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Trump+Musk; the DOGE and Pony show continues -Trump thread #140

1000 replies

Spandauer · 18/03/2025 17:41

Trump, as out of control as a faulty Tesla, takes an ICE pick to the Constitution.

Thanks to @AcrossthePond55 and @Jaichangecentfoisdenom for the thread title and sub-title 😊

Photocollage: Cold War Steve
Map illustration: Barry Blitt

Previous thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/5286872-the-orange-man-and-the-state-of-his-union-trump-thread-139

Trump+Musk; the DOGE and Pony show continues -Trump thread #140
Trump+Musk; the DOGE and Pony show continues -Trump thread #140
OP posts:
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150
AcrossthePond55 · 29/03/2025 14:49

Spandauer · 28/03/2025 23:04

Elon Musk stepping down from DOGE in May. Here's what he said.
https://www.app.com/story/news/nation/2025/03/28/donald-trump-elon-musk-leaving-doge-may-2025-report/82704950007/

TL; DR Musk underestimated how much all of this would ultimately be blamed on him (as it should be), how much everyone would hate him, and how tired shareholders would get of his shit.

So now he's trying to declare victory while slinking away
https://bsky.app/profile/aricohn.com/post/3llhtsbs5rk2l

He's saying this because his pretend status as a "special government employee" is limited by law to no more than 130 days in a year. 18 USC 202(a). That's why he refers to that oddly specific number. He's not actually going away.
bsky.app/profile/andycraig.bsky.social/post/3llhuc37jms2o

I'll believe it when I see it.

I think he's saying this to try and bamboozle people into leaving Tesla alone and try to get its stock to rebound. In May I predict that Scrotus will 'beg' him to stay and he'll reluctantly agree.

AcrossthePond55 · 29/03/2025 14:52

Spandauer · 28/03/2025 23:11

Elmo busy, busy, busy.

Elon Musk on Friday evening announced he has sold his social media company, X, to xAI, his artificial intelligence company. xAI will pay $45 billion for X, slightly more than Musk paid for it in 2022, but the new deal includes $12 billion of debt.
https://www.cnn.com/2025/03/28/business/elon-musk-sells-x-to-xai/index.html

Sooo, he sold it to himself then. I know that 'high finance' is beyond my ken, but I do understand that when someone sells a company they own to another company they own, they still own that company.

AcrossthePond55 · 29/03/2025 14:58

Ohhh, that's right!!! "Tesla Takedown" is today!!!!

Interested in this thread?

Then you might like threads about this subject:

PickAChew · 29/03/2025 14:58

Jaichangecentfoisdenom · 29/03/2025 14:11

Well, I presume that’s why he closed down the Department of Education, so children don’t have to be schooled any more and are available for work. Are there many chimneys needing sweeping in Florida? Huge work opportunities for primary aged children there.

Plenty of fruit to pick.

BustingBaoBun · 29/03/2025 15:04

AcrossthePond55 · 29/03/2025 14:58

Ohhh, that's right!!! "Tesla Takedown" is today!!!!

Yes! I've just got back from the nearest one to me! My placard went down a storm 😂

There was between 20-40 people there at any one time and what I found interesting was the amount of cars, lorries and buses that honked their horns. I would say 80% on the busy road in front of us. Even Tesla drivers honked! One tesla driver screamed obsenities and gave us the bird, but apart from that...

BustingBaoBun · 29/03/2025 15:05

Only drawback also is that my ugly mug has found it's way into the local paper with the picture they have taken 😂
There were quite a few Americans there, who have married English or moved over here for various reasons. They were interesting to talk to.

ForestAtTheSea · 29/03/2025 15:10

PickAChew · 29/03/2025 13:24

And that won't be half of it.

TechCrunch argued that all the "material" on X is great training material for AI.
Granted, there is a lot of useless stuff on X, but there are also people posting thoughtful contributions. They are now involuntary sources for AI and as xAI owns X, they own the texts and user data.
The original deal of social media was: your data vs our income through advertisements. Now they leveraged it a second time for free stuff.

