What we knew would happen, happened
Now what?
All of us are still reeling from today's news, the Real-Housewives-style, bejeweled slap-fest of two oversized, billionaire children fighting for top dog in the Mr. America Pageant, both seemingly unaware their reputations sit somewhere between "flotsam" and "jetsam" in the scum at the edges of reality TV - ahem - the "news."
So now what? We all predicted this from day one. You can't have two alphas (or so they would have you believe) in the same room working together. One has one foot in the grave, a coronary on the horizon. The other, a pretty substantial drug habit. And yet half the population is just fine with them running the country and shuffling through our financial records. But for the rest of us, this is sweet, sweet redemption.
Rick Wilson published an open letter to Elon Musk this afternoon, a video seen by over 140,000 people on Twitter, owned by Musk himself, and thousands more on Rick's Substack. I'll admit, I was ready for him to dig into the guy, because we really, really hate Elon Musk for everything he's done to our country, and almost more to our favorite platform, which he's turned into a one-sided, right-wing machine that algorithmically decapitates artists, writers, free-thinkers, and people who didn't vote for Donald Trump. But Rick was nice. Rick was honest. Rick was a little strategic, but not so much that it won't be tempting for Elon to at least think about his options.
"No one's immune, not even you. But Elon, in the spirit of goodwill, since you have now fully committed to the bit, fully jumped in on the side of being the richest guy in the world versus the most powerful guy in the world, I want to help you. I really do. I want to help you." - Rick Wilson, The Lincoln Project
Wow. I don't know if Rick is a better person than I, that I should feel guilty for the iciness in my heart that has settled into this overwhelmingly juicy, and dance-party-worthy afternoon, or if he's just that smart. He didn't pull punches. He called Elon’s views "morally reprehensible," told him he's too old to be on that many drugs, brought up the fact that he isn't really a father-figure to any of his children, and that he won’t be while he’s on the path he’s on--a "stern dad talk," Rick called it, "from a 61-year-old man to a 54-year-old man."
So let's look at some hypotheticals. We have a guy who is from a billionaire background that dabbles in racism and Nazi tendencies, not to mention apartheid. He fathers a new child a couple times a year, then pays the mother to stay quiet. He and a cohort of diapered brats have been elbow-deep in our tax returns for months, firing workers and turning federal buildings into frat houses. He used the front lawn of the White House as a Tesla showroom. He paid $300 million to bolster, nay buy, an election, and Democrats didn't dare contest the results for fear of looking like January 6ers. But didn't we all notice our Twitter followers shrink by almost half the day after the election, silent bots casually disappearing into the ether? Why were they were? What were they looking for? And why disappear all at once? The news called it a "mass exodus," but was it you? It wasn't me.
While he fired everyone from Washington, Elon signed billion-dollar government contracts with his company SpaceX. He called you waste, fraud, and abuse, whether that meant you were from somewhere, looked like something, lived in some way, or, well, were just a woman. And he encouraged swift and harsh punishments for businesses and institutions that didn't comply with the new anti-DEI rules. We saw newspapers cave. We saw universities cave. Hell, we saw Target cave, which, let's be honest, might have been the hardest one. And by weeding out all these "others" from places like the Environmental Protection Agency, and Department of Education, and the Department of Homeland Security, and even the Department of Veterans Affairs, he paved the way for private companies to fill the vacuum. As of April 29th, at least 121,000 workers had been fired or put on unpaid administrative leave. For the latter, they do not qualify for unemployment, nor can they be hired anywhere else, leaving them stuck.
"I received one paycheck - I received a paycheck for $16.85, and I since have been put on leave without pay. I had to apply for SNAP benefits." - Shernice Mundell, Office of Personnel Management, Air Force Veteran
So what do we do if and when Elon answers Rick's call? What if he flips and comes begging, offering everything we want? What if it isn't genuine, and he's really out to save his own ass, but yet in doing so we can overthrow this corrupt government we're dying to rid from the history books? What do we do? My heart says the bridge is burnt. But so burnt that I'd sit back and risk the richest man in the world donating another $300 million to the beast who's treating immigrants like thieves and cattle?
I don't know.
But I’m going to watch. And I'm going to listen. And you can sure as hell believe I will fight to get this place back to what it was.
In 24 hours this could all be a moot point. But please, Elon, whatever you decide, can you just hit “publish” on that file first?
Ellie is an author, editor, and owner of Red Pencil Transcripts, and works with filmmakers, podcasts, and journalists all over the world. She lives with her family just outside of New York City.