Wow, where to begin?  

I guess we’ll first talk about Elon Musk and Tesla’s… uh… whatever that was last night. After hyping up (and delaying from August) their “We Robot” event, last nights “show” was simply a harsh look at the man behind the curtain and it turns out he’s not really a wizard at all and not even a nice old man from Kansas but a shameless immigrant huckster from South Africa who has bought himself a politician in a bromance that could take down democracy. 

Oh, and don’t blame me for this image – it was created by Grok – Musk’s own AI – the irony!  

The “We, Robot” event was supposed to be about Tesla becoming a Robot Company, which Elon used as an excuse back in April, when he needed a distraction as profits plunged 55%. He figured by August they would be able to fake a robot but it turns out robots are harder to fake than cars – so they delayed that event at the last minute BUT they were stuck with the title (stolen from Isaac Asimov’s “I, Robot” because he’s dead and Jewish – so why not?).    

And the robots he demonstrated walked out with a WALL of minders, not to keep them from murdering the children in the crowd but, apparently to keep them from falling because, despite the videos he quickly cut to – there was no evidence any of these robots could do any of the things he claimed. 

If you were able to get through the BS, notice the “dancing” robots don’t move their feet – FAKE. Cars creep down the street – so what? There was a robot bartender but it suspiciously only handed out gift bags, not drinks and a Cyber Bus discharged 20 people but I remember a Cyber Rig demo’d 10 years ago – still waiting for that to actually show up.  

Musk, America’s immigrant techno-messiah, once again proved that he’s the master of overpromising and underdelivering. What did we get? A “Cybercab” that looks like it was designed by a 12-year-old who just saw Blade Runner and is now doodling cars in his notebook. It’s got butterfly doors, folks! Nothing says “practical autonomous vehicle” like doors that are one strong gust of wind away from turning your ride into a very expensive kite.

The price tag for both the Robot and the Cab will be, supposedly “below $30,000.” Sure, Elon. This is coming from the man who promised us a $35,000 Model 3 and then immediately yanked it away from consumers. Musk’s pricing promises have about as much credibility as a EMail from a Nigerian Prince…

And don’t get me started on the autonomous driving claims. Musk is promising fully autonomous Model 3s and Model Ys in California and Texas by next year and THIS time it WON’T be like the last 10 “next years”, right? This whole dog and pony show was meant to distract us from the fact that Tesla still hasn’t delivered on its promise of a truly affordable electric vehicle. Remember the $25,000 car? Apparently, Elon doesn’t…  

Musk has once again proven that he’s the tech world’s equivalent of a street magician – lots of flash, lots of distraction, but when you look closely, it’s all just smoke and mirrors. Unfortunately, the only thing disappearing faster than his credibility is the money of the investors who keep falling for his tricks.

In fact, the only toy of Musk’s that seems to be working is Donald Trump – just wind him up and off he goes and Musk winds up his pet President by feeding Trump BS on X, which used to be Twitter which banned Trump – so Musk bought it and Trump is back with this kind of BS:  

Now, I want to congratulate America for only giving this 283,000 (1.6%) likes out of 16.9M views – good job! Amazingly, there are some people who don’t understand that “Face the Nation” and “60 Minutes” are two different shows that were taped at two different times (with two different ties – which is why the 2nd clip is in black and white) but that hasn’t stopped this from becoming a rapidly-growing right-wing conspiracy attack on the media and no, I’m not going to say anything bad about Donald Trump or compare these tactics to the ones the Nazis used as an excuse to destroy the free press in Germany…

I just want you to think about what kind of country you want to live in when choosing to give the next President the ABSOLUTE POWER the Supreme Court just decided he (or she) should have.  Joe Biden has that power right now and hasn’t been crushing his enemies – real or imagined – will Donald Trump have the same restraint?  

We report, you decide.  

Have a great weekend, 

• • Phil