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That what he has doesn't scale, and what he has is currently maintained by investors / borrowed cash. That Starship isn't "unimaginable giga-tech", it's necessary for the whole thing to not collapse (this certainly seems to be the impression Elon himself has).
I don't know man, I don't know how to have a conversation with someone so high on hype. Make a specific prediction within a reasonable time frame, as in the past, I'll be happy to put my name on the other side of it. That's the only way I found I can have a productive conversation on the topic.
High on hype? Come on, make an argument. My argument is bounded by the theory that the US Government will bail out SpaceX in the worst case because it's important to a generation of American military power, and that SpaceX will be extremely economically productive in the medium case because -- blah blah blah I'm repeating myself. Did you even read what I wrote? It was actually pretty measured.
Do you disagree that continuous satellite imagery and communications servers (already proven technologies) represent huge industries? Why does an email from five years ago give you the impression that Elon thinks it's all going to collapse? (And despite the real problems they are having, they are producing more Starship Raptor engines now than they were at the time of Elon's email.)
I've given you a get-out-of-flail-plea card by noting that Elon could bet the company on yet-unrealized tech that becomes vaporware. You could have just agreed with that. The point you raised instead is a prediction from Elon that SpaceX would go out of business if something that wouldn't happen, didn't happen. SpaceX still hasn't gone out of business. In fact, quite the opposite recently.
My bet is that SpaceX is undervalued and its stock will rise. Tell me where you think it will be in ~2 years.
The democrats are going to get back in office at some point, and they are almost certainly going to try to permanently remove Musk's access to anything resembling wealth or power when they do so. This creates an obvious avenue for generating a fiscal crisis for SpaceX correlated with an obvious obstacle for the sort of bailout you're suggesting. At a minimum, I would expect a "bailout" under such conditions to require the removal of Musk and all Musk loyalists from the company's leadership, and the installation of people deemed politically reliable. I would expect such a "bailout" to effectively destroy the company.
The route to stopping Musk for a Democratic president and majority is getting harder. Unlike Tesla where it’s possible they could lean on institutional shareholders to pressure him out (although they’d be very loathe to do so given it would tank the price), Musk has a supermajority of SpaceX voting rights. They could try to use the SEC to force him out of management, defense production acts to take control of operations etc but they would be stayed by a conservative fifth circuit judge, then blocked by SCOTUS, especially this SCOTUS. So they’d have to pack the court first, which requires abolishing the filibuster, which would make some on the center squeamish, etc etc. There’s also no real competition in a lot of places eg Starlink, NASA contracts are so long term they’re hard to change quickly. I assume they’d try to fund competitors, maybe offer generous tax breaks or state funding or exploratory contracts, but they couldn’t actually replace them, not quickly. They can investigate him for DOGE actions, securities law violations etc but I expect Trump will give him a blanket pardon for everything that he ever did in his entire life up until January 20th 2029 when he leaves office.
"harder" is not "impossible" or even "sufficiently hard to successfully deter the motivated", and it seems to me that the Democrats and Blue Tribe generally are at this point highly motivated.
Packing the court is likely to happen soon in any case.
Loss of actual capabilities is not a significant obstacle; the federal government is very comfortable wallowing in infrastructure and technology mediocrity for indefinite periods of time.
I would not be comfortable betting my freedom and well-being on Presidential Pardons being the norm that shall forever stand, but I'll grant that a pardon is likely and should offer at least some protection short-term.
What would be the obstacle to a federal wealth tax aimed exclusively at trillionaires?
And of course, straightforward murder is always an option.
I don't see how a court packing does not signal the beginning of the end of the US - much like if Pence would have tried to appoint Trump president during the electors issue.
The Dems would have to lock out the Reps from power for at least a generation or face a retaliatory court pack the second the Reps return to power - and then we repeat the cycle until we all get bored of the 51% beating the 49% with sticks.
Each side packing the court each time they get power - SCOTUS rulings become meaningless. We become increasingly banana republic like.
Maybe I am dooming too hard though at the prospect?
We have pretty clearly initiated the beginning of the end of the US some years ago, arguably with the election of Trump in 2016.
Obviously, and this is pretty clearly the plan, at least arguably on both sides. Blues and Reds do not share sufficient compatibility of values to make cooperation possible, so the only remaining options are separation or war. Legacy social institutions obstruct these natural solutions, and so we observe the culture war blastwave striking, bending, and blowing out those institutions in sequence as it propagates through society. SCOTUS won't be able to hold it back any more than Free Speech Principles or Liberalism or the Courts or Academia was; things made by humans can be unmade by other humans.
There have been worse presidents than Trump, by and large our institutions have held against his efforts to get around them. He'll be gone in a little over two and a half years. No successor to him has been really able to gain any kind of traction to his cult of personality. The US is able to handle the bumpy road of a bad presidency, SCOTUS court packing is a different animal as there is no foreseeable end it to.
If it was the plan on the right, they'd court pack now, but they haven't - they won't even kill the filibuster for the SAVE act. I'd suggest both sides want to win, but that is different than locking the other out of power through court packing, killing the filibuster, adding US states, etc.
We have been in worse culture war situations than now. Cooler heads must prevail.
When you begin packing the court, the constitution becomes useless - as it only matters what SCOTUS says it does. Fundamental rights could oscillate as quickly as every four years, that is not an environment for a stable society. The last time court packing happened was right after the civil war - I'd suggest that is where it should stay.
Is the current GOP really any more a "Cult" than the Democrats are at this stage?
While I would not underestimate the GOP's penchant for snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, they appear to have a clear path forwards. Assuming that the political apparatus that Rubio and Co. have spent the last decade and a half building will simply evaporate the moment Trump exits stage right seems presumptuous.
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