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Anything interesting happen this week?
As even the very-not-online know by now, President Donald Trump and Wealthy Nuisance Elon Musk got into it on Thursday. In a volley of social media posts throughout an afternoon, the two demonstrated that they have, like Taylor Swift and Blake Lively, halted their friendship. Of course, unlike Swift and Lively, neither of these boys seems to have run any of his public messages by any legal representatives before blasting them out into the world. So we got Elon admitting to having bought the Republican Party its wins in the last election and then accusing Donald of being in the Epstein files. We got Donald threatening to cancel all of SpaceX’s federal contracts and then divulging the really dishy details of a conversation he had about Elon with Heather Locklear, who he could tell was pretty into him.
That last part is not technically true, but it is tonally accurate. It actually could still happen at any minute, so you should park yourself on the home page of either The New York Times or The Wall Street Journal, both of which still have live coverage of this social media breakup spat, updating in real time.
It was like a particularly testy exchange on a Vanderpump Rules reunion episode, except the whole problem with both of these guys is that they’ve never worked a service-industry job. It was, as many pointed out, Kendrick vs. Drake for Republicans, except, as I pointed out, they are both Bubba Sparxxx. (Apologies to Bubba Sparxxx.) It was an embarrassing but occasionally pleasurable distraction, so long as you didn’t think too hard about the fact that one of them could nuke Portland just to get it out of the headlines and the other could do something much worse, which is publish your search history.
Some believe this was all a psyop, a shiny sparkly thing designed to distract from the legitimately terrifying stuff within the Big Beautiful Bill, or this Palantir business, or any of the hundred other active governmental grease fires that are currently blazing. I disagree. I think Steve Bannon may have the brainpower to think through the strategic implications of “flooding the zone with shit,” but he’s not a close adviser anymore. I think flooding the zone just turned out to be a natural fit for one of Trump and Musk’s shared interests: literally constantly pissing and shitting. I don’t think they are lashing out as a willful distraction; I think Trump is lashing out because he can’t help himself, and Musk is lashing out because he needs our attention and because he doesn’t have the good sense to put that ketamine energy onto a dance floor where it belongs.
Sometimes a cigar is a dick, and sometimes it’s just a cigar. This, I think, is just exactly what it looks like: Two grown men being dicks.
Speaking of which, the spat also brought out the absolute dumbest in some of the absolute dumbest people in the manosphere, which is the absolute dumbest place in the universe, so let’s do our duty as Americans and laugh at them.
Joey Mannarino is a political commentator, or so says his bio on X, which also says he used to work in R&B radio. It appears that early and prolonged exposure to Jodeci and Dru Hill has taught this man nothing. In the Mannarinosphere, having a big emotional breakup shouting match is what masculinity looks like. It is not a lack of impulse control; it is not a pampered lifetime spent perpetually having the upper hand because of your father’s wealth; it is not cognitive impairment. It is testicles. It is because of the size and quality of these men’s testicles that we have to hear them fight. This post raises and immediately answers the questions “What was Joey Mannarino’s home life like?” and “Why is he like this?”
And it wasn’t even the weirdest take.
Jack Probiotics is one of these guys who keeps turning up on those third-tier conservative news channels and Turning Point USA conventions, one of these dudes who you’re never quite sure what he does or how he earns a living at it, yet he reliably pops up with the worst opinion you’ve ever heard. Jack Prilosec does not disappoint here. We are not watching two children have separate tantrums, he says. We are watching men be men because men are like this, and women are like that. This is a nuanced and carefully considered take on the situation from Jack Posdnuos, who got his master’s degree in gender studies from the University of Catching a Couple Episodes of Whatever That Last Tim Allen Sitcom Was.
The easy thing would be to speculate on how badly both of these guys need to, you know, watch two males going at it. It’s too easy, in fact, but you can’t help but notice how much time guys like this spend thinking about guys, and guys’ genitals. I don’t actually think either of these guys is gay and conflicted about it, largely because if they were, they’d be interesting. But I will say this: As a practical matter, for both of these guys, active homosexuality would be a real time-saver.
Obviously, Jack Protoplasm’s tweet got shared far and wide because it was truly demented. His next move was pretty predictable.
There is a lot of this going around. “I voted against my own financial interests; deal with it.” “I’m dismantling my own safety net—jealous?” Let me say this from the bottom of my testicles: NOBODY IS MAD. We are laughing at you. We are laughing at you because you are being ridiculous, and also because we cannot laugh with you, because you cannot laugh. After all, you are afraid laughing is for women (gynocentric).
