Yes he really did say it, and with emphases just to be absolutely sure his advertisers got the message during the New York Times DealBook Summit interview …
Here is a transcript and context via a Reuters report …
The Tesla (TSLA.O) CEO bristled at the idea that he was antisemitic and said that advertisers who left X, formerly known as Twitter, should not think they could blackmail him.
“If somebody’s gonna try to blackmail me with advertising, blackmail me with money? Go fuck yourself,” he said.
“Go. Fuck. Yourself. Is that clear? I hope it is. Hey, Bob, if you’re in the audience,” he added, in an apparent reference to Robert Iger, chief executive of Walt Disney (DIS.N), which pulled ads on X. Iger spoke earlier at the event and said that Disney felt the association with X following Musk’s move “was not a positive one for us”. A spokesperson from Disney did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
“What I care about is the reality of goodness, not the perception of it. And what I see all over the place is people who care about looking good while doing evil. Fuck them,”
The slightly bigger picture here is that Elon had previously supported and boosted a tweet to his 165 million followers that falsely claimed all Jewish people were stoking hatred against white people. He had replied saying it was “the actual truth.”. That’s the tweet he used to firmly establish his antisemitic credentials, and so it motivated major advertisers to rapidly flee.
Within the same “Go F**k yourself” interview, he goes on to blame the advertisers for the potential failure of X …
“If the company fails because of advertiser boycott, it will fail because of an advertiser boycott. And that will be what bankrupt the company and that’s what everybody on earth will know,” he said. “Let the chips fall where they may.”
Er … no. The responsibility is totally and completely his, and his alone.
What Elon utterly fails to grasp is that Free Speech that he claims to be a fan of is also freedom to not speak, for example the decision to not tithe to his platform via advertising.
So how are the Elon fan boys now reacting?
Like this …
So wrap your head around this – they want to cancel Disney to force them to buy ads on X because Disney made the decision to cancel advertising on X because X refused to cancel people who were saying things that Disney felt their customers didn’t want said. All this is in the name of “free speech” and opposition to cancel culture. LOL
In other words, hypocrisy on steroids, and quite frankly both profoundly juvenile and also laughably stupid.
Meanwhile we have the bigger on-going X show. This is where Elon is giving a real-time demonstration of how to make a small fortune via the social media company he purchased. It appears his secret sauce is to start with a large fortune and then rapidly convert that into a smaller and smaller fortune with each passing day.
Moving on, below you will once again find my usual selection of some truly bizarre and extreme claims that have popped up during the last 7 days. Each is laced with my snarky commentary.
With my usual hat tip to my various sources, let’s once again dive into this very murky pool of absurdity and stupidity.
George Santos gets expelled
The tipping point was the report from the House Ethics Committee that revealed that he “sought to fraudulently exploit every aspect of his House candidacy for his own personal financial profit.” They also said it uncovered wrongdoing that went beyond activities covered by the 23 federal criminal charges he is facing, which include wire fraud, money laundering, and theft of public funds.
Yet, 112 Republicans still said … “nope, he is one of us, we want to keep him”, and that included all of the GOP leadership.
For the rest of us, it was indeed a happy Expulsion Day last Friday.
DeSantis vs Newson Debate (Blue state vs Red state)
A debate between the two happened this past week despite neither of them actually running for office (well OK, DeSantis still thinks he is, but honestly at this stage his campaign is dead, he has simply not admitted it yet)
Fox News might indeed claim DeSantis won, but back in reality, he did not do well at all …
Even on immigration DeSantis came off badly …
Serious observers wish to know, did they have to surgically extract Newsom’s foot from DeSantis’s ass?
Christian Nationalism
Christian nationalist North Dakota state Rep. Brandon Prichard can’t … “imagine being a man and voting Democrat”: “Laughable!”
