker 2: maybe a little less. Elanie Sarah, you also so kind
Speaker 2: of we're in the same zone right well.
Speaker 4: I picked the word political, and it also is a
Speaker 4: reflection of just how I looked back on this Elon Inc.
Speaker 4: Project when this started. When we were devising this podcast,
Speaker 4: it was like around the time that everyone was so
Speaker 4: surprised that the Starling satellites had become this tool in
Speaker 4: the war in Ukraine and Musk had the power to
Speaker 4: turn off or on the Internet in a war zone,
Speaker 4: and that was kind of a moment for us realizing, Wow,
Speaker 4: this guy is like, this guy's hands on the on
Speaker 4: like the pulse of geopolitics right now, Like he can
Speaker 4: really make things happen, and what does that mean? For
Speaker 4: the richest man in the world, who owns a social network,
Speaker 4: who owns you know, this satellite company and this very
Speaker 4: influential car company, and the only means for the US
Speaker 4: government to get to space. Like what does it mean
Speaker 4: that he has this power? And I think that this
Speaker 4: year is like, oh, it means he can help can
Speaker 4: a president elected and then like sit with him at
Speaker 4: every meeting as he's building his cabinet and you know,
Speaker 4: basically shadow him in a typical Elon Musk launch mode.
Speaker 4: So yeah, extremely political is what I would say about
Speaker 4: Musks here.
Speaker 6: Okay, Ryan, what about you? I cheated light on me.
Speaker 3: I put four words down. I believe I wrote exactly
Speaker 3: let's see here, dumb and unfortunately successful.
Speaker 6: Okay, so you cheated.
Speaker 2: But actually I'm intrigued by this answer, just because I
Speaker 2: feel like you can successful as difficult to quibble with unfortunately,
Speaker 2: like that's a question of opinion.
Speaker 6: But I'm curious, like why you said dumb. So I
Speaker 6: sort of.
Speaker 3: See this whole year as a massive existential gamble for Musk,
Speaker 3: both in terms of let's say, you know, let's say
Speaker 3: if the Harris team had won, Like, is he looking
Speaker 3: at a lot more scrutiny on his various businesses and
Speaker 3: how they all interact. Is he looking at more sort
Speaker 3: of crackdowns on X and how that operates all the
Speaker 3: rest of it?
Speaker 6: Right, And it fell like.
Speaker 3: You know, mask off this year of saying like I'm
Speaker 3: going to endorse Donald Trump because he's always been this
Speaker 3: sort of political chameleon. So in a lot of ways,
Speaker 3: I sort of saw him putting all of his chips
Speaker 3: on the table this year and saying I'm going to
Speaker 3: get behind this. And I think if Trump had not won,
Speaker 3: we'd be having a very different conversation about like his
Speaker 3: perceived success this year, because I think there'd be more
Speaker 3: questions about what might happen next.
Speaker 4: I totally agree with you.
Speaker 1: But Trump did win, and he won all seven swing states,
Speaker 1: and they also won the Senate and Congress, so now
Speaker 1: they've got a trifecta in the Supreme Court. So whether
Speaker 1: it was dumb to put the chips all in or not,
Speaker 1: it was like a big bet that has paid off
Speaker 1: for musks so far. Like, are you saying that it's
Speaker 1: dumb because it was just dumb to make such a
Speaker 1: big bet, or that it's dumb because there are risks
Speaker 1: to this bet that haven't played out yet.
Speaker 3: I think that there are unknown risks. I also just
Speaker 3: think much of what he does publicly is dumb, but
Speaker 3: that's just my personal opinion, like the doge naming of
Speaker 3: the Department of Government Efficiency and sort of his various
Speaker 3: viral stunts that I think he uses to kind of
Speaker 3: ask his political moves. This year, it felt like he
Speaker 3: kind of aligned them all at once.
Speaker 6: I spent a lot of the.
Speaker 2: Year, like Ryan, thinking that Elon was making mistakes and
Speaker 2: that this was a huge This was like obviously a
Speaker 2: big bet, but a bet with a lot of risk,
Speaker 2: and I think there are still risks.
Speaker 6: And it's like very.
Speaker 2: Easy now we can talk when we get to predictions,
Speaker 2: we can talk about this. But like it's very easy
Speaker 2: to see, you know, stock is at whatever, over four hundred.
Speaker 2: It's like nearly twice what it was not too long ago,
Speaker 2: and and and he's at the Year of Trump. But
Speaker 2: like it could definitely fall apart. All right, But we're
Speaker 2: segueing into pretty pretty nicely into the biggest story of
Speaker 2: the year. And really there's only one answer, and I
Speaker 2: think we had to listen to the answer before we
Speaker 2: hear from all of us.
