Donald Trump is the president-elect, but everyone knows the power behind the throne is Elon Musk. The richest man in the world, and one of the worst people on the planet, is clearly calling a lot of the shots right now.
He’s been appointed the co-head of the advisory body Department of Government Efficiency, or “DOGE,” along with Vivek Ramaswamy, but his grasp for power seemingly extends out far past that. Musk recently killed a bipartisan agreement to prevent a government shutdown by posting – not tweeting; tweeting no longer exists thanks to him – countless rejections of the bill, as well as outright misinformation about it. Support for the bill disappeared, Musk gloated, and people despaired at being ruled by an unelected multi-billionaire.
Stephen Colbert is meeting that despair with humor, the way he always does. He did a bit on The Late Show that was all about mocking Musk. “Makes sense that Musk would kill this [bill] at the last minute,” he said, “because he’s an expert of blowing things up on the launchpad.” He showed the audience footage of a SpaceX rocket exploding at Cape Canaveral in 2016. That’s just one incident— SpaceX rockets don’t always get off the ground. If only we could say the same for Musk’s political career.
“I’m sure the founders are spinning in their graves with joy at the way all of this is playing out,” Colbert went on. “After all, the Constitution does start with, ‘We the people do whatever rich boy tells us. Rich boy makes the big square truck car. LOL.’”
Elon Musk’s hideous big square truck car, aka the Cybertruck, has been subject to mockery since the moment it was announced. Other late-night hosts have pointed out what an unsafe, unusable disaster it is. Back in April, Cybertrucks were recalled over a malfunction with the accelerator panel: an embarrassment for Tesla, but it did nothing whatsoever to puncture Musk’s ego.
Colbert went on regarding the bill, “Trump didn’t weigh in for a few hours, but when he did, it was just to echo what Musk had already said, which is why now some folks are calling Elon Musk president.” And by folks, Colbert means a lot of folks. AI images of Donald Trump serving Elon Musk in the White House, or kneeling down before him, are all over the Musk-owned X right now.
“If [Musk]’s gonna be the guy running everything, I’m gonna have to work on my Elon Musk impression,” Colbert said, before jumping into the air in the same cringe-worthy way Musk did at a Trump rally back in October.
Everything Colbert said about the Tesla founder was funny, of course, but underneath it, there’s a deadly seriousness. Musk should not play such a large role in the US government. Nobody voted for him. The upside is that nothing would annoy Trump more than people calling his pal “President Musk.” Cracks were starting to show yesterday, even, when Trump gave a speech in Arizona and mentioned Musk. “No, he’s not going to be president, that I can tell you. And I’m safe, you know why? He can’t be [president]—he wasn’t born in this country.”
That “I’m safe,” says so much. Many are hoping neither Trump nor Musk ever again feel safe in their seats of power. They deserve nothing but mockery, from TV hosts and from everybody else.
Published: Dec 23, 2024 09:25 am