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Elon is Still in; Vivek is Out
I hate to say I told you so (actually, I kind of enjoy saying that), but two brilliant, large ego and successful men have discovered that sharing the top job is not so easy. Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy are both men accustomed to being fully in charge and have earned the right to be called the “top dog.”
So what are the rumors? Essentially, Ramaswamy apparently shot himself in the foot—twice. One mistake was his support of the H-1B program. Although both Ramaswamy and Musk supported the program, they had distinctly different ways to describe their perceptions:
Department of Government Efficiency co-chairs Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy have come out in support of the program. Ramaswamy has argued that the US does ‘not produce the best engineers,’ while Musk claimed there is ‘a permanent shortage of excellent engineering talent’ in America.
Somehow, I think some educators and engineers might have taken Ramaswamy’s comment personally. And plenty of people were criticizing the program, rightly or not.
Ramaswamy’s second error was taking a shot at American workers and corporations:
In late December, Ramaswamy criticized American culture, saying that tech companies hire foreign workers in part because of a mindset in the country that has ‘venerated mediocrity over excellence.’
This comment basically attacked the country. When you’re about to upend the federal bureaucracy, insulting the employees and citizens is probably not the best tack.
To complicate things (or maybe to simplify the decision about Ramaswamy and DOGE), Ramaswamy lost out on the appointment for the senate position that JD Vance had vacated. Governor Mike DeWine had already chosen Lt. Gov. Jon Husted for that position; Ramaswamy settled for running for governor, along with two other candidates.
Although Trump transition spokesperson Anna Kelly praised Ramaswamy for the work he had done in creating DOGE, she stated that his plan to run for governor “requires him to remain outside of DOGE based on the structure that we announced today.” She didn’t elaborate.
Other people made observations that Ramaswamy hadn’t been actively working with DOGE since December. And he’d experienced some tensions with Musk and some of Musk’s staff; much of this information comes from anonymous sources.
Still, I favor the practical assessment that you can’t have two kings ruling the realm. DOGE is going to encounter enough resistance without having to negotiate conflicts with its two leaders.
I wish Ramaswamy well in his run for the Ohio governor. And wish Musk the best on his own.
Published in Culture
I said the same thing (though in person, not around here). I’d hoped that they could figure out a way to divide the DOGE into two semi-autonomous divisions or something so as to avoid the issue, but it was obvious that they would never be able to co-lead. That never works out.
I’m sad about it myself. They think and create in different ways, and would have provided a balance to the positions they took.
I haven’t followed either Musk or Vivek closely, but I do seem to recall Musk being quite insulting on the H-1B. The story linked in the OP doesn’t seem to mention it, but there’s a tweet from Musk, apparently from late December, that says:
The full profanity appeared in the tweet, which you can read <a href="https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1872860577057448306?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1872860577057448306%7Ctwgr%5E9664d9b9d2651471c612a73b012e2c615c66cc76%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.livemint.com%2Fnews%2Fus-news%2Felon-musks-blunt-[REDACTED]-yourself-response-for-trump-supporter-amid-h-1b-visa-debate-the-reason-i-m-in-america-is-11735397996879.html”>here. The ALL CAPS was in the original.
This seems inconsistent with the explanation offered in the OP for the different treatment of Musk and Vivek.
Sorry that the last comment turned out so weird. I just tried to link the tweet. I presume that it’s Ricochet’s system for dealing with links that contain foul language.
Ohio already has a tradition of good governance and a strong Republican Party. Vivek should target a Blue State for his next run.
I think you’re missing the point; not surprising, when we have to get past his profanity. But I think he has an underlying belief that he and other valuable people might not be in America without the program. I guess you could say he felt pretty strongly about it, but could have been more tactful. But that’s Elon.
That’s an interesting point, Kent. I guess Ohio was home for his family, and he probably feels he has a lot of credibility there.
Agree, but here’s the thing: Vivek hasn’t been attacked with near the ire that Elon has been. This could have been an opportune partnership where they found different threads to weave a DOGE message through. I’m being vague, but it’s like that: they’d both have different opportunities at different times to sell cuts/mergers/etc. to the public.
Both of them had awkward moments in interviews, etc.. I would still like to see them both on this overall team that is the Cabinet.
Are you suggesting that they could be part of Trump’s Cabinet, Chris? Remember, Musk sees his assignment as temporary, and he has other companies to run! Not sure if Vivek would be interested or not. Where would you want to see him placed?
Providing links to external sites:
That way, you don’t have to worry about The Bad Word Redactor rubbishing your link if it finds words in bad taste embedded therein. That and the link doesn’t take up 9+ lines of text on the screen and make the comment itself hard to read.
I really don’t care who represents the group that is tasked with exposing government waste and excess, other than to want someone who is hard to ignore.
