You may recall that the Wall Street Journal published an article about Marlo Elez, the 25-year-old whiz kid who made racist tweets, deleted them, then resigned after they went public. Elez is or was the senior member of the DOGE team that has been scooping up government records.
Musk conducted a poll on Twitter, asking whether the mildest member of his DOGE team should be rehired.
The original article is updated in the link.
On Friday morning, Musk posted a poll to X, asking his followers if DOGE should rehire the “staffer who made inappropriate statements via a now deleted pseudonym.” Within hours, it had amassed more than 200,000 votes, almost 80% in favor of bringing Elez back.
Musk is likely to rehire Marko.
Some of Marlo’s tweets were extremely prejudicial towards Indians, because they get great jobs in Silicon Valley.
I wonder what JD Vance’s wife thinks of Elez. She is of Indian heritage. She is a graduate of Yale Law School, like Vance. I wonder if she likes the racist crowd he runs with.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Twitter is basically a state media platform now. Considering deleting my account there. If only Bluesky were more interesting.
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Make it more interesting. It’s important to establish a viable replacement for Twitter among the general population.
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I love BlueSky!
Twitter is a swamp of Musk-o-votes and Nazis. Whatever I post will be attacked vehemently by Trumpers .
I leave Twitter feeling as if I need to wash my hands.
BlueSky makes me happy. Sane people. Compassionate people. Rational people.
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Might as well post on Fox Nation.
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I deleted my X account yesterday. I have been on Bluesky for a month and I find the platform intuitive and very easy to use.
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The tech is fine. It’s just a bit of an echo chamber. Not enough disagreements for my taste. But on the other hand, it’s less of a cesspool. And most important, it has no Musk.
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I think you have to have some kind of moral conscience for things to bother you. A scarce resource in that crowd
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(emphasis added)
That pretty much says everything you need to know about M’s group.
The T crowd probably grant Vance’s Indian wife an exception as “one of the good ones.” This sort of mentality will find a way to rationalize any lapse of consistency or logic in order to maintain their delusion.
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emphasis in above was removed in positing. it was “25-year-old” & “senior member.”
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Oh yeah… We really want this kid having access to private records when he didn’t even know merely deleting something from the Internet doesn’t actually get rid of it. I mean if they’re going to keep his 19 year old colleague, Big B*lls, I guess they may as well continue to strive for the highest levels of naive arrogance. Maybe see if they can even hire a woman who goes by “Big B**bs” while they’re at it. Oh, wait… I forgot, no DEI allowed.
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Musk Morality on full display: Right and Wrong are up for a vote.
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We should judge people by the content of their character instead of by how well they can write code.
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Retired: What a concept–character.
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Welcome to Twitocracy
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She doesn’t care because she is trying to fit in as a part of the dominant culture.
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The irony. This guy’s future and the future of our privacy now based on a “poll.” YET… No one elected Musk. No election, no confirmation hearing. Doubtful even a standard government background check.
Can we get a poll on Musk on BlueSky or Times/Warner or even a Fox with a sample representative of Americans? (Much to their chagrin, that sample will be, wait for it… diverse).
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Maybe Musk could poll Twitter to ask whether he should have all of Trump’s powers. I bet his followers would vote yes. Then he could ask Trump to retire while Musk takes over. Who would complain?
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There is actually no real evidence that this 25 year old is a “whiz kid” – my guess is there are many hundreds of other 25 year old engineering graduates who could do what he supposedly did. Maybe thousands. Maybe 25% of the 18 year old graduates of huge Brooklyn Tech High School or Stuyvestant could do what he does. All of us get unwittingly propagandized by the media’s own embrace of right wing truths. If Musk hires someone, he must have been chosen only because he was exceptional – superior to all other applicants.
The reason DEI got started is because rich white people like Musk hired reasonably qualified people who they “felt comfortable” hiring. Once they could no longer exclude women and Blacks from the group of qualified people who got hired, the far right propagandized people to believe that the opposite of DEI is “merit” when the opposite of DEI is hiring the people that make those in power feel most comfortable. Their qualifications are almost never “the best” except by standards invented by the people who hire them (like “look how good he works with people like me”)
This will no doubt come as a shock to those who bash DEI programs, but Jared Kushner didn’t get into Harvard because his academic merit surpassed the academic merit of every Black and Latino applicant who was rejected that year. The anti-DEI definition of “merit” is “how good are this person’s connections or how high is his willingness to follow orders of powerful people without any concern for ethical behavior?”
An excellent example of a company full of people hired according to the anti-DEI definition of “merit” is Enron. Being one of “the boys” (not literally) meant – by definition – they had the very highest merit. And thus they were willing to do whatever they were told, without any concern of whether it was legal or ethical.
There were surely people who worked at Enron who didn’t stay when they realized what was required. Or it’s possible Enron’s definition of “merit” was like Musk’s definition. An academically more qualified person who demonstrated integrity would clearly be deemed unworthy (less meritorious) to be hired in a job which requires absolutely willingness to do whatever someone very powerful told them to do regardless of whether it was legal, moral, or ethical.