- Rep. Prichard is a 22 year old Pinocchio who really needs to grow the f**k up and become a real boy
- Meanwhile real men are capable of wanting basic human rights, respect for democracy, scientific-based policy, and ethical government, and so they don’t vote for Mr. 91 Felonies
- Side Note: Rep. Prichard has only been in office for 11 months. He was elected with just 4,910 votes. You get bigger numbers attending concerts or football games.
An Oklahoma elementary school let kids deliver Christian prayers over the intercom during morning announcements. After @FFRF warned them this was illegal, the school stopped. Predictably, State Superintendent (and Christian Nationalist) Ryan Walters claims this is bullying.
- Fascinating to observe that he thinks “Bullying” is when you are politely advised to not break the law.
- I can only wonder if he’d approve of some students planting an oak grove on school grounds and broadcasting druidic ceremonies over the school P.A.
- How about the Adhan (the Muslim call to prayer) five times a day over the school P.A. would he be OK with that?
Pennsylvania state Rep. Stephanie Borowicz claims that 65 percent “of all of the founding documents” came “from Jesus’ words and the Bible.”
- RWW commentary: She has no idea what she is talking about, but we assume this is some mangled reference to the 1984 study that Christian nationalists love to misrepresent and which we have repeatedly debunked.
- “And the day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter. – Letter to John Adams, April 11, 1823 ― Thomas Jefferson
There was also this …
- I’ve always retained the illusion that it was the voters that decided … but apparently there is only one vote and a god has it … or … perhaps he is claiming that the voters are in fact god.
- Given his various antics, we can of course speculate which specific god it is … Momus perhaps because he is the Greek god of satire and mockery.
Satan And Demons
Mario Murillo declares that “the Democrats have openly endorsed Satanism.”
- Because (according to him) … “The battle has moved into the supernatural” and so he encourages people to “preach against the evil of woke”, and he then pivots to his lord and savour, Trump, supposedly spreading the word to bring a moral message.
- Translation: “preach against the evil of woke” = “Fuck all that empathy and compassion, it’s my right to be an obnoxious intolerant bigot”
- It is perhaps traditional for anybody and everybody who does not embrace his imaginary friend as real to be deemed to be the incarnation of his imaginary enemy.
We have a deeply ironic second Mario Murillo item. This past week he also declares that “we need outrage: “We need the white hot rage of a people who will not go gentle into that dark night of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. Do not hesitate or surrender.”
- The pure beauty of this quote, “not go gentle into that dark night“, is that it is lifted from the title of the 1951 poem by Dylan Thomas. He was not only a well-known poet, but was also atheistic in the extreme, a lifelong opponent of all forms of religion, whether pagan or Christian.
- I not sure Pastor Murillo truly grasps whom he is being inspired by.
Andrew Torba asserts that the word “racism” is “designed to demonize someone’s rational and biological preferences.”
- Andrew Torba is the founder of Gab, which is basically a safe place for racists and nazis. It’s where people go when they have been tossed off every other social media platform.
- Racism is well documented and well defined. The actual scope and manifestation of it encompasses far more than his deeply flawed definition.
Lance Wallnau Says Those Who Oppose Trump Are Under Demonic Control
- Hey wait, Halloween was last month, he’s a bit late with this.
- Literally demonizing political opponents appears to now be a thing with these guys.
- There is also no missing the observational fact that his beloved Lord and Saviour is a vulgar, greedy, racist, who has had 5 kids with 3 wives, pays porn stars for Sex, gropes women, incites violent mobs, and is so unacquainted with truth that the concept is literally an undiscovered country … and those that dare to suggest he might not be the chosen one are “demonic” … yea right.
- Fact Check: Demons don’t actually exist, they are just a popular religious fantasy.
The Cult of Trump
AP Press Story: “Trump hints at expanded role for the military within the US. A legacy law gives him few guardrails”
- FFS AP, when the almost certain nominee of a major party is promising to DEPLOY THE MILITARY TO CRUSH POLITICAL DISSENT, the headline describing it ought to go further than the above “Trump hints at expanded role for the military within the US”
- There’s also this timidly-worded line: “While deploying the military regularly within the country’s borders would be a departure from tradition…” … eh yes, no kidding.
