I used to love Elon like everyone else. I still think that having four or five billionaires in a space race against each other is finally the world I thought I was going to get growing up reading Heinlein. The Tesla Model S was probably one of the most revolutionary cars of the last 50 years. But he lost me when he committed outright fraud in the Solar City – Tesla deal and since then have only become more skeptical about he and Tesla.
Elon Musk at the 2015 Tesla Motors annual meeting.
Photo by Steve Jurvetson via Wikimedia Commons.I sort of laugh when folks tell me that really smart successful rich people believe in Tesla. You mean like James Murdoch, on the board of Tesla and who also was lost his entire investment in Theranos? Or like Larry Ellison, an adviser and fan of Elizabeth Holmes who invested $1 billion in Tesla just 6 months ago and has already lost 40% of it? The window on this is probably closing, but over the last 10 years if you wanted to get Silicon Valley investors to throw a lot of money at you, find a traditional bricks and mortar business and devise a story in which you take that industry and convert its economics to that of the networked software world (see: Uber, WeWork, Tesla, and even Theranos in some of its strategic pivots).
Or how about true millennials and Elon Musk? Name a wealthy millennial supporter of Elon Musk and Tesla and I can bet you any amount of money they have not looked at Tesla’s balance sheet or cash flow or the details of its global demand trends. They have not thought about its dealership strategy or manufacturing strategy and the cash flow implications of these. They just like what Elon says. It sounds big and visionary. They buy into Elon’s formulation that he is saving the environment and everyone opposed to him is in a cabal with big oil (ignoring the fact that Elon routinely uses his Gulfstream VI to commute distances less than 60 miles). So saying that rich millenials adore Elon is effectively saying that they want to be associated with the same things Elon says he is for — the environment and space travel et al.
Elon Musk is Ferdinand DeLesseps. He is PT Barnum. He is Elizabeth Holmes. He is the pied piper. He is fabulous at spinning visions and making them sound science-y. But he is not Tony Stark. There is a phenomenon with Elon Musk that everyone thinks he is brilliant until they hear him speak about something about which they have domain knowledge, and then they realize he is full of sh*t. For example, no one who knows anything about transportation or physics or basic engineering has thought his Boring Company and Hyperloop make any sense at all. His ideas would have been great cover stories for Popular Mechanics in the 1970’s, wowing 13-year-old boys like me with pictures of mile-long cargo blimps and flying RV’s. He is like a Marvel movie that spouts science that is just believable-enough sounding that it moves the plot along but does not stand up to any scrutiny.
All of this would be harmless if he was not running a public company. I don’t really care about the rich folks who were duped by Elizabeth Holmes, but hundreds of thousands of small millenial investors who have totally bought into the Elon hype are literally putting their last dollar into Tesla, and sometimes borrowing more. Tesla shorts often laugh at these folks on Twitter, calling them “bagholders,” but it is a tragedy. Unless Tesla finds a sugar daddy sucker, and the odds of that are getting longer, I think it is going to end badly for many of these investors.
As a disclosure, I have been short Tesla via puts for a while now. It you really want to understand Elon, the best book I can recommend is The Path Between The Seas about the building of the Panama Canal. First, it is a great book you should read no matter what. And second, Ferdinand DeLesseps is the best analog I can find for Musk.
Warren Meyer, “People Who Express Opinions Outside of their Domain Seldom Have Really Looked into it Much”, Coyote Blog, 2019-05-28.
July 3, 2019
QotD: Elon Musk as a modern-day Ferdinand DeLesseps
July 2, 2019
Antifa strikes back against the White Patriarchy … by assaulting a gay, visible minority journalist
Andy Ngo suffered potentially serious injuries in an assault by Antifa “activists” during a Portland demonstration:
Andy Ngo, a photojournalist and editor at Quillette, landed in the emergency room after a mob of antifa activists attacked him on the streets of Portland during a Saturday afternoon demonstration.
The assailants wore black clothing and masks, and were engaged in a counter-protest against several right-wing groups, including the Proud Boys. Ngo is a well-known chronicler of antifa activity, and has criticized their illiberal tactics on Fox News. He attended the protest in this capacity — as a journalist, covering a notable public event.
According to Ngo, his attacker stole his camera equipment. But video footage recorded by another journalist, The Oregonian‘s Jim Ryan, clearly shows an antifa activist punching Ngo in the face. Others throw milkshakes at him:
First skirmish I’ve seen. Didn’t see how this started, but @MrAndyNgo got roughed up. pic.twitter.com/hDkfQchRhG
— Jim Ryan (@Jimryan015) June 29, 2019
Quillette posted their reaction to the attack:
All revolutionary movements seek to sanctify their lawless behaviour as a spontaneous eruption of righteous fury. In some cases, such as the Euromaidan movement in Ukraine, this conceit is justified. But usually their violence is a pre-meditated tactic to intimidate adversaries. Or as Bolshevik theorist Nikolai Bukharin put it, “In revolution, he will be victorious who cracks the other’s skull.”
