I’ve noticed that irony too. For example, in 2024:

Donald Trump’s campaign has filed a Federal Election Commission (FEC) complaint against the UK’s Labour Party, accusing it of “blatant foreign interference” in the US election

And then, in 2026:

JD Vance backs Orbán’s re-election bid in Budapest visit

It’s funny that conservatives are all about “law and order” and then they’ll happily break the law (fleeing Brazil illegally) when it serves them

Trump on 13th June 2020:

We are ending the era of endless wars

Trump on 5th October 2024:

I will not send you to fight and die in a foolish, never-ending foreign war

That second link has other examples too.

Oppressive authoritarianism? But tankies told me that China is a place of unbridled liberty. A land of milk and honey. Unlike the evil West which is always horrible and terrible.

Him seeming like a “weirdo” makes more sense when you look at his background. He was influenced by the hippie culture of the 60s and 70s. He travelled to India when he was a young adult and he got into Buddhism. I think all of that stuff inspired him to try things which are unconventional in western countries.

As for what you mentioned about jumping to the front of a transplant queue, yes that’s obviously selfish and wrong, if he did indeed do that.

Rich people pump money into politics in order to amplify their personal whims. Then they wonder why self-described socialist politicians are becoming more popular.

Apparently he has citizenship of the USA and Canada as well as South Africa:

According to Isaacson’s biography and an Esquire magazine profile of Musk, he became a US citizen in 2002

I’m trying out Piefed. Lemmy looks like relatively good software, but I don’t like the political views of the developers behind Lemmy. Their whole shtick seems to be “non-western countries good, western countries bad”.

Of course, western countries have done many bad things. But I think plenty of non-western countries have also done bad things. I just don’t buy into a narrative which always tries to paint western countries as “the bad guys” and non-western countries as “the good guys”.

Fair points. I’m British not American, so I’m sure you know a lot more about Newsom than I do. I’ve seen a couple of interviews with him but that’s about it.

If 2028 is Newsom vs Vance and Newsom wins, I would hope that would improve the world. Maybe a Democrat who more boldly stands up for ordinary (non-wealthy) people would be better, but whether they’d get enough support from Middle America to win the presidency, I don’t know.

I think I read some time ago that Newsom’s argument is that a national billionaire tax would be better and more effective than a California billionaire tax.

But yeah maybe he should just support both: a California tax and a national tax.

It is pretty obscene that billionaires can spend nearly limitless money trying to defeat a proposal for them to pay just a little bit more in tax; a tax which could save the lives of the most disadvantaged people in society.

Newsom seems more sensible than Trump. Presumably if Newsom does win the presidency in 2028 then he would be more supportive of Ukraine, like Biden was.

That’s true, I should have thought about Canada and other allies of the West (Australia, New Zealand, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, maybe others).

I guess the US was the lynchpin that held “the West” together. Without good leadership from them, then I guess the world is as Mark Carney described: the US doing its own thing, and then a bunch of “middle powers”, who should act together, if they want better outcomes when dealing with the big powers.

Maybe Putin doesn’t need video of Trump. Maybe Trump’s admiration of dictators like Putin is all Putin needs to get Trump to do the Kremlin’s bidding.