@DetroitDan @t0nyyates Gentle with people, tough on ideas is an ideal I generally endorse with respect to public discourse. But there are public figures who exercise influence not by virtue of mere persuasion, but via the exercise of economic or political power. Elon Musk doesn’t offer meaningful arguments in order to persuade. He purchases a public square in order to influence. 1/

@DetroitDan @t0nyyates As a human being, I wish Musk well, as I wish all human beings. But in his capacity as an exerciser of economic and political power, I do not wish him well. I wish him stripped of his extraordinary influence. All billionaires are policy failures, in part because their extraordinary economic power translates to influence that subverts democratic deliberation. Musk is an ostentatious and unapologetic exemplar of that. /fin