Musk, Trump Talk America's Fate

The nation has reached 'a fork in the road'

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The United States faces a choice: restoration or ruin.

That was the takeaway from Monday night's conversation between tech titan Elon Musk and former President Donald Trump – an exchange that by night's end had garnered more than 95 million views.

The billionaire entrepreneurs – both revolutionaries in their own right – came together on Musk's social media platform X to discuss what ails America, and how Nov. 5 offers the nation a last chance opportunity to self-correct.

Overcoming technical challenges and shrugging off attempts by European Union officials to censor their dialogue, Musk and Trump spoke for three hours about the most critical issues facing the United States today.

TRUMP UNCENSORED TRIGGERS DEEP STATE FOES

In the lead-up to Musk's conversation with Trump, there was much hand-wringing among those on the Left; clearly, the enemies of the former president were incensed that he would have a chance to present himself, unfiltered and uncensored, to millions of undecided US voters – and tens of millions more listeners abroad.

The prospect of Trump having his own uninterrupted platform – if only for a few hours – even sparked a diplomatic row, of sorts.

In what may have been the most blatant – and bizarre – example of Deep State seething, Thierry Breton, the European Union's censorship czar, sent an open letter to Musk on Monday, warning that his conversation with Trump would have to conform to the EU's messaging decrees – an outlandish move that some branded an outright attempt at election interference.

"As the individual entity ultimately controlling a platform with over 300 million users worldwide, of which one third [are] in the EU ... you have the legal obligation to ensure X's compliance with EU law."

Breton also cautioned Musk that Big-Brother-in-Brussels would be watching:

"We are monitoring the potential risks in the EU associated with the dissemination of content that may incite violence, hate and racism in conjunction with major political – or societal – events around the world, including debates and interviews in the context of elections."

Breton demanded that Musk put in place "effective mitigation measures" against "the amplification of harmful content" that could "generate detrimental effects on civic discourse and public security" inside the European Union.

Incredibly, Breton followed by calling on Musk to report back to him what steps he planned to take to comply with Brussels' diktats.

"I therefore urge you to promptly ensure the effectiveness of your systems and to report measures taken to my team," he said.

Nonplussed, Musk replied publicly to Breton with a meme, telling the French eurocrat to "Take a step back and literally, f*** your own face!"

Later, in response to the continuing barrage of criticism from the Left, Musk struck a more diplomatic tone, posting to his X account the words of President John F. Kennedy:

"In 1946 the United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution reading in part, 'freedom of information is a fundamental human right, and the touchstone of all the freedoms to which the United Nations is consecrated.' This is our touchstone as well. This is the code of the Voice of America. We welcome the views of others. We seek a free flow of information across national boundaries and oceans, across iron curtains and stone walls. We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people."

Events Monday night confirmed that opposition to the Trump talk ran deeper than the stale halls of the EU bureaucracy. Slated to begin promptly at 8 p.m. Eastern, the discussion was delayed owing to a cyberattack on X's systems.

Once the technical issues were resolved, Musk opened with an apology for the late start, and an explanation of what the platform had just endured.

"We unfortunately had a massive distributed denial of service attack against our servers and saturated all of our data lines, like basically hundreds of gigabits of data were saturated. We think we've overcome most of that, and so it's now time to proceed. But as this massive attack illustrates, there's a lot of opposition to people just hearing what President Trump has to say."

A FIRESIDE CHAT FOR THE 21st CENTURY

As the exchange got underway, Musk described the format to listeners, stressing that his dialogue with Trump should be thought of simply as a conversation and not a formal interview.

"I want to emphasize it's a conversation, and it's really intended to just get a feel for what Donald Trump is just like in a conversation," Musk noted. "It's hard to catch a vibe about someone if you just don't hear them talk in a normal way. And when there's an adversarial interview, like no one's themselves in an adversarial interview."

"This is really aimed at kind of open-minded, independent voters who are just trying to make up their mind," Musk added.

Over the course of the next three hours, Musk and Trump engaged in a common sense, albeit at times meandering, discourse.