The Antifa thugs who attacked Quillette editor and photojournalist Andy Ngo in Portland yesterday did not quite manage to crack his skull. But they did manage to induce a brain hemorrhage that required Ngo’s overnight hospitalization. (For those seeking to support Ngo financially as he recovers, there is a third-party fundraising campaign.) […]
Andy Ngo is an elfin, soft-spoken man. He also happens to be the gay son of Vietnamese immigrants — salient details, given Antifa’s absurd slogans about smashing the heteronormative white supremacist patriarchy. Like schoolboy characters out of Lord of the Flies, these cosplay revolutionaries stomp around, imagining themselves to be heroes stalking the great beast of fascism. But when the beast proves elusive, they gladly settle for beating up journalists, harassing the elderly or engaging in random physical destruction.
Antifa’s first prominent appearance was in 2017, when black-clad protestors at Berkeley used violence to shut down an appearance by provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos. This set a pattern whereby their rallies have been presented as counter-demonstrations aimed at “taking back the streets” from right-wing groups. But more and more, this conceit has dissolved into farce — as in Washington last year, when Antifa gangs showed up to protest largely non-existent conservative protestors. “Again and again, small groups of Antifa members harassed, threatened and occasionally jostled reporters,” the Washington Post reported. “The activists demanded not to be photographed as they marched down public streets — even as many of them hoisted their own phone cameras and staged their own photo ops.”
Update: I’m told that this is the lawyer who will be acting on Mr. Ngo’s behalf:
Goodnight everyone except Antifa criminals who I plan to sue into oblivion and then sow salt into their yoga studios and avocado toast stands until nothing grows there, not even the glimmer of a violent criminal conspiracy aided by the effete impotence of a cowed city government.
— Harmeet K. Dhillon (@pnjaban) July 1, 2019
The Rainmaker – Ualarai Stories – Australian Aboriginal Myth – Extra Mythology
Extra Credits
Published on 1 Jul 2019Join the Patreon community! http://bit.ly/EMPatreon
During a terrible drought, the people wondered why Wirreenun, the Rainmaker, was doing nothing, if he was the one who could bring the rains back. It turned out that he really needed to do an extremely complex elaborate ritual to make the people learn how to take care of themselves.
Rebecca Jensen on strategy, tactics and the need for a Canadian approach to “operational art”
Rebecca Jensen’s submission was selected as one of five winners of the 2018 Defence and Security Essay Competition:
Over 12 years, the Canadian military involvement in Afghanistan cost 162 lives, more than 10 times as many wounded, and $18 billion in direct costs. While the tactical capabilities of the Canadian Armed Forces were widely praised, it is unclear what benefit Canada or Afghanistan realized for this steep investment of blood and treasure.
“Operational art” is the term used in defence circles to describe the alignment of tactical accomplishments with strategic ends, since tactical victories alone, as coalition forces have learned in Afghanistan, do not ensure success. The development of a more rigorous approach to operational art in the CAF would help to shrink the gap between tactical accomplishments and strategic stagnation in future conflicts, particularly in coalition missions involving stabilization and development elements.
Operational art connects tactical activities to strategic objectives. Principle elements include the coordination of tactical efforts in space and time to achieve national goals, as well as the balancing of resources and risk. Fighting as part of a coalition, and in complex contingency operations that include elements of stability operations and conventional warfighting, makes the practice of operational art more difficult, as it increases the factors shaping inputs, the environment, and desired outcomes. In particular, it requires coalition members to account for, if not balance, coalition and national objectives, which may differ or even be at odds with each other.
The Canadian army adopted much US thinking about operational art in the 1980s. Confronted by a conflict in Afghanistan very different from that for which it had trained, the CAF reacted similarly, grafting American doctrine and perspectives onto the army’s existing thought and practices. Given the need for rapid adaptation in Afghanistan within an US-dominated coalition effort, this graft made had a pragmatic logic to it, but in the longer term, it is no substitute for the development of organic Canadian thought on the planning and conduct of war.
The publication of Land Operations [PDF] by Canada’s director of army doctrine in 2008 represented an important step in that direction. Crucially, it recognized the complexity of wars like Afghanistan, and the centrality of relationships with other services, nations, and agencies. However, the emphasis on particular end states, and the dualism implicit in the siloing of fires and influence operations, which take place on the physical and psychological planes respectively per the manual, is reductive and linear. When termination criteria include objectives as subjective and complex as a “stable and legitimate host government,” the military can more helpfully plan [PDF] for progress toward that state than be charged with achieving a particular result. While some military activities will be more concerned with influence than maneuver and vice versa, it is similarly unproductive to prompt the military to be aware of the physical and psychological planes. Not only are the moral and the material affected by any action, they are frequently irreducibly interconnected.