Musk clearly has a definition of “merit”, which excludes every brilliant person who is unwilling to follow illegal, unethical, immoral orders. Lots of very smart people don’t meet Musk’s definition of “merit”, and lots of less accomplished people do. Given what we know, that “whiz kid” is more likely a “whiz” at doing what Musk orders without question, without any concern for what is right and wrong. Calling that “merit” is Orwellian.
This guy was surely hired based on Musk’s anti-DEI definition of “merit” – and this 25 year old probably has the same “merit” as the smartest guys in the room at Enron.
Every smart kid can be a “whiz” kid if they are only willing to do anything asked of them by the “very smart” right wing billionaires who hire them over far more qualified folks who lack those “special qualities” of merit that the Enron guys had. We all need to be aware that those “special qualities of merit” isn’t academic supperiority, but lack of integrity and a yearning for the approval of corrupt and very rich men.
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Musk’s poll “amassed more than 200,000 votes, almost 80% in favor of bringing Elez back.”
Well, that’s no wonder since he polled the choir that he owns and preaches to on a daily basis. X is not what it used to be as Twitter, so many people who are not morally bankrupt, have a conscience and abhor racism, sexism, xenophobes & anti-LGBTQ+etc. policies don’t use X anymore. That’s precisely because twitter is now like Fox News on steroids, now that the un-elected President Musk is now in charge of virtually everything here purely because of his extreme wealth & influence over the malignant narcissist.
The good news is that, for the same reasons, “Tesla Sales Are Down” in a number of markets! https://electrek.co/2025/02/06/tesla-sales-crash-in-another-market-and-this-time-it-cant-blame-model-y/
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I guess the big question is “Can twitter bots vote?” My guess is that their vote counts for quadruple! Welcome to the future of our Putinesque “democracy”. Where the “will of the people” = “the will of the many bots and others on twitter whose votes counts exactly as much as Musk wants it to count.”
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In Europe, Tesla car sales have been severely plummeting, according to Rachel Maddow today: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08aCHssMoo8
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And there’s MUCH more good news, including on push back by Americans who are furious about what’s been going on in DC and have been protesting, so be sure to watch that entire Rachel Maddow episode!
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or watch the first 44 minutes (since the end is something in an Asian language.)
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I doubt that Usha Vance cares. She got hers, and she’s as self-interested and repellent as her husband.
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In other news, the Philadelphia Inquirer’s website ran a poll yesterday and “voters” decided that the Eagles soundly defeated Kansas City in Superbowl LIX.
Superbowl LIX will be cancelled, since the winner has already been announced, but there will be entertainment and commercials for everyone instead! And on Monday afternoon, there will be a big victory celebration in front of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, hosted by Sylvester Stallone. President Trump will be in attendance to honor the victorious Eagles and give a special shout out to Elon Musk, who Trump said knows those vote counting computers better than anyone.
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My friends here might have noticed that I haven’t commented a lot lately. I have been extremely busy with personal matters and with a new Youtube series that I have been writing, filming, and editing. I am also finally seriously studying classical and koine Greek and trying to fight back aging with long walks and a lot of time in the gym. But I am also, like many others, simply overwhelmed. I’ve been reading a lot of ancient history lately. Trying to take the long view. Not sure my heart could handle response to the Outrage of the Day. We will come through this time. And, one hopes (and I believe) that our institutions (shambles that they already were because of the incompatibility of democracy and government-for-sale to the wealthy) will survive the onslaught. Here’s the home page for the series, if anyone is interested. Trying to post a new vid every few days. The whole thing is written (in draft form). This is new for me. I have decided that if young people in the age of Instagram and TikTok aren’t going to read, I will try a medium they find more appealing.
Series as a whole:
(4) Robert Shepherd – YouTube
Intro video:
Christian Existentialism, Episode 1 Introduction
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Videos 2-5 are a brief overview of Sartrean Existentialism, if you are interested. The foundation for what is coming.
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You go, Bob! Let’s feed our heads AND our spirits!! Philosophy is one of the JOYS of my life. I recommend Swami Sarvapriyananda’s lectures about Vedanta on You Tube. He is the resident minister at the Vedanta Society of New York. He explains the Vedantic philosophy of consciousness better than anyone I’ve ever heard. It’s really beautiful. I recommend his series on Vedanta Sara and Bhagvad Gita – and ALL of his videos. He’s a wonderful speaker as well. Bonne chance!
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After watching all your videos, I think I might know where all your thought leads, Bob. Of course, I don’t want to spoil it for your viewers.😊
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Thank you, Mamie!!! xoxoxo!!!!
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These are fantastic, really well done. Also your voice is outstanding!
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You are so kind, FLERP! Thank you!!!
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Great to hear from you, Bob. Kudos on this new project! Will be checking it out.
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Thanks, Ginny! I have missed your wise voice!
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Hi Bob – you’ve been missed! Good to see you’re back & doing well. I’m with you on not paying much attention to Outrage of the Day. Too exhausting!
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Love to you and yours, Lenny!
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My other comment is in moderation, Bob. Is there a place I can comment on your videos (where you will read and respond)?
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As soon as I open my cell and the WP app, I open comments that are in moderation. The process is arbitrary.
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Thank you.
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