ForestAtTheSea · 29/03/2025 15:16

Jaichangecentfoisdenom · 29/03/2025 14:11

Well, I presume that’s why he closed down the Department of Education, so children don’t have to be schooled any more and are available for work. Are there many chimneys needing sweeping in Florida? Huge work opportunities for primary aged children there.

https://edition.cnn.com/2025/03/25/business/florida-child-labor-laws/index.html

What I find particularly wrong is that they allow weekdays late and night shifts for teenagers who go to school. How is that compatible? Really horrible. Kids will be exhausted and not ready to learn, which further endangers education and their life options.

They could argue then that it permits reducing social security "because they can work". What is going on in their nightmare heads?

Also I thought AI and automation is taking over so many jobs, but somehow they haven't found enough ways to make difficult jobs easier.

Also some demands for workforce are from very capitalist concepts: that everything must be open 24/7, in case someone wants to buy ice-cream at 4am, the delivery platform jobs that exploit many people (I understand there are some jobs that are fine, but many companies earn a lot and pay very little)...

ForestAtTheSea · 29/03/2025 15:21

Update from the US Forces in Europe about the missing soldiers & tank:
https://www.europeafrica.army.mil/ArticleViewPressRelease/Article/4139109/press-release-recovery-operations-in-lithuania-march-29-update/

Many photos of the works here:
https://nitter.poast.org/USArmyEURAF

It is a wholly different tone; very cooperative and praising all the contributions (Poland sent a team, too). Maybe there are still reasonable people who are not as blinkered as their leaders.
I know of course press releases require a different tone, but even with thinking this is a PR exercise, the text sounds quite down to earth.

CaveMum · 29/03/2025 15:25

Spandauer · 28/03/2025 23:04

Elon Musk stepping down from DOGE in May. Here's what he said.
https://www.app.com/story/news/nation/2025/03/28/donald-trump-elon-musk-leaving-doge-may-2025-report/82704950007/

TL; DR Musk underestimated how much all of this would ultimately be blamed on him (as it should be), how much everyone would hate him, and how tired shareholders would get of his shit.

So now he's trying to declare victory while slinking away
https://bsky.app/profile/aricohn.com/post/3llhtsbs5rk2l

He's saying this because his pretend status as a "special government employee" is limited by law to no more than 130 days in a year. 18 USC 202(a). That's why he refers to that oddly specific number. He's not actually going away.
bsky.app/profile/andycraig.bsky.social/post/3llhuc37jms2o

We called it on a previous thread didn’t we - max 6 months before shutting down and declaring victory.

PerkingFaintly · 29/03/2025 15:31

ForestAtTheSea · 29/03/2025 15:10

TechCrunch argued that all the "material" on X is great training material for AI.
Granted, there is a lot of useless stuff on X, but there are also people posting thoughtful contributions. They are now involuntary sources for AI and as xAI owns X, they own the texts and user data.
The original deal of social media was: your data vs our income through advertisements. Now they leveraged it a second time for free stuff.

Yes. I wonder if there was an initial T&C that Twitter would not sell or share users' data with other companies? Or a potential copyright issue needing to be ironed out when transferring data?

Solves any such problem if one company simply buys the other and all of its data.

SerendipityJane · 29/03/2025 15:43

TechCrunch argued that all the "material" on X is great training material for AI.

Not sure where the "I" is coming from then ?

Personally, if I could go back in time, I'd press more for "AI" to be called "synthetic intelligence", because then could write SI instead of the "AI" needed to make it clear that "AI" contains 0% intelligence.

CaveMum · 29/03/2025 16:06

SerendipityJane · 29/03/2025 15:43

TechCrunch argued that all the "material" on X is great training material for AI.

Not sure where the "I" is coming from then ?

Personally, if I could go back in time, I'd press more for "AI" to be called "synthetic intelligence", because then could write SI instead of the "AI" needed to make it clear that "AI" contains 0% intelligence.

