this post was submitted on 08 Sep 2023
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[–] downpunxx@kbin.social 154 points 1 year ago (10 children)

The US has spent at least 80 Billion dollars arming and supporting Ukraine in it's defense against Russian genocidal aggression and Western expansion that puts the entire NATO block in jepordy, why is Elon fucking Musk allowed to put his thumb on the scale in favor of the enemy? Why isn't anyone in the Biden administration tearing him a new asshole form stem to stern, why isn't anyone in the Biden administration publicly discussing nationalizing Starlink. We're literally throwing money into conflict (for absolutely necessary, vital, and justified reason) that one man is deciding the outcomes of, and the United States government is just ..... what .... ok with this?

[–] chemicalprophet@lemm.ee 41 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I'm just some dumbfuck but,..money?

[–] Poggervania@kbin.social 16 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Pretty much - Muskrat most likely privately funds (read: bribes) enough government officials to either stand by and do nothing or actively interfere.

This advisor should also consider the lack of response from the US itself as part of the problem - Muskrat is helping out an enemy, but uhhh… what the fuck did the government do to curb that shit from happening in the first place?

[–] Slwh47696@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago

Friendly reminder to everyone that all politicians are corrupt pieces of shit that will sell you out in a heartbeat. I don't know what the solution is but anyone who isn't rich is getting absolutely fucked by our own governments.

[–] JokeDeity@lemm.ee 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Money from the guy who moves his companies to dodge taxes?

[–] demlet@lemmy.world 12 points 1 year ago

Oh, ha ha, not tax money, bribes to the right politicians, silly...

[–] spaghettiwestern@sh.itjust.works 32 points 1 year ago (1 children)

One thing that seems to be the case with Biden's administration - there's a lot going on behinds the scenes that we're not aware of.

You're right, there should be some life changing repercussions for Musk. Hopefully we'll find out those are in the works.

[–] AlwaysNowNeverNotMe@kbin.social 26 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That would require holding a billionaire accountable in some way though?

[–] pennomi@lemmy.world 19 points 1 year ago

If we’ve learned anything from the Trump indictments, it takes many years to build a watertight case against somebody with lots of legal resources.

Do we need to hold Musk accountable? Yes. But also we need to do it in a way that he can’t wriggle out of, and that means years of legal work first.

[–] AFKBRBChocolate@lemmy.world 18 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It's insane to me that the CEO of a private company can directly engage to change the outcome of a battle without the whole population completely losing their shit over it. This asshole turned off his product to intentionally prevent our ally from succeeding in a battle against our enemy. And his reason is that he was trying to prevent escalation. How the fuck is that his call to make?

[–] bennieandthez@lemmygrad.ml 4 points 1 year ago

concentrating wealth and power on individuals is literally the point of private property 😅

[–] mondo_brondo@lemmy.world 12 points 1 year ago

Yes. Because a lot of powerful people stand to make a shitload of money off this conflict. The longer it goes, the more weapons it requires. The more weapons it requires, the more money they make.

[–] butterflyattack@lemmy.world 8 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Isn't most of that $80 billion in the form of weaponry ordered from US manufacturers? Or maybe I've misunderstood. I thought much of the cash hasn't really left America.

But yeah, musk needs to be stopped. No one person should have so much power, it makes a joke of democracy.

[–] SpaceCowboy@lemmy.ca 8 points 1 year ago

Most of it is actually old equipment they're taking out of storage. Of course the US likes to have stuff like that around for various contingencies, one of which is the exact thing it's being used for now. So new equipment will be bought for the US military and existing equipment will be placed into a storage a little sooner than usual.

But a big chunk of that price tag is ordinance, and yeah that needs to be re-ordered right away.

But at any rate, yeah nearly all of it is from US manufacturers, though there may be a few parts and things from allies like Canada.

[–] bennieandthez@lemmygrad.ml 2 points 1 year ago

Spoiler: they dont want the war to end.

[–] fishos@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

Why with all those billions are we relying on a private company for military communications? I'm not excusing Musk AT ALL, but communications are insanely important in a conflict. Why are these governments spending all of this money and not just doing it themselves? If the military ordered supplies from Walmart and Walmart didn't deliver them, wouldn't we be asking the government instead "why the hell did you do that?"

[–] Crozekiel@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I don't feel like nationalizing Starlink for the USA is best for everyone. It is a world-wide network, I feel like it would be better as something that isn't controlled by any single country (but, obviously I agree it should not be controlled by a single billionaire fuck-boy either...).

[–] Grellan@lemm.ee 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Go check out who runs GPS. Starling being nationalized isn't happening, but if it did the service would likely keep on keeping on.

[–] Crozekiel@kbin.social 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

GPS is quite a bit different. The satellites just orbit and send the same information out. The user device doesn't have to send anything back - the "communication" is only 1-way. Also, GPS is significantly further out from the planet and involves a lot less satellites, so it is not really feasible to turn them off specifically targeting a small area or an individual target - you'd have to black out a huge chunk of the planet to reliably block "an enemy" from using it.