I expect the process of taking on the institutions to be messy and full of drama. But I certainly enjoy progressivism being on the defensive now. I think it’s the first time in my lifetime that this is the case.
Some people say the next conflict is Trump vs Musk, and that one of those egos will have to go. We’ll see.
I hope Vivek succeeds in his goal of the Ohio governorship. His take on H1Bs was more problematic than Elon, who despite his rambunctious entry into the discussion on the issue not only heard the equally rambunctious responses from American engineers, but was well on his way to a compromise position that would make the H1B program better for all involved.*
* Well, not for all involved. The poop-heel companies who abuse the program to bring in STEM workers who will remain indentured to them until the workers obtain green cards will be hosed, but nobody likes them anyway
So far, Musk seems to know his job. He may try to persuade Trump if they disagree, but he’ll hopefully remember who’s boss.
The real trick is that most of those links aren’t even necessary: typically, most of them consists of stuff for tracking your activity, what ads to show you… the actual link isn’t that long.
The “some people” I had in mind was Vlad Vexler, who is not exactly a Trump fan. It was something he said several weeks ago. He think it will happen in some dispute where Trump is right and Elon is wrong, and Elon won’t get it because of his autism, or something like that, and that will blow up the relationship. I’m far from confident of his analysis of Elon, but I thought it was interesting.
That is interesting. I think the bigger issue will be if Elon remembers his place. I think when he experiments with SpaceX, he knows a decision is on him. If he goofs, he corrects. With Trump, he knows a decision will also be on Trump and won’t be as easy to walk back. That’s just the sense I have of him, having read Isaacson’s biography of Musk.
It’s more of a visual thing, Susan. Vivek and Elon were seated with members of the Cabinet during the Inaugural Ceremony. I thought they added much to that picture of competence.
Got it. They fit right in.
Yes, and added to a sense of confidence, comfort, and resolve. I kept thinking, “Look at that team, that’s a great looking Cabinet,” and I did not mean their appearance.
Oh, yeah, but I wasn’t going to describe editing down the link in a comment. It’s easier to navigate directly to the tweet in question, but even that would be too complicated. My way was only four steps, and the steps are short and simple.
I have no idea how well Vivek will do in his run for governor. When I have heard him in one-to-one interviews, he seemed like a smart, rational, decent guy. But seeing him on the presidential campaign trail and in debates made me hate him. He was such an aggressively belligerent jackass, I wouldn’t want to be in the same room with him. So, who is the real Vivek Ramaswamy? A decent guy who pretended to be an [expletive], hoping that he could portray himself as a younger version of Donald Trump? Or an intelligent [expletive] who can speak civilly when the situation requires it?
You ask excellent questions, Randy, and I have no idea. I hope he figures it out, because I think he’d be good for Ohio.
What are the chances both of these guys make it through Trump’s term without him turning on them/them turning on him?
I hope we’re not hearing about what an idiot Elon is in a year or so.
Hope it works for all. I like the optimism.
I’m not pleased. Vivek is still very bright and right on a lot of things, and him being out worries me.
DOGE needs to succeed. It’s the only thing that sets this administration apart from practically any “mostly right wing” administration.
You could be right, but that isn’t how this feels, at least to me.
For the first time in more than half a century, this feels to me like a real cultural shift to the right. I’ve been waiting for decades for people to wake up, and it does feel like that is beginning.
DOGE is nice, but not the biggest part of what is happening, in my opinion.
Yeah, that struck me as wrong also. Not least because DOGE might be the least likely to actually succeed, because it depends on so much else.
I don’t see why DOGE really needs either Musk or Ramaswamy. What DOGE needs are good accountants, bean counters, and efficiency experts. I don’t know that either Musk or Ramalamadingdong are good at those things. What they seemingly have to offer is celebrity and money. I don’t know how this thing will work, but I can’t see Musk and Vivek each scouring hundreds of thousands of government financial documents on their own time and writing lists of thousands of more pages outlining the waste and inefficiencies. I presume they will have to hire hundreds of people to examine the enormous mountain of governmental bureaucracy the way Congressmen and Senators have staff to read through all the legalese and summarize it for them. Those would be the people doing the real work, while all Musk Ox and Vivisection can do is guide and advise and make the final recommendations.
Does this sound like a reasonable assessment or am I missing something?
I think the great value of DOGE is likely to be in publicizing the scope of government waste, and shining a light on many of the things the government does but should not do.
And that, that publicizing, is greatly facilitated if the program is led by someone who can reach people without the cooperation of mainstream media. There are few who do that as well as Musk, and I think that’s his great value here.
I would have assumed that it would be the other way – that it would have been Elon that got bored with the politics and went back to SpaceX or Tesla shortly after the election or inauguration. Not Vivek. (I hear thats not quite what happened)
David Stockman has some thoughts on cutting government spending.