The real problem is that both of these guys have a hustle to attend to. Mannarino has a podcast or something; Posobiec’s Instagram bio links to an online supplement store that features a $600 tub of Ivermectin (use the code NOSHAME for 10 percent off your first order). They need attention, and there is no longer any meaningful distinction between good and bad attention. There is only engagement. There is only an eyeball. Eyeball makes the number big, and the big number gets people to your podcast or your speaking engagement or your 30-day supply of branded horse dewormer.
These guys are no longer incentivized not to say the worst and dumbest thing they can think of. So they say this: These grown men, in positions of great global power, behaving like children for all the world to see? It is because of their balls. Their wonderful, perfect balls. And their dicks! Their balls and their dicks and the way they filter and funnel all of their thought and communication through them. Think about those balls and dicks, these guys tell the world, right out loud. We sure are.
Masculinity really is in crisis, and one of the main drivers of that crisis is the fact that these are the guys who talk about it.
Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s alliance took off like one of SpaceX’s rockets. It was supercharged and soared high. And then it blew up.
The spectacular flameout Thursday peaked as Trump threatened to cut Musk’s government contracts and Musk claimed that Trump’s administration hasn’t released all the records related to sex abuser Jeffrey Epstein because Trump is mentioned in them.
The tech entrepreneur even shared a post on social media calling for Trump’s impeachment and skewered the president’s signature tariffs, predicting a recession this year.
The messy blow-up between the president of the United States and the world’s richest man played out on their respective social media platforms after Trump was asked during a White House meeting with Germany’s new leader about Musk’s criticism of his spending bill.
Trump had largely remained silent as Musk stewed over the last few days on his social media platform X, condemning the president’s so-called “Big Beautiful Bill.” But Trump clapped back Thursday in the Oval Office, saying he was “very disappointed in Musk.”
Musk responded on social media in real time. Trump, who was supposed to be spending Thursday discussing an end to the Russia-Ukraine war with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, ratcheted up the stakes when he turned to his own social media network, Truth Social, and threatened to use the U.S. government to hurt Musk’s bottom line by going after contracts held by his internet company Starlink and rocket company SpaceX.
“The easiest way to save money in our Budget, Billions and Billions of Dollars, is to terminate Elon’s Governmental Subsidies and Contracts,” Trump wrote on his social media network.
“Go ahead, make my day,” Musk quickly replied on X.
Hours later, Musk announced SpaceX would begin decommissioning the spacecraft it used to carry astronauts and cargo to the International Space Station for NASA.
Musk also said, without offering evidence of how he might know the information, that Trump was “in the Epstein files. That is the real reason they have not been made public. Have a nice day, DJT!”
The deepening rift unfurled much like their relationship started — rapidly, intensely, and very publicly. And it quickly hit Musk financially.
After Trump started criticizing Musk, shares of his electric vehicle company, Tesla plunged more than 14%, knocking about $150 billion off Tesla’s market valuation. Musk lost about $20 billion on his personal holding of Tesla.
Politicians and their donor patrons rarely see eye to eye. But the magnitude of Musk’s support for Trump, spending at least $250 million backing his campaign, and the scope of free rein the president gave him to slash and delve into the government with the Department of Government Efficiency is eclipsed only by the speed of their falling-out.
Musk offered up an especially stinging insult to a president sensitive about his standing among voters: “Without me, Trump would have lost the election,” Musk retorted. “Such ingratitude,” Musk added in a follow-up post.
Musk first announced his support for Trump shortly after the then-candidate was nearly assassinated on stage at a Pennsylvania rally last July. News of Musk’s political action committee in support of Trump’s election came days later.
Musk soon became a close adviser and frequent companion, memorably leaping in the air behind Trump on stage at a rally in October. Once Trump was elected, the tech billionaire stood behind him as he took the oath of office, flew on Air Force One for weekend stays at Mar-a-Lago, slept in the Lincoln Bedroom, and joined Cabinet meetings wearing a MAGA hat — sometimes more than one.
Three months ago, Trump purchased a red Tesla from Musk as a public show of support for his business as it faced blowback.
Musk bid farewell to Trump last week in a somewhat somber news conference in the Oval Office, where he sported a black eye that he said came from his young soon but that seemed to be a metaphor for his messy time in government service.
Trump, who rarely misses an opportunity to zing his critics on appearance, brought it up Thursday.