Speaker 4: Elan, Eileen, Elon, Elan, Elon, Elon, Elan, Elan Elan.
Speaker 2: And we all in one way or another brought up
Speaker 2: something around Trump and Elon Musk, but ever had slightly
Speaker 2: different ideas about what specifically, what part of this was
Speaker 2: the biggest Sarah, why don't you lay your first one
Speaker 2: on us?
Speaker 4: I think it was when he decided to form a
Speaker 4: pack and donate millions to Trump, And in the beginning
Speaker 4: he was sort of warm about it. He was like, yeah,
Speaker 4: forty five million to Trump, and then he was like,
Speaker 4: I didn't promise forty five million. We had this debate
Speaker 4: is like is he actually going to spend that much?
Speaker 4: And then you know it would turn out to be
Speaker 4: upwards of two hundred and fifty million. He really went
Speaker 4: all in and so deciding to get financially involved. Even
Speaker 4: though that amount of money for him is like not
Speaker 4: much when you've got four hundred billion, it was extremely
Speaker 4: significant in the race. And he also used it in
Speaker 4: a way that surprised us because he was going after
Speaker 4: the base. He was targeting people who already were in
Speaker 4: favor of Trump, just kind of a get out the
Speaker 4: vote effort, which is very different than what a lot
Speaker 4: of campaigns do in trying to like convince independence, convince
Speaker 4: swing voters. It was like, yeah, you know, if you're
Speaker 4: a white man, gets the polls.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I mean, I remember there was this whole thing in
Speaker 2: the middle of the year where we weren't sure if
Speaker 2: he really was giving money, and like the Wall Street
Speaker 2: Journal in Bloomberg had reported forty five million dollars a
Speaker 2: month and Elon was denying it. I mean, did you Ryan,
Speaker 2: I'm curious, did you think he was going to go
Speaker 2: like rewind to July or whatever when this reporting started
Speaker 2: coming out.
Speaker 6: Do you think he was going to play such a
Speaker 6: big role, like financially, I did not.
Speaker 3: The question that I've had about his political involvement all
Speaker 3: year is would he have donated as much if X
Speaker 3: was as socially powerful as Twitter used to be? And
Speaker 3: so I sort of view it through that lens where
Speaker 3: you know, a lot of his dealings with the pack
Speaker 3: and the giveaways and sort of dumping money into the
Speaker 3: Trump campaign. I do wonder if that was this sort
Speaker 3: of kind of make up for the fact that like
Speaker 3: X doesn't really have the reach it used to, and
Speaker 3: so because he.
Speaker 6: Wanted to be a player.
Speaker 3: But I did not think it would be as extensive
Speaker 3: as it was.
Speaker 2: Maybe there are three aspects of this of his political
Speaker 2: engagement this year, and like one of them Sarah just
Speaker 2: mentioned is the money and this pack. Another one was
Speaker 2: x which Ryan just brought up. And then there was
Speaker 2: a third which was essentially his campaigning and Dana, that
Speaker 2: was for you, right, Yeah, I.
Speaker 1: Wrote electing Trump because I think you know, in politics,
Speaker 1: everyone always talks about the October surprise, and for me,
Speaker 1: the October surprise was how publicly Elon campaigned for Trump.
Speaker 1: And you look at the month of October, just look
Speaker 1: at the calendar. He goes to Butler, the site of
Speaker 1: the first assassination attempt, and is jumping around on stage.
Speaker 1: He holds a series of town halls across Pennsylvania from
Speaker 1: like Lancaster to Pittsburgh. He does this million dollar giveaway,
Speaker 1: which is just basically a way to get free media.
Speaker 1: The fact that he's doing this and gets people who
Speaker 1: maybe wouldn't normally have signed his petition to sign his petition.
Speaker 1: Then he uses that list to actually get people motivated
Speaker 1: to go to the polls. And then you know, the
Speaker 1: big coda of the month, Madison Square Garden, You and
Speaker 1: I were sitting there together and there speaker after speaker
Speaker 1: after speaker, and we were like, oh my god, when
Speaker 1: is Elon gonna speak? And then it was like holy cow,
Speaker 1: like JD. Vance speaks, and then there's like other speakers,
Speaker 1: and then there's Elon, and then Elon introduces Milania and
Speaker 1: then like Malania introduces her husband. Like he had top
Speaker 1: billing at like the magifest of the year. He was
Speaker 1: fully like the most powerful surrogate Trump could have asked
Speaker 1: for in an election that largely hinged on voter frustration
Speaker 1: about the economy and inflation and immigration. You have Musk
Speaker 1: who has been sounding all of those same notes for
Speaker 1: months now, like on the trail, like lending credence and
Speaker 1: lending his personality and his vibe to the campaign. Like
Speaker 1: it was just sort of the best thing that the
Speaker 1: Trump campaign could have ever asked for, and it really
Speaker 1: made a difference in all of those swing states. I mean,
Speaker 1: his pack knocked on eleven million doors.