In their conversation, the pair addressed a host of the most pressing issues afflicting the United States after three-and-a-half years of leftist misrule.

Toward the end of their discussion, Musk briefly mentioned Vice President Kamala Harris' ties to Marxism; unfortunately, however, there was no deeper dive into the Marxist assault on America – the root of the nation's ills today.

Still, the X discussion was a boon for Trump – an opportunity to reach millions of voters on his own terms, rather than those of the leftist Establishment media. As one user of the social media platform rightly noted:

"34% of US monthly active users on X are swing voters, over-indexing the rest of the media by 20%, including Instagram, TikTok, and Snapchat. Over 84 million X users in the US say they are likely to vote in the 2024 election, including 35 million swing voters. 84% of US policy and opinion leaders actively engage with voters across X's diverse user base of over 90 million in the US. X is where leaders and organizations meet their constituents, across the country."

The issues Musk and Trump covered are too numerous to be adequately recapitulated here; therefore, a look at some key highlights follows below.

THE VAMPIRE OF INFLATION

One of the standout topics the pair explored was Bidenflation and its ruinous impact on the lives of Americans today.

"The people wanna hear about the economy and the fact that they can't buy groceries because they don't have enough money to buy groceries," Trump observed. "The inflation has killed them."

"It's a disaster with inflation. The inflation – it doesn't matter what you make. The inflation has eaten you alive. If you're a worker or if you're just a middle income person, you can't afford – you know, four years ago, five years ago, people were saving a lot of money. Today, they're using all their money and borrowing money just to live. It's a horrible thing that's happening."

"Yeah, a lot of people just don't understand where inflation comes from," Musk responded. "Inflation comes from government overspending because the checks never bounce when it's written by the government. So if the government spends far more than it brings in, that increases the money supply. And if the money supply increases faster than the rate of goods and services, that's inflation."

"We need to live within our means," he continued. "We're currently adding, I think, a trillion dollars to the deficit ... roughly every hundred days. And the interest payments on the national debt have now exceeded the defense budget."

"And inflation is effectively a tax on people that save money and for people that are working day to day," Musk added. "It's just a form of taxation. And if we can solve the government spending problem, we'll solve the inflation problem, which means people will have a better standard of living – and that's a really big deal."

"Well, the people that got hurt the worst are the people that did it the way they were taught to do it all through ... their young life and their whole life," Trump replied. "The people that saved money ... got no interest on their money and inflation destroyed them."

"Those people have been absolutely decimated and we're gonna bring those people back and help those people," Trump pledged. "We've got to get the prices down. You know, when I look at bacon costing five, four or five times more than it did a few years ago, when you look at some of the food products and groceries, those people go, they can't believe it. They used to be able to buy a whole cart and today, you know, a lot of people just don't have the money. They go in and they can't buy anything. They look at – it's sticker shock."

BORDER INSECURITY

The pair also examined one of Harris' most glaring failures – the border crisis.

"I say it very simply: They have to come in legally; they have to be checked," Trump said of would-be immigrants hoping to enter the United States.

"Kamala was the border czar. Now she's denying it," he noted. "You have millions of people coming in a month, and then she gets up and she tries to pretend like she's going to do something. She had three-and-a-half years."

"I think it is essential to have a secure border," Musk agreed. "I mean, you're really not a country unless you have a secure border. ... It's just essential to have a real border, or we can't function as a country. And our central services are being overwhelmed in a lot of cities."

"She's the border czar," Trump reiterated. "She was totally in charge. She could have shut the border down without [Biden]. He didn't know what he was doing anyway. He wouldn't have even known what happened. You could shut the border down – he wouldn't even know the difference. But the fact is that she was border czar ... she was in charge of the border and the border was the worst ever."

"It's simply not working," Musk conceded. "No, it's horrible. Whether it's a question of intention or competence, either way, we don't have a secure border and we have people streaming over ... it looks like a World War Z zombie apocalypse at times. And, you know, sometimes you've got to sort of wonder, like, is it real or not?"