Hand tools for $100 #3: Fast plane restoration with BENCH GRINDER
Rex Krueger
Published on 14 Apr 2017More videos and exclusive content: http://www.patreon.com/rexkrueger
So, you bought a vintage hand-plane and now you need to get it working. You can spend several hours working away with sand-paper and rust-removers, or you can get all the hard work done fast with a standard, 6-inch bench grinder. In this video, I’ll show you how to use a coarse grinding wheel and a fine wire-wheel to de-rust, clean, and sharpen an old plane in under an hour. When we’re done, your plane will look and feel good and be ready to use.
On the other hand, if you don’t have a grinder, I recommend Mitch Peacock’s excellent hand-tool method. This is the first plane restoration video I ever saw and I used it to restore my first plane:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZtfS-…
I also highly recommend Paul Sellers method. He’s a no-nonsense craftsman and he gets the job done fast with common tools:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYyV6…
I do poke a little bit of fun at Wood By Wright, but he’s got a great channel and I highly recommend it:
QotD: Italy and the Nazi Final Solution
Surprisingly given the bad associations I have with the word “fascist”, Mussolini’s Italy may win third prize in the Righteous Among The Nations stakes. [Hannah] Arendt describes it [in Eichmann in Jerusalem] as “sabotaging” the Final Solution within its borders despite nominal alliance with Germany:
Colorized portrait of Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini in 1940.
Colorization by Roger Viollet via Wikimedia Commons.
The gentlemen of the Foreign Office could not do much about it, because they always met the same subtly veiled resistance, the same promises and the same failures to fulfill them. The sabotage was all the more infuriating as it was carried out openly, in an almost mocking manner. The promises were given by Mussolini himself or other high-ranking officials, and if the generals simply failed to fulfill them, Mussolini would make excuses for them on the ground of their “different intellectual formation”. Only occasionally would the Nazis be met with a flat refusal, as when General Roatta declared that it was “incompatible with the honor of the Italian Army” to deliver the Jews from Italian-occupied territory in Yugoslavia to the appropriate German authorities.
An element of farce had never been lacking even in Italy’s most serious efforts to adjust to its powerful friend and ally. When Mussolini, under German pressure, introduced anti-Jewish legislation in the late thirties he stipulated the usual exemptions – war veterans, Jews with high decorations, and the like – but he added one more category, namely, former members of the Fascist Party, together with their parents and grandparents, their wives and children and grandchildren. I know of no statistics relating to this matter, but the result must have been that the great majority of Italian Jews were exempted. There can hardly have been a Jewish family without at least one member in the Fascist Party, for this happened at a time when Jews, like other Italians, had been flocking for almost twenty years into the Fascist movement, since positions in the Civil Service were open only to members. And the few Jews who had objected to Fascism on principle, Socialists and Communists chiefly, were no longer in the country. Even convinced Italian anti-Semites seemed unable to take the thing seriously, and Roberto Farinacci, head of the Italian anti-Semitic movement, had a Jewish secretary in his employ…
What in Denmark was the result of an authentically political sense, an inbred comprehension of the requirements and responsibilities of citizenship and independence – “for the Danes … the Jewish question was a political and not a humanitarian question” (Leni Yahil) – was in Italy the outcome of the almost automatic general humanity of an old and civilized people.
Scott Alexander, “Book review: Eichmann in Jerusalem”, Slate Star Codex, 2017-01-30.
July 1, 2019
Theodore Dalrymple on “the ancient rhetorical tricks of suppressio veri and suggestio falsi“
In the New English Review a recent Theodore Dalrymple post on “inventing European identity”:
I doubt whether there is anyone who has never resorted to the ancient rhetorical tricks of suppressio veri and suggestio falsi. Some do it knowingly, others unknowingly. The omission of relevant facts and the insinuation of falsehoods are dual and often inseparable techniques that are the stock-in-trade of most practising politicians. Arguments have often to be schematic and if in theory it is possible to tell no falsehoods, it is virtually impossible not to suppress, or at least omit, some truths if a discussion of complex matters is not to be interminable.
Nevertheless, universal resort to error, whether honest or not, is no defence for those who utilise it. This is particularly so of intellectuals, whose metier above all is, or ought to be, honest argumentation. I was therefore intrigued to read an open letter published in the Guardian newspaper by what were described as “30 top intellectuals.”
The letter began with a ringing suggestio falsi: “The idea of Europe is in peril.” What the authors meant was that the idea of the European Union is in danger. They implied, in effect, that Europe and the European Union were synonyms, which is clearly false. If a country ceases to be a member of the European Union, or has never been a part of it, it does not cease to be European, neither geographically nor culturally.