Speaker 6: I answered this question very similar to you.
Speaker 2: I was like, my biggest thing was the Butler rally,
Speaker 2: and really the rallies. And now as we're talking through this,
Speaker 2: I don't know if I was actually answering it as
Speaker 2: like Elon's biggest story or my biggest story was God
Speaker 2: the Madison Square Garden rally, Like these these incredible shows
Speaker 2: and the way that he put himself in the middle
Speaker 2: of it and in the way, you know, we made
Speaker 2: this mini series sit as an Elon and and talk.
Speaker 2: We talked to this historian. We're asking him, like, what
Speaker 2: what is different about Elon Musk versus other rich guys.
Speaker 2: And the thing he said is like the campaigning, Like
Speaker 2: like this is a guy who's doing it out in
Speaker 2: the open rather than you know, like some like Shelle
Speaker 2: Nagelson just writing a check and then essentially disappearing. Ryan,
Speaker 2: you actually had sort of an out of the box
Speaker 2: idea here for the biggest Elon story of the year.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean I zeroed in on like the new
Speaker 3: information that's currently come o out about Elon Musk's involvement
Speaker 3: with RBG Pack, which was sort of this superback funding,
Speaker 3: like a dark social campaign to kind of muddy the
Speaker 3: waters around abortion rights. And it kind of comes back
Speaker 3: to this idea that I had mentioned slightly earlier, which
Speaker 3: is that I think this year part of Elon Musk's
Speaker 3: big gamble and part of his like sort of like
Speaker 3: push for a political power was making X feel valuable,
Speaker 3: even though you know, anyone who has ever been on
Speaker 3: it can tell you it's not nearly as powerful as
Speaker 3: it used to be. And so my major question throughout
Speaker 3: the entire election is, Okay, if the conversations aren't happening
Speaker 3: on what used to be Twitter, where are they happening?
Speaker 3: How are people getting informed about the election? Is Elon
Speaker 3: Musk connected in any way to that? And it seems
Speaker 3: like yes, he was. And I find that to be
Speaker 3: very interesting that he is. He is clearly involved in
Speaker 3: other ways that we weren't aware of, and so I
Speaker 3: find that under reported and sort of a curiosity.
Speaker 1: That's a really great point. And we also don't know
Speaker 1: what other dark money is slashing around. I mean that's
Speaker 1: the whole thing about dark money, Like it's not really traceable,
Speaker 1: and thanks to Citizens United and so many other court cases, like,
Speaker 1: he could have put way more money in in other
Speaker 1: ways that we will never know.
Speaker 4: I think it's interesting too that you think that this
Speaker 4: is kind of to make up for the irrelevance of X,
Speaker 4: because in Elon's mind it probably still is quite relevant
Speaker 4: because it's this like echo chamber for the things he
Speaker 4: cares about.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I got to stop. Actually, I'm glad Sarah brought
Speaker 6: that up. Like, do you think that Do you think
Speaker 6: he thinks that it's successful? I think it is successful.
Speaker 6: Do like, like I think that X is more relevant
Speaker 6: than it was a year ago? Yeah? No, really, that's why.
Speaker 6: And I guess the reason I would say that is
Speaker 6: it never had huge reach Twitter. I'm never right and
Speaker 6: and but what it has now.
Speaker 2: And maybe there was a moment like in twenty eleven
Speaker 2: or something when it was like you know, like when
Speaker 2: the Arab Spring or whatever was playing out a next
Speaker 2: where maybe that was a higher level of relevance than
Speaker 2: it has today. But I mean it is at the
Speaker 2: center of conservative politics. Like it is where like the
Speaker 2: entire it's where conservative lawmakers are talking to supporters. It's
Speaker 2: where like memes are bubbling up on the right. It's
Speaker 2: like what it was in twenty ten or twenty eleven,
Speaker 2: but just on the right. And I think that is actually,
Speaker 2: in certain ways, like an achievement.
Speaker 6: That's interesting.