"I went to the border at Eagle Pass and I saw for myself in Texas," Musk recounted. "I just flew there one day just to see, hey, is this made up or real? And I'm just seeing people stream across the border – and I have to say ... the people that I saw did not look friendly."

"I think this is a fundamental existential issue for the United States. And if we have another four more years of open borders, and it's gonna be even worse, with another four more years, it's gonna be even worse than it's been for the past three and a half years. I'm not sure we've got a country."

"It's just the border with Mexico, but the people coming in, it's Earth, the rest of Earth," Musk noted. "And America is only, you know, about 4 or 5% of the population of Earth. It would only take a few percent of the rest of Earth to overwhelm everything."

BUMBLING ABROAD

Trump also underscored the military and foreign policy catastrophes that the Biden-Harris regime has wrought. He noted that Biden's weakness and fecklessness emboldened Vladimir Putin to invade Ukraine in February 2022, and Hamas to launch its Oct. 7, 2023 terrorist attack on Israel – a conflict that today is on the cusp of exploding into a wider, and far bloodier, regional war:

"The worst president in history. ... First of all, the Israeli attack would have never happened. Russia would never have attacked Ukraine and we'd have no inflation. And we wouldn't have had the Afghanistan mess if you think of it. ... Think of it, you take a few of those events away and we have a different world."

"I know Putin very well," Trump continued. "I got along with him very well. He respected me. ... And we would talk a lot about Ukraine. It was the apple of his eye. But I said, don't ever do it. Don't ever do it. I shut down Nord Stream 2; that was the big oil pipeline – the biggest, I think the biggest pipeline in the world, going all over Europe. I shut it down. Biden came and then they say, I loved Russia, I was a friend of Putin and I loved Russia. No, he actually said to me one time, he said, 'If you're my friend, I'd hate to see you as an enemy.'"

"And we did things and said things through this president with a low IQ, very low IQ – he had a low IQ 30 years ago, by the way, but now he might not even have an IQ at all," Trump quipped. "There's nothing on the board that goes as low. He said things that were so stupid ... war had zero chance of happening if I were there – zero chance."

"And it's so sad because many more people have been killed in Ukraine than you read about," he explained. "You don't read about how bloody it is ... just in the two armies, you lost a half a million people. And Ukraine's having a hard time. ... Russia defeated Germany with us and they defeated Napoleon. You know, they've been around a long time – they're a big fighting force. ... And Ukraine now doesn't have enough men. They're now using young men and very old men to fight."

Trump warned that foreign dictators weren't fooled by attempts by America's Marxist media to cover up Biden's obvious deficiencies.

"They're at the top of their game," he observed. "They're tough, they're smart, they're vicious ... And when they see a Kamala, or when they see Biden, Sleepy Joe, they can't even believe it. They can't believe this happened. All this stuff that you're seeing now, all the horror that you – look at Israel. They're all waiting for an attack from Iran. Iran would not be attacking, believe me – we would have been good with Iran ... they knew not to mess around."

"We're in a very bad position," Trump lamented. "I can tell you I could have stopped that and a smart president could have stopped that – it wouldn't have happened. But we had a man that actually made it more prevalent. ... I said, this guy's gonna cause us a war. He's gonna cause this."

"And let me tell you, it can lead to World War III," Trump warned. "That can lead to World War III. The Middle East can lead – we have numerous places that could end up in World War III right now for no reason whatsoever."

"I think you're right," Musk replied. "I think people underrate the risk of World War III. And it's just – when looking at the risk of global thermonuclear warfare, it's game over for humanity. And it's something that people have, I think, after the end of the Cold War, people have become complacent about, but they actually have forgotten that there are currently a lot of nuclear missiles that have targeting parameters for the United States and other countries."

Trump agreed, pointing to the need for enhanced US defense against the prospect of nuclear attack.