There was a quote in a previous episode of The Infinite Monkey Cage where a guest was asked to describe what “AI” is. She said - a bad choice of words in the 1950s!

SerendipityJane · 29/03/2025 16:10

Meanwhile another judge ripping Trump a new one. Her response to the clever attempt to use a warrant to deport people he doesn't like.

Trump+Musk; the DOGE and Pony show continues -Trump thread #140
ForestAtTheSea · 29/03/2025 17:00

SerendipityJane · 29/03/2025 15:43

TechCrunch argued that all the "material" on X is great training material for AI.

Not sure where the "I" is coming from then ?

Personally, if I could go back in time, I'd press more for "AI" to be called "synthetic intelligence", because then could write SI instead of the "AI" needed to make it clear that "AI" contains 0% intelligence.

Totally agree with the criticism; I think it is a very misleading term.
It's machine-regurgitated texts stolen from people's work, and only putting up the appearance that the answers are logical and thoughtful.
It is a terrible flaw that from some point on even the programmers do not know anymore how the solutions/answers were created.

I appreciate that there are useful applications such as in medicine, where they seem to better detect cancers from pattern recognition, but there are always people involved in the further diagnostics.
There are also good uses for services / answers when people go on a website that has all the information (!!!) - councils, administrations, service providers - but they don't want to look for it, just have a quick question. Instead of making the pages more user-friendly and easier to navigate, they put a bot on top of it.

So I am torn about that, on one hand some information is difficult to find when people aren't experienced enough or maybe they work in a second or third language. On the other hand I think more efforts should be made to "upgrade" the user / educate people instead of spoon-feeding everything. It is important that people know how to navigate information, media and know how to learn instead of relying on bots.

My comment above that robots and AI replace people was meant in that they should replace them where it really helps instead of the easy stuff. For example in manufacturing, robot arms & robots are very helpful in lifting heavy parts that need to be assembled. They are also good in making sure that each part is assembled in the correct order and nothing is forgotten.
There are also great efforts made for using them more in farming and harvesting, for difficult backbreaking manual work and large areas.
In such an area, they are helpful, but I don't agree we should outsource our thinking.

The article I referred to was here btw:
techcrunch.com/2025/03/29/elon-musk-says-xai-acquired-x/

AcrossthePond55 · 29/03/2025 17:02

BustingBaoBun · 29/03/2025 15:04

Yes! I've just got back from the nearest one to me! My placard went down a storm 😂

There was between 20-40 people there at any one time and what I found interesting was the amount of cars, lorries and buses that honked their horns. I would say 80% on the busy road in front of us. Even Tesla drivers honked! One tesla driver screamed obsenities and gave us the bird, but apart from that...

My small local Tesla dealer is wall to wall MAGA. Banners, flags, signs, the whole shebang. With Trump trucks driving back and forth 'on patrol'.

I didn't see any 'Takedown' protesters, but I'm not surprised. Discretion is the better part of valor.

And TBH I have a feeling the actual dealership is probably just as unhappy with MAGA there as with Takedown protesters. Either one is going to keep customers away. Which I expect is the point of the whole thing. So in a way MAGA is doing our job for us.

AcrossthePond55 · 29/03/2025 17:07

PS I did allow myself to roll down the window, give the one finger salute and shout "Fuck Trump, fuck Musk, and fuck all of you too" a few times.

Igotjelly · 29/03/2025 17:08

AcrossthePond55 · 29/03/2025 17:07

PS I did allow myself to roll down the window, give the one finger salute and shout "Fuck Trump, fuck Musk, and fuck all of you too" a few times.

That sounds very cathartic.

Wallaw · 29/03/2025 17:08

ForestAtTheSea · 29/03/2025 15:10

TechCrunch argued that all the "material" on X is great training material for AI.
Granted, there is a lot of useless stuff on X, but there are also people posting thoughtful contributions. They are now involuntary sources for AI and as xAI owns X, they own the texts and user data.
The original deal of social media was: your data vs our income through advertisements. Now they leveraged it a second time for free stuff.