Speaker 3: I don't disagree that it is clearly the new hub
Speaker 3: for like America's right wing throwing stuff at the wall
Speaker 3: and seeing what sticks as we saw with Springfield, Ohio. Right,
Speaker 3: they're sort of using it as like a SNL writer's
Speaker 3: room kind of thing. But I do question if it
Speaker 3: can accomplish what most of I think Elon Musk's diehard
Speaker 3: supporters want, which is to essentially invade and kind of
Speaker 3: take over and influence what they understand as the media,
Speaker 3: and that I think it has become actually less influential,
Speaker 3: and I don't see the same sort of ability for
Speaker 3: Twitter to put its thumb on American media and generate
Speaker 3: millions of pieces like it could five or six years ago,
Speaker 3: which is I think why Elon Musk bought it in
Speaker 3: the first place. But I don't disagree with you about
Speaker 3: it sort of it becoming this new right wing hob online.
Speaker 4: I also don't think that it's going to be the
Speaker 4: Trump megaphone that it was no in the first presidency.
Speaker 4: I think we're going to see a very different version
Speaker 4: of it. And part of that is just like main
Speaker 4: character theory, like you can only have one main character
Speaker 4: on a social platform, and it was Trump and now
Speaker 4: it's Elon And does Trump really want to play that game?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 6: Their breakups could be spectacular.
Speaker 2: I can't wait Okay, So let's move on to another category,
Speaker 2: Sidekick at a Year. I've asked each of you before
Speaker 2: we started taping to send me the name of your
Speaker 2: nominee for the Sidekick of the Year, the person who
Speaker 2: has been key to Elon Musk's success, who you think
Speaker 2: of when you think of, who is sitting next to
Speaker 2: Elon Musk and offering him support. We've gathered tape from
Speaker 2: each one of these four sidekicks, and I'm going to
Speaker 2: play the tape and the people who did not pick
Speaker 2: that sidekick are gonna have to try to guess who
Speaker 2: it is. And there's gonna be a scoring system, and
Speaker 2: we're gonna carry this through across both shows. If you
Speaker 2: get it right, you get two points. Okay, great, Okay,
Speaker 2: I love points.
Speaker 6: All right?
Speaker 2: This is this first clip comes from a very own
Speaker 2: Sarah Fryar. Let's hear the first nominee for Sidekick of
Speaker 2: the Year, What should.
Speaker 6: I do save America? And how Trump? Okay?
Speaker 3: Okay, Ryan, Am I identifying what sounds to be some
Speaker 3: sort of toddler or baby talking or am identifying the
Speaker 3: more adult voice in the clip?
Speaker 2: You are identifying who in the clip is the side
Speaker 2: is a nominee, A very credible nominee for Sidekick of
Speaker 2: the Year. This is This is a hard one if
Speaker 2: you're not following this closely, although I know that Dana
Speaker 2: will steal this.
Speaker 3: Is this one of his sons, the one that he
Speaker 3: keeps the Daniel Plainview kind of kid he keeps bringing
Speaker 3: around like they will be blood Like that's what we're
Speaker 3: talking about. Let me hold on, let me mash my
Speaker 3: computer keyboard and figure out what his name is. But yeah,
Speaker 3: I can't remember. Is it Techno Maximus.
Speaker 4: His name is X.
Speaker 1: This is one of his children with Grimes and it
Speaker 1: is the one that he definitely kind of trots around,
Speaker 1: you know. I mean he brought this child to Capitol Hills.
Speaker 1: It's kind of like take your dad to workday. And
Speaker 1: so he has joined custody, so they'll be like week
Speaker 1: one week off, so you'll see him a lot and
Speaker 1: then you won't see him, and you'll see him a lot,
Speaker 1: you won't see him.
Speaker 2: But yes, X has been to Auschwitz, he has been
Speaker 2: to the US Capitol, He's been to the Rocket Factor.
Speaker 6: He's been a little boy's favorite thing and everywhere Elon goes.
Speaker 4: He was at Madison Square Garden yes, he was.
Speaker 2: All right, our next sidekick of the year. This is
Speaker 2: Dana Hall's nominee. Let's listen to the tape.
Speaker 7: The thing is, I was at a three day fashion
Speaker 7: conference in Mrrakish and I dare not talk politics among
Speaker 7: fashion people, So I said, when I get back, I'm
Speaker 7: ruin my modeling career, but I'll help you save America's
Speaker 7: And that's why I was so so active in the
Speaker 7: last week.
Speaker 6: Well, thanks, all right, Sarah Friar.
Speaker 4: Oh, it's mom, it's May Musk.
Speaker 2: That's right, Dana. You want to refresh us rush our
Speaker 2: memory of the context here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So, I mean, Elon has always been close to
Speaker 1: his mom. His mom has always been a regular at
Speaker 1: like Tesla events, but this was like the first year
Speaker 1: that we saw May become like sort of a pundit
Speaker 1: in her own night right, Like she went on Fox
Speaker 1: News like talking about how she also used to be
Speaker 1: a Democrat but was now voting for Trump. And then
Speaker 1: this clip is actually from election day itself, when you know,
Speaker 1: as Max will remember, like the polls are closing and
Speaker 1: Elon is on his private jet flying from Texas to
Speaker 1: Palm Beach to go to mar A Lago and he
Speaker 1: hosts this like impromptu x spaces that hundreds of thousands
Speaker 1: of people tune into, and then all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: like May calls up and chimes in and is on
Speaker 1: her son's Twitter spaces And.
