Question for Republicans. What do you think about Musk being given the access that he's been granted?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not sure our Congress is productive nor effective. The average age at least needs to come down - the ones in power are all age 75+ - I just don't see how anyone can suggest that Congress should have control over anything. I'm not a supporter of Musk and also worry he has too much control. No, I don't trust him BUT - here's a big one - he's bringing a new game. Congress is the same old BS and I don't trust them anymore than I trust Musk. At least with Musk being new, and his predilection of using social media and posting all the time and the fact he is business v. politics by trade, there's going to be more public scrutiny and debate at least over what he's doing. When Congress and the old folks run the show, it's a rigged game, admit it.

The truth is, we're in bad shape as a country. Whether it was Trump/Musk or current Congress (status quo/Kamala) running things, our near future sucks.

So you’re ok with trashing THE CONSTITUTION? Just so I’m clear?

Yes. Yes these people are ok with this. It’s insane.

Also, I am very for stricter term limits in Congress (because I’m pretty sure it would be considered discriminatory to solely limit service based on old age). But this would at least stop someone like Mitch McConnell from sticking around so long.

But we should not limit Congress through abuses by the executive branch.

I also find it ironic that conservatives promote themselves as such strict constitutionalists, except they’ll totally bastardize things when it suits them and interpret a well armed militia to mean easy access to as many guns and as much ammo as their hearts could desire.

We have a minimum age, there's nothing discriminatory about a maximum age.

Minimum ages aren’t problematic. But we have laws preventing age discrimination in employment for older people. Or at least we used to have laws. Maybe those don’t count anymore.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Elon Musk is rich because he is a genius and he earned it. He deserves every penny.

I love my President Trump.

Oh, and by the way, I got mine.

- Signed a MAGA 65-year-old white man who couldn't care less about anyone or anything but myself

What does "I got mine" mean? You have some guns and a mail order bride?

I bet that one dies alone. His next of kin refuse to attend the burial

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:These are the same people who put a senator in office who couldn’t name the 3 branches of government. For whatever baffling reason they don’t care and/or think it’s funny that our democracy is being destroyed. Part of this can be tied to the republican decades long effort to tightly control what is taught in schools in red states. Not learning history through a larger lens, prevents students from learning and practicing critical thinking skills. They grow up and are funneled to a singular news source and blindly believe anything they are told.

The responses in all these threads are indicative of that. Attempting to explain USAIDs role in keeping the US safe and secure is lost on these people. It’s too esoteric of concept for them to understand. That’s why the responses are so simplistic “feed the people at home” - when there are massive programs also dedicated to that already.

Dems have got to simplify their messaging. Explain directly what will happen to these people individually if USAID fails, OSHA fails, Treasury fails and tariffs are put in place.

Let's be extraordinarily clear that they are also okay with people starving at home.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These are the same people who put a senator in office who couldn’t name the 3 branches of government. For whatever baffling reason they don’t care and/or think it’s funny that our democracy is being destroyed. Part of this can be tied to the republican decades long effort to tightly control what is taught in schools in red states. Not learning history through a larger lens, prevents students from learning and practicing critical thinking skills. They grow up and are funneled to a singular news source and blindly believe anything they are told.

The responses in all these threads are indicative of that. Attempting to explain USAIDs role in keeping the US safe and secure is lost on these people. It’s too esoteric of concept for them to understand. That’s why the responses are so simplistic “feed the people at home” - when there are massive programs also dedicated to that already.

Dems have got to simplify their messaging. Explain directly what will happen to these people individually if USAID fails, OSHA fails, Treasury fails and tariffs are put in place.

Let's be extraordinarily clear that they are also okay with people starving at home.

Yes. This isn't an either or thing. These psychopaths are coming for Medicaid and other social services next.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:At this point it ai beyond obvious that structures and process have been used to entrench the status quo. Congress nor the American voter have the stomach to make needed changes.

An American citizen (immigrant!) is working to improve serious problems. *If* somehow he manages to deliver, it will be one of the greatest gifts ever received by our country. Entrenched interests have had decades to fix these problems. They’ve failed. Might as well try this. Just give him and his team a blanket pardon before Trump leaves office.

Just goes to show that we need immigrants. They get the job done. Musk should remind Stephen Miller this. LOL

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am okay with it, the swamp and control in DC is very real. While I no longer live there, I did for thirty plus years, the entitlement and sense of power was everywhere. I truly did believe most of those people were untouchable so it's' sorta of poetic to see them sweating under the collar as it were, also unbelievable at the same time. This will make a great movie one day and yes, I am enjoying watching the turmoil. Incidentally, I don't think it's as bad as most of you are making it out to be, nothing wrong with the incoming administration having access to all of this information. I think once it became clear there would be roadblocks, which is probably all the way back to the election month, they knew they'd have no choice.