The opening salvo sets the tone for the rest. Any opposition to the ever-closer union that is the aim of the European Union is characterized as purely irrational, nostalgic and even fascistic. It cannot by definition be founded on any rational considerations whatever. It success would be, as the authors put it, the triumph of “a politics of disdain for intelligence and culture” — which is in effect to say that anybody who opposes the proposed ever-closer union is either a demagogue or uncouth and stupid. Thus the top intellectuals, including five winners of the Nobel Prize and many world-famous writers, appear to have learned nothing from the single most disastrous phrase used in any recent election, Mrs. Clinton’s infamous “basket of deplorables.” Who is more stupid than whom?
The top intellectuals say of opponents of the drive towards a large federal state something like, “Let’s reconnect with our ‘national soul!’ Let’s rediscover out ‘lost identity’!” They go on to say, “Never mind that abstractions such as ‘soul’ and ‘identity’ often exist only in the imagination of demagogues.”
I overlook the fact that any British politician, however fervent a supporter of Brexit would never use a term such as “the British soul” for justified fear of being laughed out of court, but notice only that a few lines further on the top intellectuals say “We count ourselves among the European patriots.”
History of England – A New Future – Extra History – #6
Extra Credits
Published on 29 Jun 2019The 116-year struggle helped define and unite the English. In France, the wars forced the kings to tackle the separatist forces, and France would become the undisputed arbiter of Europe.
Thanks again to David Crowther for writing AND narrating this series! https://thehistoryofengland.co.uk/pod…
Join us on Patreon! http://bit.ly/EHPatreon
A new Blackadder?
Colby Cosh retweeted a link to British Comedy Guide:
BBC promotional photo for Blackadder Goes Forth.
Photo via http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/content/images/2007/02/22/trench_1600_1600x1200.jpg
The stars of Blackadder have reportedly agreed to reunite for a new episode or series, after having met up in London to discuss the idea of bringing back the hit sitcom.
The Sun reports Rowan Atkinson, Tony Robinson, Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie agreed on a return, after meeting together at the Soho House members club in London.
A source told the newspaper: “They were all having a great laugh and they are all old friends. So they just said, ‘Yes, let’s do it’. It is being written now. Rowan has been saying he is extremely excited.”
The new series will reportedly be set in the modern day, with Blackadder as a university lecturer.
Speaking in a recent newspaper interview, co-writer Richard Curtis said: “The thing about Blackadder was, it was a young man’s show criticising older people, saying how stupid those in authority were. So I did once think, ‘If we ever did anything again, it should be Blackadder as a teacher in a university, about how much we hate young people’.”
Very Early Mars Pistol #4
Forgotten Weapons
Published on 17 Apr 2015Sold for $46,000.
Until the midle of the 20th century, the most powerful automatic pistol made was Sir Hugh Gabbett-Fairfax’s Mars pistol. With the .45 caliber version approaching the energy of a .45 Winchester Magnum, it was quite the accomplishment for a gun designed initially in 1898! Well, RIA has a very early example of the Mars – serial number 4 – coming up for sale. This gun (chambered for the .360 Mars cartridge) has a number of features that differ from the more “typical” Mars pistols (all 80 or so that were ultimately made). These include a very long barrel, a tangent-style rear sight, and a 3-lug bolt instead of the standard 4-lug type. A very cool pistol to have a look at!
QotD: Canada Day, if we have to…
It is Perfectly All Right that a country should be entirely unable, on the anniversary of its founding as a state, to think of a single reason to celebrate it. It is Perfectly All Right, likewise, that it should be so devoid of fellow-feeling amongst its citizens that its government does not dare mention the reason for the generic celebrations it has ordered up, for fear of alienating one section of the population or another.
The reasons for this bouncy nihilism vary: either because nationalism is icky, or because Canada’s lack of nationalism is in fact a kind of inverted nationalism, a way of distinguishing ourselves from other nations. Anomie is part of our unique cultural identity. Yadda yadda yadda never had a civil war blah blah blah we’re a shy, diffident country yadda yadda something about the wilderness, and we’re done.
It’s interesting that this anti-nationalism, mostly on the left, should coincide with the rise of nationalism — mostly imported, in one of the many ironies of this debate — on the right. The ur-text among the latter is that interview Justin Trudeau gave the New York Times Magazine, in which he referred to Canada as the world’s “first post-national state,” inasmuch as it has no “core identity, no mainstream,” thus confirming populist suspicions of him as a treasonous stooge of globalist elites.
Andrew Coyne, “On Canada Day let us remind ourselves we have done well, even as we strive to do better”, National Post, 2017-07-01.