Speaker 6: It was adorable. Honestly, it was really great.
Speaker 1: It's a fascinating dynamic.
Speaker 6: Getting some looks. You know. It's just I just thought
Speaker 6: it was very relatable. When he and his you know,
Speaker 6: audience of.
Speaker 2: Twitter people were were sort of like talking about politics stuff.
Speaker 2: Somehow they started talking about May Musk, and then all
Speaker 2: of a sudden, you heard I'm here, and she just
Speaker 2: jumped in. It was kind of like a like a
Speaker 2: like an advertisement for the beautiful spontaneity that is x
Speaker 2: spaces elon Musk's real time chat platform.
Speaker 6: She's my favorite SNL cast member.
Speaker 3: What can I say? I think she's great. I wish
Speaker 3: my mom played political defense for me on Twitter.
Speaker 6: That would be great.
Speaker 3: She has an account, but I've told her to never tweet,
Speaker 3: please do never tweet, So yeah, I support May Musk
Speaker 3: doing that.
Speaker 2: I guess all right, We've got two more clips and
Speaker 2: the next one comes from me, so you all have
Speaker 2: the opportunity to guess it.
Speaker 8: I get asked this question time was about like what
Speaker 8: is that elong like in private? And I think the
Speaker 8: main thing to understand is just kind of what you
Speaker 8: see is what you get. Like the things he says
Speaker 8: in public are the things is what he's saying in
Speaker 8: private is just maybe you know, we'll hear them a
Speaker 8: little sooner.
Speaker 6: Okay, Ryan, who's that is that? I'll give you him.
Speaker 2: He has a government job or he has been designated
Speaker 2: to have a government job, assuming you know, Trump duly
Speaker 2: takes office and nothing falls through.
Speaker 3: I was gonna guess the egg Mark and Dreeson, but
Speaker 3: I can't. I can't place the voice. It's kind of
Speaker 3: a huskier voice, isn't it. It's a great guess, Sarah,
Speaker 3: what do you think is this?
Speaker 6: Is this?
Speaker 4: Uh?
Speaker 2: The vic?
Speaker 6: Oh? No, wrong way too husky of a voice. Dan,
Speaker 6: I'm stumped.
Speaker 4: I can't. I can't pick David Sacks.
Speaker 6: Can you put Oh David Sacks? Did you say all
Speaker 6: In is a tease for that? No?
Speaker 2: No, I said he has He's he not David Sacks,
Speaker 2: co host of the All In Podcast. Okay, guys, I
Speaker 2: really the fact that no one knows David Sacks's voice,
Speaker 2: A famous podcaster future cryptos are you know, obviously, the
Speaker 2: White House Press Office has a lot of work to
Speaker 2: do in the coming weeks. All right, we have one
Speaker 2: more clip that I feel like we're gonna all get instantly,
Speaker 2: but we'll still be interesting.
Speaker 5: Just consider this, our parents and grandparents they went to Mars,
Speaker 5: or excuse me, they went to the moon with pocket calculators.
Speaker 6: And slide rulers.
Speaker 5: Americans can't even build enough housing for our citizens. Now,
Speaker 5: I think that suggests something fundamentally broken.
Speaker 6: And what I like about Elon.
Speaker 5: Musks is that he reminds us that America is a
Speaker 5: nation of great ambitions, of great dreams. And I believe
Speaker 5: that it is the solemn obligation of the American civilization
Speaker 5: to conquer the stars.
Speaker 6: We are meant for great things in the.
Speaker 5: United States of America.
Speaker 6: And Elon reminds us of that. All right, Sarah Fryar,
Speaker 6: this is an easy one, but I'm giving it to you.
Speaker 4: Oh man, I'm the worst of voices. This is jd Vance.
Speaker 2: Yes, it is jd Vance. And Ryan tell us why
Speaker 2: you picked Vance?
Speaker 3: Okay, So obviously I was thinking about Vivek because he
Speaker 3: is literally Elon Musk psychic right now, But there's really nothing,
Speaker 3: and keeping Vivek involved because like Dojes doesn't exist, it's
Speaker 3: not real, and he can just fire him if he
Speaker 3: wants to.
Speaker 6: He can't really get rid of jade Vance.
