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Comment by ben_w | Hacker News Reader

Given Musk is currently pissing off foreign governments, there is a real danger that one of those governments will just send in a nice looking person with some tea to have a quiet chat with him.

After which, he will look very tired, and suddenly stop being "turbulent", as per the meaning several judges have recently noted in Trump trials was once infamously said by a king of a priest.

Then I will be sad, because I would have liked to have gone to Mars.

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Like that time he was summoned to Israel and "convinced" to tow the line? He looked like a school kid being told off by the principle.

When was that?

late November 2023

I have thought the same thing. Musk can protect himself from the average nutjob but he is working very hard to make the kinds of enemies he will NOT be able to protect himself from.

Can you give an example?

I dislike Musk as much as the next person, but I can't think of any major state actors or criminal organizations he'd currently be antagonizing.

Don’t worry, once he is no longer under the protection of the US government he’ll probably be a dead man. They will get to him.

He’s pushed boundaries on the Ukraine war. Both the Russians and the Ukrainians would be willing and capable of assassination if it helped war goals but I think he just hasn’t quite crossed a line to either side where he’s better off dead.

Eg. Starlink connections in Ukraine are geofenced. Which would piss off both sides in various ways. Pisses off ukraine because they have legitimate targets outside the fence and pisses off russia because they have legitimate targets inside the fence. That’s walking a fine line.

> Starlink connections in Ukraine are geofenced

This was debunked. Starlink was never active in Crimea because Crimea was sanctioned by the US. He said if the US government asked him to activate it he would. They did not.

Read some history of the Gilded Age.

What happened to Rockefeller, Carnegie and JP Morgan? It wasn't the plebs and their jabbering (see muckrakers) that directly took them down, though that jabbering did help give an unusual dude from the NY aristocracy named Teddy(who couldn't stand the muckrakers) political cover to move against them.

Also worth reading about the 2 elections preceding Teddy's fascinating rise to power, where the oligarchy bought the Presidency.

That sounds extremely interesting. Do you have particular books you would recommend?

TR's autobiography is in the public domain, for one

Ok, so who brought down these three?

The Rockefellers and Morgans were brought down? It was a pretty soft landing for them, then.

The governments of Brazil, thanks to how Musk treated their judges and Musk blatantly favoured people who were being investigated for inciting violence and planning a coup: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blocking_of_Twitter_in_Brazil#...

of the UK, for calling for a government minister's arrest and for his "civil war" tweet: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5ydddy3qzgo and https://www.msn.com/en-us/politics/government/elon-musk-need... and https://www.newsweek.com/elon-musk-called-uk-ministers-not-a...

of Germany, as "Germany's lower house of parliament, the Bundestag, is investigating whether Musk's support for the AfD on the platform where he has 210 million followers could constitute an illegal party donation": https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/elon-musk-investigated-...

(also note that the party he's supporting, AfD, is getting investigated for being hostile to the constitution: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-69003733)

of Italy, where he has been warned by "Italian President Sergio Mattarella to stop interfering in the country’s affairs after a controversial tweet on his page asked for judges to be dismissed": https://www.euronews.com/next/2025/01/04/germany-accused-mus...

of Canada, because of what he's doing in so many other places: https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/musk-angus-trudeau-poilievr...

I've thought that too (you articulated it well). I mean, there are other uber rich in the world that, you know, are president of a different country — and might feel threatened by Musk's wealth.

I too would have liked to see Musk go to Mars.

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