If he does win in 2024, even if AP refuses to sound the alarm, its not like nobody else warned us …
Christian “Love”
Christian hate-preacher Corbin Ressl says God didn’t forgive sinners. He murdered them. Then he clarifies that his own church shouldn’t do the same. “I know I always gotta put that little [asterisk] when I say that so some atheist idiot on the internet doesn’t twist my words.”
- No need to twist anything he says, just quoting him verbatim, in context, will be just fine.
Deeply Weird
Far-right pastor Jack Hibbs says America has “rejected God” and therefore become a “schizophrenic nation,” warning that Mexico will start launching missiles into California: “That’s the U.S.’s Gaza forming.”
- Apparently a nation where 81% believe in some variation of God is, according to this guy, “rejecting god”
- Why the f**k would Mexico be launching missiles into CA. Honestly, given the utter lunacy that prevails these days I suspect that they would be far more inclined to build a wall and pay for it in order to stop us ever escaping the asylum and going there.
- In that same rant, Pastor Higgs was also outraged about medical needle disposal containers in airport bathrooms … which quite frankly have been around for 30 years or more and are for those who need to inject due to medical conditions such as diabetics.
- He makes it rather clear that I’ve misunderstood the 2006 Idiocracy movie, I though it was SiFi comedy. Mr Hibbs is making a real-time compelling case that it was a documentary.
Ali Alexander says that he “sometimes forget I’m a genius ad maker”: “It’s like Thomas Jefferson inventing the rocking chair.”
- It was the swivel chair, not the rocking chair that Jefferson came up with … but hey, his point is that we tend to remember Jefferson for other greater things and forget about his swivel chair contribution.
- As an organiser of some rallies just prior to Jan 6 … yes we do indeed tend to forget Ali’s rallies due to the unfolding of some rather larger events that day.
- Reminder: This same “genius ad maker” has also previously claimed he can time travel … which is perhaps true in the sense that we all progress forwards at the velocity of 60 seconds every minute, but that’s not what he meant.
Kandiss Taylor doesn’t understand why she is being mocked for believing that there is a “propaganda” effort at work to put “globes everywhere”: “It’s true. Why are they pushing the globes?”
- “My mind is made up, the earth is flat. Don’t confuse me with the facts!” … is a stance that positively screams out for mockery
- It leads me to also wonder if the Christmas tree ornaments she uses are flat and not globes.
- She is not alone, there are also other flat earth believers all around the globe.
- It must be a global conspiracy (oh come now, don’t blame me, these quips write themselves)
David Lane warns that “America finds itself on the very same path” as Nazi Germany “unless the church finally will engage in confrontation with secularism.”
- {Rant mode on} …
- So … if we were indeed to draw such a comparison then let’s line up a few measures. Demonization and actual political oppression of a minority because they are different, for example the Jewish, Muslim, or LGBTQ community. The election into office of a facist who plans to deploy the military for his own political goals and calls his opponents vermin …. so who fits the bill, who exactly is it today that ticks all those boxes?
- Mr Lane’s “solution” is an increase in fanatical religious fundamentalism, his to be specific, and direct opposition to religious neutrality and tolerance … because of course, as we and the nations founders observed and learned from European history, whenever that happens it always works out so wonderfully well for all involved.
- I have honestly no idea if he is actually this stupid or if he is being maliciously manipulative because he wants to participate in a power grab by his strand of religion. Assuming utter stupidity would perhaps be the most charitable answer. Either way, what is clear is that it is deluded fanatics like Mr Lane who are working ever so hard to ensure that we will be … “tyrannized by a diabolical prince of darkness who consorted with diehard ultras, maniacs and assorted barbarians”. I would very much sincerely hope that the majority are better than that, and it is just a minority, but I just might be wrong.