Speaker 3: But jade Vance has like obviously lowered his status in
Speaker 3: the operation enough that he's posting AI generated photos of
Speaker 3: him as Trump's wife. I don't know if you've seen that,
Speaker 3: where it's like a photo and he like photoshopped his
Speaker 3: face over the wife next to Trump's like clearly in
Speaker 3: his mind, like he has already accepted the second fiddle role.
Speaker 6: So I don't know if you're.
Speaker 3: Familiar with like Batman lore, but like oftentimes there's like
Speaker 3: an older Robin and a younger Robin, and I kind
Speaker 3: of see it like that. So it's like Elon's in
Speaker 3: the middle there, and then jade Vance is already accepted
Speaker 3: that he's.
Speaker 6: Like underneath the Elon.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I thought about this quite a bit.
Speaker 1: It's very clear to me that Elon is the de
Speaker 1: facto vice president because he is he is going to
Speaker 1: Capitol Hill, he is, you know, meeting with the lawmakers.
Speaker 1: He is weigh in on these cabinet picks at mar
Speaker 1: A Lago, like we haven't really seen jad Vance that much,
Speaker 1: and when we have seen him, he's gotten like the
Speaker 1: worst jobs, like it was cheating dance to like basically
Speaker 1: dogwak Matt Gates around the Hill. If I'm not mistaken,
Speaker 1: I think it was like the very that same very
Speaker 1: day he withdrew his nomination for the for the attorney
Speaker 1: general role. So he's getting like the crappy jobs. And
Speaker 1: I mean, to be fair, of being vice president is
Speaker 1: kind of a crappy job. Like it's like you have
Speaker 1: to do all the gruntwork and all the bad things.
Speaker 1: You get the portfolio that nobody wants, which is the
Speaker 1: challenge that Vice President Harris has. But like, so yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know, Musk isn't really it's like de facto
Speaker 1: vice president sounds wrong because vice president isn't even that powerful.
Speaker 1: He's more of like the consigliere or the first buddy.
Speaker 6: You know.
Speaker 2: It's funny because I've had a lot of people say, like, oh,
Speaker 2: jd Vance and Elon Musk they must hate each other,
Speaker 2: right because clearly on the drama Because yeah, because you know,
Speaker 2: like Danna said when we were at Madison Square Garden,
Speaker 2: you know, jd Vance is kind of buried between like
Speaker 2: doctor Phil and like a painter. I mean, you know,
Speaker 2: like really like he's in the bowels of the program.
Speaker 2: Elon Musk has like a really good spot. And it's
Speaker 2: that that's kind of played out over and over again,
Speaker 2: and I think that is like totally wrong because Elon
Speaker 2: is like Jade Vance's best friend. It is like it
Speaker 2: like this the Batman Robin thing, I think is right.
Speaker 2: Like jd Vance. First of all, when your vice president
Speaker 2: Dana hit It hit on this like you don't get
Speaker 2: to do important stuff. You're kind of cast aside. What
Speaker 2: you really need to do is stay out of trouble,
Speaker 2: avoid getting caught in too many scandals, and just kind
Speaker 2: of coast to the next nomination.
Speaker 6: And that's basically where Jade Vance is headed.
Speaker 2: He's he's gonna be the front runner to be the
Speaker 2: next Republican candidate, and as long as he stays close
Speaker 2: to Elon Musk, who, as far as we know based
Speaker 2: on reporting and and such, they have a good relationship.
Speaker 2: Elon Musk was advocating for Jdvance. So Jade Vance goes
Speaker 2: into you know, twenty twenty seven, twenty twenty eight, as
Speaker 2: people start thinking about who the next person is, as
Speaker 2: you know, vice president, immediate qualification and good friends with
Speaker 2: the number one donor, So like, I think he's going
Speaker 2: to be in a great position as long as he
Speaker 2: can just bring himself, you know, to deal with the
Speaker 2: constant you know, potential humiliations that come with being vice
Speaker 2: especially vice president in this administration.
Speaker 3: Sarah might have more thoughts on this, but I feel
Speaker 3: like Elon Musk and JD. Vance are very important for
Speaker 3: each other because they're both the closest articulation we've seen
Speaker 3: of this sort of like reactionary tech CEO wing of
Speaker 3: the Republican Party, and like they're very aligned that way.
Speaker 3: Like Vance from as I sort of have read and understand,
Speaker 3: it was sort of groomed to be this guy that
Speaker 3: could represent the Silicon Valley dark Enlightenment guys in Washington,
Speaker 3: and Elon Musk has never like totally aligned with those guys,
Speaker 3: but he likes enough of the same stuff that it
Speaker 3: feels like they can help each other kind of define
Speaker 3: what Republicanism is after Trump can't run anymore.
