Trumped & Un-Musked In America

Badly behaved billionaires with armies of loyalists don’t always win. They can’t manage the toxicity they created

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The word maverick comes from 19th-century Texas rancher Samuel Maverick, who defied norms of that time and chose not to brand his cattle. The charitable explanation is he did not want to inflict pain on the animals. An alternate theory is that he was an opportunist who wanted to corral any unbranded cattle.

Going by what’s happening in America today, you may want to rule out the first premise when it comes to Donald Trump and Elon Musk, two billionaires who are incendiary mavericks and are dominating political and social discourse these days. Tender-hearted altruists they are not. Inflicting pain and a keen sense of opportunism is their stock in trade.

Similar personalities: Trump’s reputation as a hedonistic carpetbagger who demands absolute loyalty precedes his presidency. Sidelining moderate elements in the Grand Old Party, he has fashioned the MAGA brand of insurgent Trump Republicans who are credulous in their fealty.

Musk has been rather more reputable, but he is rapidly moving from being a matchless iconoclast with some notable success in his field of engineering, to a reckless egomaniac who believes he has the solutions to all the world’s problems. His train wreck treatment of Twitter involves engineering worker drones who give him 80+ hours a week of unquestioned allegiance.

They are 25 years apart in age, but share several common beliefs and traits. Politically, both were in the Democratic fold and even contributed to the Clintons before heading for the door – Musk more recently – evidently put off by “radical left” policies. Both are aggressive, abrasive, narcissists who demand total obedience. They also believe in crushing all opposition.