- …{Rant mode back off}
QAnon conspiracy theorist Liz Crokin is elated that Elon Musk is now promoting the PizzaGate conspiracy theory: “He would not be putting a laser pointer on PizzaGate if PizzaGate wasn’t real.”
- Ah yes Pizzagate, the conspiracy that is supposedly taking place in the basement of a pizza place that doesn’t have a basement. How very symbolic.
- For the curious still catching up, the NYT sliced and diced it all years ago and very robustly debunked it. Elon’s attempt to use this as deflection from his antisemitic ways last week will only motivate even more users and advertisers on X to head for the exit. Well yes, we covered that in the opening above.
- Meanwhile, here is every QAnon conspiracy: All powerful Democrats have total control over the world and a secret society where they (and no Republicans) do the most horrible things for zero reason that no one can catch them doing…..but apparently these same Democrats still can’t win elections.
Emerald Robinson tells her fellow Americans to “stop embarrassing your ancestors”: “My fellow Americans: your ancestors started an armed revolt over a slight tax increase to their breakfast tea. Meanwhile, you hid in your house for three years over a virus that your own government subsidized and released on you.”
- “breakfast tea”! … but I though it was Earl Grey.
- It is truly astonishing how she manages to cram so much misinformation into several sentences, but hey ho, she has had lots of experience doing this as a Newsmax correspondent who has promoted numerous whacky conspiracy claims.
- As for “The Government” being to blame, remind me again who was president back in 2019/2020 when the pandemic happened?
- Meanwhile, the quantity of actual evidence that “The Government” subsidised and released it is exactly zero … but you already knew that, and she and her followers don’t care about the actual facts.
The False Profit$
MAGA Pastor Shane Vaughn seems to think that freedom of speech means that he could not be held accountable if he told his followers to “go and murder all non-believers” and then one of them actually did so.
- That is legally just not the case.
- Context: He is attempting to argue against gag orders for Trump
- Life Tip: Don’t take guidance on anything from people like Shane Vaughn who is a pastor at that time who has been convicted of fraud and spend years in jail.
MAGA pastor Leon Benjamin says that “a lot of doors are going to be opened up” for Christian nationalist candidates who want to run for office now that Johnson is Speaker: “It is prophetic, him being in that spot.”
- “prophetic” ???
- Bottom of the video clip are names. “Pastor” Leon Benjamin is presented as an “Apostle”. When this supposedly anointed Apostle stood for election to the House (the special one for Virgina’s 4th in Feb 2023), 75% of the voters went “Nope”. The point is that it’s not Johnson that gets to decide who takes a seat, the voters do… unless of course he would like to perhaps mull over the thought that it was “prophetic” that he lost.
Brain Drain
Family Values
The “Family Values” party totally fails to grasp that there are people who are willing to help family members without trying to profit from it …
Hypocrisy
Bridget Ziegler, the wife of Christian Ziegler GOP chair, who is reportedly Casey DeSantis’ best friend, co-founded ‘Moms for Liberty’, a viciously homophobic organization that continues to terrorize members of the LGBTQ community, especially LGBTQ children, turns out to swing both ways.
- To be clear this is not just a story about one guy and two ladies. It is also a story about a vigorously anti-gay Moms for Liberty founder also allegedly was having a gay relationship with the other women.
- So … Moms4Liberty is actually Moms 3 Liberties or perhaps @Liberty4MeButNotThee
- They also appear to have taken the Holy Trinity to an entirely new level
What does Biden think of Boebert?
Yes you could have correctly guessed, but you now have your answer and can see it yourself …
Meanwhile …
Imagine just how utterly stupid you need to be to toss your freedom away for Donald Trump …
- Dawn Munn guilty plea: https://justice.gov/usao-dc/case-multi-defendant/file/1505751/download
- Thomas Munn guilty plea: https://justice.gov/usao-dc/case-multi-defendant/file/1505766/download
… and like most MAGAS, they still don’t get it….sad.