Speaker 2: So just a quick recap on the scoring. Right now,
Speaker 2: we have Sarah with two points, Dana with three points,
Speaker 2: and Ryan back but still.
Speaker 6: In contention with one point.
Speaker 2: I split the points on that on the X one
Speaker 2: you each got one. All right, let's move on to
Speaker 2: most underrated story of the year. And Ryan, I want
Speaker 2: to start with you tell us what the most underrated
Speaker 2: story of the year for Elon Musk was in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty four.
Speaker 3: Okay, I have to say that this is totally unconfirmed.
Speaker 3: It's an internet rumor. I want to stand that we're
Speaker 3: in a serious journalistic institution right now, but I'm gonna
Speaker 3: just I'm gonna go for it. There is a rumor
Speaker 3: that Elon Musk is not actually playing Diablo all the time,
Speaker 3: and that he has hired a ghost player to keep
Speaker 3: his score at number one. I have nothing, guys.
Speaker 1: You need to break that story.
Speaker 3: You need to confirm that if there's anyone listening here
Speaker 3: who can give me the details, I need to lock
Speaker 3: this thing down. My email is Ryan at garbage date
Speaker 3: dot email and.
Speaker 2: Do me a favor and cc Elon ain't get Bloomers
Speaker 2: because this, yeah, this just might be a collaboration. I mean,
Speaker 2: Dan and Sarah, what do you think about this? The
Speaker 2: Ryan's right, very little evidence except for the general thing
Speaker 2: that like this guy is running six companies. He's you know,
Speaker 2: first buddy, he's has an precedented political influence.
Speaker 6: He's a parent. Where like, where would he possibly find
Speaker 6: the time.
Speaker 1: Well, he doesn't really sleep, and he plays video games
Speaker 1: to wind down or when he's on his plane. Right,
Speaker 1: You'll notice that his tweet storms are often when he's
Speaker 1: in the air, and I think maybe he games when
Speaker 1: he's on the air too, And I think he games
Speaker 1: a lot. But I love the idea of a ghost player,
Speaker 1: Like how I didn't even know that that was a job,
Speaker 1: Like I've heard of ghost writer, but a ghost player
Speaker 1: that would be that would be amazing. We thought he
Speaker 1: was training X to take over the business, and maybe
Speaker 1: he's training X to maintain his Diapolis store score once
Speaker 1: he's old enough.
Speaker 6: I don't believe it.
Speaker 2: I think this is like the thing that I yeah,
Speaker 2: he's playing those games.
Speaker 6: I just don't.
Speaker 2: I just think like this would be such a weird
Speaker 2: thing to fake. I mean, it's part of why would
Speaker 2: be such an amazing.
Speaker 4: So that's why he would fake it. I don't know.
Speaker 4: I like conspiracies part of being an online person.
Speaker 1: I wish that way I had known that we could
Speaker 1: just we could put out rumors because I have great
Speaker 1: I mean, I have a great room, uncut, unsubstantiated rumors, dish.
Speaker 6: Let's go all right, let's let's let's move to Sarah.
Speaker 2: Sarah, what was your most underrated Elon Musk's story of
Speaker 2: twenty twenty four?
Speaker 4: So I really liked Dan and Sophie's big piece on
Speaker 4: Elon Musk's fertility obsession and how he's basically trying to
Speaker 4: make more babies in the world, and he's talked about
Speaker 4: that quite a bit on the Internet. So I like that,
Speaker 4: But I think that maybe the most surprisingly underrated piece
Speaker 4: where like this this news broke and then like within
Speaker 4: an hour, like nobody really talked about it anymore, was
Speaker 4: Elon's regular contact with Vladimir Putin, and it was just like,
Speaker 4: you know, the journal had that story and people were like, Wow,
Speaker 4: what a big story, and then like, what have you
Speaker 4: guys heard anyone talk about it in the week since,
Speaker 4: like he can get away with anything.
Speaker 1: He's teflon Elon.
Speaker 4: What's important to about it to me is just that
Speaker 4: he's like as tied in with the Trump administration as
Speaker 4: he is. He's a private citizen, right, he can do
Speaker 4: whatever he wants. He's a business owner, and he can
Speaker 4: do things. He can talk to China as a business owner,
Speaker 4: and he can talk to Russia as a business owner.
Speaker 4: And in you know, no one's gonna brief him or
Speaker 4: stop him or make him an ambassador to the United States,
Speaker 4: but other countries will see him as a representative of
Speaker 4: the US. So it's good to be tricky, right.
Speaker 6: He was at Notre Dam Sarah.
Speaker 2: I've never been convinced that this was like such a
Speaker 2: like a huge scandal or something, but also it does
Speaker 2: seem like there's a lot here and it's something that
Speaker 2: we that no one really like has explored. Dana over
Speaker 2: to you your underrated story of twenty twenty four.