I suspect you're right.

Along those lines, Kara Swisher has been theorising for a while that DOGE wants all that government data for the same reason. She thinks he's running out of training material and the government databases are the richest cache in existence.

SerendipityJane · 29/03/2025 17:09

All "AI" is, really, no matter how you dress it up, is very fast sophisticated pattern matching.

Now I accept it may eventually be discovered that natural intelligence is really "very fast sophisticated pattern matching.". However thus far there is no sign of that - which is why we can't define intelligence. (Feel free to try, but you'll only end up with a circular definition).

This is why all these poor news outlets are having (and will continue to have) hilarious snafus with "AI" generated content. Because the "AI" has no idea what bilge it is producing.

I could produce Urdu output with a dictionary, a book of rules and some text. It may even make some sense as a translation. However, exactly like our "AI" friends, I wouldn't understand a word of it.

Still it's your own money you are wasting.

Wallaw · 29/03/2025 17:09

PickAChew · 29/03/2025 14:58

Plenty of fruit to pick.

They're very useful to send out ahead to draw out alligators, allowing safe passage for the adults.

Wallaw · 29/03/2025 17:11

SerendipityJane · 29/03/2025 17:09

All "AI" is, really, no matter how you dress it up, is very fast sophisticated pattern matching.

Now I accept it may eventually be discovered that natural intelligence is really "very fast sophisticated pattern matching.". However thus far there is no sign of that - which is why we can't define intelligence. (Feel free to try, but you'll only end up with a circular definition).

This is why all these poor news outlets are having (and will continue to have) hilarious snafus with "AI" generated content. Because the "AI" has no idea what bilge it is producing.

I could produce Urdu output with a dictionary, a book of rules and some text. It may even make some sense as a translation. However, exactly like our "AI" friends, I wouldn't understand a word of it.

Still it's your own money you are wasting.

This is why all these poor news outlets are having (and will continue to have) hilarious snafus with "AI" generated content. Because the "AI" has no idea what bilge it is producing.

To be fair, the same could be said about almost the entire Republican Party

Wallaw · 29/03/2025 17:14

Did anyone else see this one?

I assume she was there as his minder. Time to put down the bottle, Pete. Don't sexually assault the nice lady, Pete. Check who you're messaging before you hit send, Pete. Think 'do I really want to alienate this ally' before you insult them, Pete...

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/mar/29/pete-hegseth-wife-jennifer-foreign-defense-official-meetings

Pete Hegseth’s wife reportedly attended meetings with foreign defense officials

Defense secretary, already under fire for chat group blunder, faces new scrutiny for having wife in high-level meetings

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/mar/29/pete-hegseth-wife-jennifer-foreign-defense-official-meetings

AcrossthePond55 · 29/03/2025 17:40

Re Special elections.

Right now the House numbers are Dem 213, Repug 218 with 4 vacancies.

There are 3 upcoming, 2 in FLA, one in AZ. The 4th is in Texas but the ultra-MAGA governor has not called an election yet. I assume that's because that district is a 'safe' Dem district fucking Abbot will want to delay and keep it 'open' as long as possible. I have no idea if he has to declare a special election or if he can just wait until the mid-terms.

Two elections slated for 1 Apr in FLA, both former GOP seats up for grabs. The election for AZ is 23 Sep, a Dem seat. I'm sure Abbot won't do a thing until after 1 Apr at the very earliest. If those seats go Dem that would make it 215 / 218. The GOP must be at least a little concerned about that happening which could contribute to Abbot's delay.

https://ballotpedia.org/Special_elections_to_the_119th_United_States_Congress_(2025-2026)

Special elections to the 119th United States Congress (2025-2026)

https://ballotpedia.org/Special_elections_to_the_119th_United_States_Congress_(2025-2026)

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