"One of the things we're gonna do is we're going to build an Iron Dome over us," he vowed. "You know, Israel has it. We're going to have the best Iron Dome in the world. We need it. And we're going to make it all in the United States ... we're going to have protection because it just takes one maniac to start something. We're going to have protection."

KAMALA: MORE OF THE SAME – BUT WORSE

During his conversation with Musk, Trump took the opportunity to stress that as bad as Biden has been for the country, Harris would be far worse.

"We need smart people," he said. "And we need people that have an ability to lead. And she doesn't have that ability. Can you imagine? Now, you know [China's] Chairman Xi very well. Can you imagine her and him negotiating, or even standing together? It is – the whole concept is ridiculous."

"If you vote for her, you ought to have your head examined," he warned. "And you see tonight – I mean, as we're doing this – I'm seeing reports coming that they expect an attack [on Israel] tonight or tomorrow from hundreds and maybe thousands of rockets. You know, their Iron Dome ... they swamp it by shooting enough missiles. ... By shooting enough missiles, they can't defend themselves. You know, they just obliterate the whole place. And that's what some people think they're looking to do. And we have no leadership. There's no respect for the United States of America with these people."

Musk agreed:

"I think you're right. ... It's important for the public that may be listening to this to say, to look at Kamala's track record, you know, before the last like month and say, is that a track record you agree with? And I think if you're an independent moderate, you definitely would not agree with it because it is, her behavior has been Far Left. And we're seeing just an overnight propaganda attempt to rewrite history and make it sound like Kamala's moderate when she in fact is not moderate."

To underscore this point, the former president recounted for listeners Harris' record of ruin in the (once-) Golden State – noting that if Americans choose Harris for their next president, the adage "as California goes, so goes the nation" will prove tragically apt.

"She's gonna be worse than [Biden] because she is a San Francisco liberal who destroyed San Francisco. ... As attorney general, she destroyed California. You talk about location and we're talking about the sun and the water and all. There's nothing better than California. She has destroyed that," Trump lamented.

"What she has done to California is – well, you know better than I do – you just left California for a lot of those reasons," he reminded Musk.

"When you think of San Francisco 15 years ago – I had a great friend, Bob Tisch, who said 'It's the greatest city in America,'" Trump continued. "Now, it's almost not livable there, and California, likewise. ... She was involved in the destruction of San Francisco and the destruction of California. And she will be involved in the destruction of our country if people are so unwise as to elect her."

REIGNITING AN ASPIRATIONAL AMERICA

In their conversation, Musk and Trump also tackled the idea of reigniting America's "can do" spirit – largely dormant after three-and-a-half years of Biden-Harris malpractice.

Musk pointed to Argentina – which in late 2023 elected Javier Milei, a reformer in the mold of Trump, as president – as both a sign of hope that the American Dream can be rekindled, as well as a warning of what the United States could become if we choose to continue down the Biden-Harris path.

"What Milei is doing is ... cutting government spending. He's simplifying things. He's putting in regulations that make sense. And Argentina overnight is experiencing a giant improvement in prosperity," Musk observed.

"But it's also a lesson for the United States," he cautioned, "which is that Argentina used to be one of the most prosperous countries in the world ... in the '30s, '40s. And because of bad government policy, it ruined the country."

"If the government's wrong, it impoverishes the people. And so I think we should not be complacent in the United States and ... taking our prosperity for granted. Because with bad government policy, we can run the country into the ground. And that's just something people should bear in mind. Don't take prosperity for granted."

"People in America want to feel excited and inspired about the future," Musk continued. "They want to feel like the future is gonna be better than the past. And that America is gonna do things that are greater than we've done in the past – reach new heights that make you proud to be an American and excited about the future. They want the American Dream back."

"They want the American Dream back – more important than anything else," Trump concurred. "You don't have that today."

"There are ... some grand projects that we could do," Musk suggested. "We could build a base on the moon. We could send American astronauts to Mars. We could build high-speed connections that are more advanced than anything else in the world between our cities so people have fast transport. ... And just do things that are exciting and inspiring and make the future feel like it's better than the past. ... We've got to have deregulation ... so we can have a prosperous future. And then we want to have some exciting sort of moonshot projects that people can get fired up about. And that's the future I'm looking for ... that's why I'm supporting you for president."

