Why Musk backs President Trump

The richest man in the world, Mr. Elon Musk, now is also the most powerful individual in America after President Donald Trump. He heads the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a task force the president created to downsize the US federal bureaucracy. So, he is now doing his job of dismantling the huge administrative set-up through forcing his way, as hooligans do, into sensitive organs of the state with the President's blessing. For instance, his first operation was to take down the US Agency for International Development (USAID). So, his men went in a body to the USAID office, a 64-year old US aid mission with global reach created under the country's federal law. But one wonders why such raw show of strength was necessary to take over the humanitarian government agency. The job could well be done through an executive order of the president. Clearly, this is something new in a democratic system of government. However, under Donald Trump as president, everything is possible. And as individuals, both Trump and Musk have many similarities if eccentricity is the yardstick to measure a person's characteristics. But what does it mean for politics of power in America and in the rest of the world? True, oligarchs hold the real power in American society and, by default, in politics because they finance the election process. Elon Musk also spent quarter of a billion US dollar in Trump's election campaign to bring him back to the White House. Obviously, President Tump has rewarded Musk for his role in the presidential election. But who is Elon Musk apart from his being world's richest man?  He was first a Democrat voting for Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden. But later, he changed his mind and supported Trump as a Republican in the last election, though he was once seriously critical of Trump. That is why he describes himself as half-Democrat and half-Republican. But this is not all about his political leanings. His support for and influence over extreme right parties in Europe that he expressed through his posts on the social media speak volumes for his political ideology, as a member of the oligarchy that is quite understandable. For the politics of extreme right always banks on people's prejudices and fears of bogeymen. The rabble rousers, who are adept at playing on the public's prejudices such as the fear that the immigrants are taking their jobs or that the minority population is the source of all problems in society, usually land up in extremist politics, especially in the rightist camp. As they can easily divert the people's attention from the real issues like social exploitation, widening income gap, job cuts in the industries, falling real income, rising level of poverty etc., the oligarchy promotes their agenda for understandable reasons. So, it is hardly surprising that political right, its extreme variety to be exact, is fast gaining ground in the West. Donald Trump's politics is also based on the people's prejudices about foreigners and conservative values that resist social change. As the existing politics of country has no answer to rising social and disparities, increasing unemployment, high inflation, the disillusioned public is looking for an alternative leadership. Trump is that alternative despite his disruptive political agenda. The oligarchs who are behind the increasing social and economic disparities would naturally back politicians who can lull the public into a false sense of security. Small wonder that Musk has emerged as a key backer of Trump. The development is not limited to America alone. It is spreading globally backed by big moneyed people like Musk.

sfalim.ds@gmail.com