Speaker 1: So this is a story that was broken by Laura
Speaker 1: Kaladney at CNBC, who is a friend of mine and
Speaker 1: a fierce competitor. But she had a great piece about
Speaker 1: how you know, Elon basically had ordered these in Vidio
Speaker 1: chips and he they were supposed to be for Tesla,
Speaker 1: but he diverted them to x dot Ai, his ai startup,
Speaker 1: and he sort of poop pooed it away like oh well,
Speaker 1: like the Tesla factory wasn't really ready and couldn't accommodate
Speaker 1: these chips, So why have them just sit around when
Speaker 1: they could go to work. But it was just yet
Speaker 1: another example of how like his companies are not really independent,
Speaker 1: they're all fused together. They have overlapping people involved, overlapping
Speaker 1: engineers like and Elon will Rob Peter to pay Paul
Speaker 1: and like move resources around as needed. And this was
Speaker 1: just sort of an example of him kind of moving
Speaker 1: around the resources. Like there's been nothing in Tesla's proxy
Speaker 1: or any filings about this conflict or potential conflict.
Speaker 2: All right, I have two underrated stories that I want
Speaker 2: to offer. The first one is sort of more serious,
Speaker 2: second one is less serious. So the first one is
Speaker 2: and I can't canna can't believe no one brought this up.
Speaker 2: But like Elon put a chip in some guy's braw Yeah,
Speaker 2: that guy, okay, And now listen, let's be fair.
Speaker 6: There have been some problems with this chip. There's a
Speaker 6: lot to talk about here. But he's like playing chess
Speaker 6: with his thoughts.
Speaker 2: And that just happened like at the beginning of the year,
Speaker 2: and and like it's not like we've all forgotten about it.
Speaker 2: It's just so many other things happen that that it.
Speaker 6: It's it's just weird.
Speaker 3: I genuinely did forget it about that's that's actually wild.
Speaker 6: What a year.
Speaker 2: Now catch up, you'll see that there have been and
Speaker 2: we've talked about this on the podcast. The threads, it's
Speaker 2: a little bit I don't gnarley like the threads from
Speaker 2: the device popped out a little bit. It's it's definitely
Speaker 2: still an experimental technology, but I mean it is a thing,
Speaker 2: and and and they're looking to put more chips and
Speaker 2: more people's brains. This is gonna be a thing I
Speaker 2: think that we're gonna talk about in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2: The second one, and this is a very specific moment
Speaker 2: from the Madison Square Garden event that I have a
Speaker 2: little tape to play for all of you.
Speaker 7: USA us said usa usay.
Speaker 2: Usa, Ryan, I think you're the one who suggested this
Speaker 2: or that I encountered this first. But the mispronunciation of
Speaker 2: the USA chan is fascinating.
Speaker 3: Yeah, the only way you can interpret that is that
Speaker 3: he's never tried it before. He's maybe never heard it before,
Speaker 3: but like it's ussa Usa, but he can't get the
Speaker 3: inflection right.
Speaker 6: And uh yeah, fascinating to watch. Okay, that's it.
Speaker 2: For the first part of our year end special, Ryan, Sarah, Dana,
Speaker 2: Happy holidays, thanks for coming, Bye.
Speaker 1: Bye bye, Happy Holidays.
Speaker 2: But listeners, don't worry. This trio is coming back in
Speaker 2: a week for more games. And you're not gonna believe this,
Speaker 2: but the scores already accrued on the sidekick portion of
Speaker 2: the game will carry over and we're gonna make some
Speaker 2: predictions for twenty five. It's gonna be a really good
Speaker 2: time and we will see you then. This episode was
Speaker 2: produced by Stacy Wong. Anna Maserakis is our editor and
Speaker 2: Rayhan Harmansi our senior editor, and if you believe it,
Speaker 2: the idea for this show also came from Rayhan. Blake
Speaker 2: Maples handles engineering, and Emma Sanchez fact checks.
Speaker 6: Our supervising producer.
Speaker 2: Is Magnus Hendrickson. The e Linink theme is written and
Speaker 2: performed by Taka Yazuzawa and Alex Sagierra. Brendan Francis Newnham
Speaker 2: is our executive producer, and Sage Bauman is the.
Speaker 6: Head of Bloomberg Podcasts.
Speaker 2: A big thanks to our supporters Joel Weber and Brad Stone.
Speaker 2: I'm Max Schaffkin. If you have a minute, rate and
Speaker 2: review our show. It'll help other listeners find us, and
Speaker 2: we will see you next week. Happy twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2: Thanks for listening to the ELONN podcast. If you never
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