"Well, I appreciate it," Trump replied. "We're gonna give incentive to companies to come into our country, not to leave our country. We're gonna be giving tremendous incentives. We want companies to build here, not to build in other locations. And we want to create jobs."

"Again, it's about the American Dream. You don't hear about the American Dream anymore, Elon. You don't hear – you're the American Dream in the truest sense – but you don't hear about the American Dream anymore. And you're going to hear about it.

People, they need that incentive to go out and do it. And they're going to love their lives. I mean, they're going to look forward to getting up in the morning and going to a job that they love, not a job that they can't stand, or not any job at all where they have no money – where they literally have no money. ... No, we're going to do some great things."

A TIME FOR CHOOSING

As their conversation drew to a close, Musk made clear that in spite of the Marxist media's incessant propagandizing, Trump is no fascist – that, in fact, his positions on key issues are fully in line with those of the vast majority of Americans.

"If I could summarize, perhaps, these are issues that I think most people in America would agree with," Musk observed. "We want safe and clean cities; we want secure borders; we want sensible government spending; we want to restore both the perception and reality of respect in the judicial system – you know, stop the lawfare – and ... how are those even right-wing positions? I think that's just common sense."

"Here's to an exciting and inspiring future that people can look forward to, and be optimistic and excited about what happens next," he cheered. "And that's the kind of future that I think you'll bring as president, and that's why I endorse you."

"Well, I appreciate that – that endorsement meant a lot to me," Trump replied. "You know, we have a phrase, 'Make America Great Again' – it's pretty simple, but it really says we want to make America great again, and we can do it, and we can do it now. But if we were going to suffer another four years like we've suffered for the last four years, I'm not sure the country can ever come back – that's how bad it is."

"I think that's a very real risk," Musk affirmed. "That's a very real risk."

The tech magnate then spoke directly to the millions of voters – many of them still undecided – tuning in from around the country and across the globe.

"I'd like to note to the people listening, I've not been very political before," Musk conceded. "Some try to paint me as a far-right guy, which is absurd ... I supported Obama, I stood in line for six hours to shake Obama's hand when he was running for president, and so it's not like I'm some sort of dye-in-the-wool, long-term Republican ... I call myself, historically, a moderate Democrat."

"Now, I feel like we're really at a critical juncture for the country ... I think a lot of people thought the Biden administration would be a moderate administration. But it's not, and obviously, we're just going to see an even further-Left administration with Kamala," he warned.

"I mean, she was brought up as a Comm- – as an actual – her dad is a Marxist economist ... You can google it ... We're not making this up ... That's how she was brought up, so ... we want to have a future that is prosperous, and I think we're at this critical juncture and I think this is a case of America is at a fork in the road."

"You are the path to prosperity," Musk told Trump. "And I think Kamala is the opposite. ... I'm going to get attacked like crazy – you know, I've also experienced quite a lot of lawfare, myself ... but I'm just trying to tell people my honest opinion, and I haven't been really active in politics before and I'm just trying to point out that my track record historically, is moderate, if not moderate-slightly Left."

"So this is to people out there in the moderate camp: I think you should support Donald Trump for president," Musk added. "I think it's actually a very important juncture in the road, and we're in deep trouble if it goes the other way."

To listen to the Musk-Trump conversation in full, click here.

Editor's note: To learn how Christians and other conservatives can win back America, check out Souls and Liberty's book selection by clicking here.

Writer, editor and producer Stephen Wynne has spent the past seven years covering, from a Catholic perspective, the latest developments in the Church, the nation and the world. Prior to his work in journalism, he spent eight years co-authoring “Repairing the Breach,” a book examining the war of worldviews between Christianity and Darwinism. A Show-Me State native, he holds a BA in Creative Writing from Pepperdine University and an Executive MBA from the Bloch School of Business at the University of Missouri-Kansas City.

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