Are you this stupid

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’ve seen zero justification for turning over decision-making and control of our government to an unelected private individual. You cannot replace Congress or our co-equal branches of government balances this way. If Congress doesn’t act, I expect a lot of this will be challenged in court (not the best because it’s costly and slow).

What actual legal authority is there for our government to operate this way? Seems to be exactly what the founders sought to avoid (centralized power at the hands of the wealthy few).

Imagine if Biden had installed someone like George Soros inside the US government to start controlling everything. It would be completely unacceptable (and I suspect we’d hear that from GOP members of Congress).

To answer your question the Federal bureaucracy sits squarely under the Executive Branch. It belongs to that one of the three branches of the government, it does not sit under Congress or SCOTUS. Which is why, for example, agencies and bureaucrats routinely deny to answer questions in Congressional probes. It can be legitimately argued by constitutional scholars that some of the laws Congress passed affecting the bureaucracy are actually unlawful. The constitution makes clear the Executive branch runs the government, not Congress or SCOTUS.

That is most likely why there's this state of paralysis and no real confidence in lawsuits doing anything more than temporarily halt the EOs affecting the bureaucracy.

As for OP's question, I don't consider myself a Republican but I approve most of what I see Musk doing if just because all his actions is bringing far more transparency into an extremely opaque system of agencies and unelected senior bureaucrats.

This sounds like an intern for trump wrote this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We had a $1.83 trillion budget deficit last year. Unsustainable. Musk thinks he can cut a trillion in spending. Good, let’s see what he comes up with. His experience at Twitter showed him that three quarters of the people employed there were useless at best.

According to an internal email sent by Elon Musk to employees, X is 'barely breaking even,' citing stagnant user growth and underwhelming revenue. Musk purchased Twitter for $44 billion in October 2022, a deal financed in part by $13 billion in debt.Jan 27, 2025

New York
CNN
—
The social media platform formerly known as Twitter is worth almost 80% less than two years ago when Elon Musk bought it, according to estimates from investment giant Fidelity.

Yeah, a real success story.

He will just sell all of this US classified and personal data to the Russians and Chinese and recoup his losses.

[Anonymous]

Twitter is now a cesspool of porn and antisemitic tropes. He's barely breaking even. Elmo was not elected to any position and lacks oversight. This is impeachable conduct by Trump for letting this happen.

[Anonymous]

Elon Musk is a South African who hates black people. How many has he hired? None that I know of. The federal govt is a major employer of African Americans and he wants to fire them all. What a slime bag.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We had a $1.83 trillion budget deficit last year. Unsustainable. Musk thinks he can cut a trillion in spending. Good, let’s see what he comes up with. His experience at Twitter showed him that three quarters of the people employed there were useless at best.

According to an internal email sent by Elon Musk to employees, X is 'barely breaking even,' citing stagnant user growth and underwhelming revenue. Musk purchased Twitter for $44 billion in October 2022, a deal financed in part by $13 billion in debt.Jan 27, 2025

New York
CNN
—
The social media platform formerly known as Twitter is worth almost 80% less than two years ago when Elon Musk bought it, according to estimates from investment giant Fidelity.

Yeah, a real success story.

He will just sell all of this US classified and personal data to the Russians and Chinese and recoup his losses.

China has all our information from TikTok. And when TikTok went dark for 24 hours, everyone downloaded a Chinese app on their phones. People don’t care about their data.

And SSNs are already out there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Elon Musk is a South African who hates black people. How many has he hired? None that I know of. The federal govt is a major employer of African Americans and he wants to fire them all. What a slime bag.

Musk is a U.S. citizen since 2002.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We had a $1.83 trillion budget deficit last year. Unsustainable. Musk thinks he can cut a trillion in spending. Good, let’s see what he comes up with. His experience at Twitter showed him that three quarters of the people employed there were useless at best.

And he cut Twitters value by over 75% in that same period of time. Is that what you want for our government?

I want you to capitulate and restate to me the fact that:

1) our national debt is $105K per person.
2) our national debt is $323K per tax payer.
3) we CANNOT continue on this course.
4) the solution for this problem is not constantly raising taxes and rates.
5) the federal government spends and wastes too much and that the time has come to tackle it with seriousness.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We had a $1.83 trillion budget deficit last year. Unsustainable. Musk thinks he can cut a trillion in spending. Good, let’s see what he comes up with. His experience at Twitter showed him that three quarters of the people employed there were useless at best.

And he cut Twitters value by over 75% in that same period of time. Is that what you want for our government?

I want you to capitulate and restate to me the fact that:

1) our national debt is $105K per person.
2) our national debt is $323K per tax payer.
3) we CANNOT continue on this course.
4) the solution for this problem is not constantly raising taxes and rates.
5) the federal government spends and wastes too much and that the time has come to tackle it with seriousness.

Too bad that isn't what this is going to do. Never picked up a history book, have you?

[Anonymous]

5) the federal government spends and wastes too much and that the time has come to tackle it with seriousness.

Agreed. Let's start by repealing the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.