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| Elon Musk |
Take a bow, Elon. Donald Trump is a guy who normally doesn’t like to share the spotlight.
That’s what makes the effusive praise that Trump heaped on Elon Musk during his victory speech so unusual. It sounded as if Trump christened Musk as his “shadow president.”
“We have a new star,” said Trump of Musk, whom he called “an amazing guy” and “super genius.”
Trump spoke glowingly about the October launch pad landing of the SpaceX’s Super-Heavy Starship, which was an unprecedented feat of engineering.
“It was a beautiful thing to see," said Trump. “Only Elon can do that.”
He praised Musk for providing Starlink communications access to North Carolina in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene. "It saved a lot of lives. He saved a lot of lives,” said Trump.
Elon’s reward is to serve as Trump’s chief cost-cutter. He claims he can reduce $2T in government spending by slashing jobs, paring services, and trashing regulations.
Musk admits his plan will cause hardship for many people, and tank the markets. But the world’s richest man says the payoff will come in two years as a stronger economy emerges from the rubble. That's good enough for The Don.
Trump will set his cost-cutter loose, shielding him from criticism tied to the blatant conflict Musk has as head of government-regulated Tesla and SpaceX.
As Trump said in his victory speech: “We have to protect our geniuses, we don’t have that many of them.”
Talk about a news dump. In the old pre-Internet days, companies would wait until Friday afternoon to release bad news. Trump Media & Technology Group put a spin on that idea, issuing its Q3 financial report on Election Day.
In what CEO Devin Nunes called an “extraordinary quarter,” TMTG posted a scant $1M revenues and suffered a $19.2M operating loss. For the nine-month period, TMTG chalked up revenues of $2.6M and posted a whopping $363M deficit.
The company tossed out everything but the kitchen sink to explain its lousy financial results.
That includes the COVID-19 pandemic, Russian invasion of Ukraine, Israel-Hamas war, and actions taken to counter inflation. And don’t forget that advertisers either paused or slowed their campaigns due to supply chain constraints, labor shortages, inflation, and rising interest rates and reduced consumer confidence.
But Nunes claims revenues are largely irrelevant at this stage of TMTG’s development.
He says the company is creating the physical infrastructure and acquiring the technology to set the foundation for becoming a major driver of long-term earnings and shareholder value.
That sounds like hot air. TMTG is 57.6 percent-owned by Donald Trump, who is the core of its Truth Social platform.
If that association with the former and future president only results in $1M in quarterly revenues, TMTG’s future doesn’t look very bright.
Cheer up, Kamala. How can Kamala Harris rebound from her thumping by Donald Trump. She can move to Paris and run for the presidency of the European Union.
America’s Vice President is a smash hit on The Continent. According to a study by Europe Elects on how Europeans would have voted in the Harris and Trump contest, it’s no match.
Harris got more than 90 percent of the vote in Denmark, Finland and Sweden. Netherlands (87 percent), Norway (85 percent), Germany (85 percent), Ireland (84 percent), France (83 percent), Lithuania (83 percent), Austria (82 percent), and Spain (80 percent) rank next.
Trump stopped the carnage in Russia, where he scored 78 percent of the Russian vote.
Despite that popularity, Russian strongman Vladimir Putin has no immediate plans to congratulate Trump on his smashing victory.
“I am not aware of the president’s plans to congratulate Trump on his election,” Dmitry Peskov, Kremlin press secretary, told reporters according to state news agency Interfax.
Putin, though, may give Trump a call after Trump settles in at the White House. “We will see what happens in January,” said Peskov.
Savvy Putin will hold the kudos until Trump delivers by cutting military aid to Ukraine.
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