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“I said, ‘Do you want a little makeup? We’ll get you a little makeup.’ Which is interesting,” Trump said.
The Republican president’s comments came as Musk has griped for days on social media about Trump’s spending bill, warning that it will increase the federal deficit. Musk has called the bill a “disgusting abomination.”
“He hasn’t said bad about me personally, but I’m sure that will be next,” Trump said Thursday in the Oval Office, presaging the rest of his day. “But I’m very disappointed in Elon. I’ve helped Elon a lot.”
Observers had long wondered if the friendship between the two brash billionaires known for lobbing insults online would combust dramatically. It did, in less than a year.
White House aides were closely following the drama playing out on dueling platforms Thursday with bemusement, sharing the latest twists and turns from the feud between their boss and former co-worker, as well as the social media reaction and memes. Officials in the extremely online administration privately expressed the belief that, like the other digital scuffles that have defined Trump’s political career, this would also work out in his favor.
Trump said Thursday in the Oval Office that he and Musk had had a great relationship but mused: “I don’t know if we will anymore.”
He said some people who leave his administration “miss it so badly” and “actually become hostile.”
“It’s sort of Trump derangement syndrome, I guess they call it,” he said.
He brushed aside the billionaire’s efforts to get him elected last year, including a $1 million-a-day voter sweepstakes in Pennsylvania. The surge of cash Musk showed he was willing to spend seemed to set him up as a highly coveted ally for Republicans going forward, but his split with Trump, the party’s leader, raises questions about whether they or any others will see such a campaign windfall in the future.
Trump said Musk “only developed a problem” with the bill because it rolls back tax credits for electric vehicles.
“False,” Musk fired back on his social media platform as the president continued speaking. “This bill was never shown to me even once and was passed in the dead of night so fast that almost no one in Congress could even read it!”
In another post, he said Trump could keep the spending cuts but “ditch the MOUNTAIN of DISGUSTING PORK in the bill.”
Besides Musk being “disturbed” by the electric vehicle tax credits, Trump said another point of contention was Musk’s promotion of Jared Isaacman to run NASA. Trump withdrew Isaacman’s nomination over the weekend and on Thursday called him “totally a Democrat.”
Musk continued slinging his responses on social media. He shared some posts Trump made over a decade ago criticizing Republicans for their spending, musings made when he, too, was just a billionaire lobbing his thoughts on social media.
“Where is the man who wrote these words?” Musk wrote. “Was he replaced by a body double!?”
On the White House grounds Thursday afternoon, Trump’s red Tesla still sat in a parking lot.
Every time you let yourself get sucked into the latest public drama—like the latest online feud between billionaires—you're not just wasting your own time. You're putting your team, your business, and your reputation at risk.
It's so easy to see this "can I get validated as the best" spat as a fun distraction. (It kinda makes me think of the Righteous Gemstones family. Are Danny McBride and HBO scripting this?)
Look away. While you got wrapped up in it, someone came looking for you to ask an important question that would move a project along.
Distractions cost you.
Research from the University of California shows it takes an average of 23 minutes to regain complete focus after an interruption.
Multiply that by the dozens of daily distractions you face—emails, texts, meetings, and yes, the endless scroll of social media—and it's easy to see why so many of us struggle to get the right work done.
The U.S. Army War College has studied how constant digital distractions and stress degrade problem-solving, impair cognition, and narrow attention to detail.
Leaders who are always "on"—responding to every ping and notification—are more likely to make errors, miss opportunities, and struggle with strategic thinking.
And when you're distracted, it doesn't just hurt you; it ripples through the whole organization. Your team becomes less engaged, makes more mistakes, and loses trust in you.
The Army War College calls this "the distracted leader effect."
The next time you're tempted to dive into the latest drama in your area of the world or your organization, ask yourself, "Will this help me get my work done today? Or will it take me away?"
Don't let the drama distract you from your leadership duties. Your team, your customers, and your business need you.
Focus on what matters—and leave the drama to the experts.
As the Republican Party braces for aftershocks from President Donald Trump’s spectacular clash with Elon Musk, lawmakers and conservative figures are urging détente, fearful of the potential consequences from a prolonged feud.
At a minimum, the explosion of animosity between the two powerful men could complicate the path forward for Republicans’ massive tax and border spending legislation that has been promoted by Trump but assailed by Musk.
“I hope it doesn’t distract us from getting the job done that we need to,” said Rep. Dan Newhouse, a Republican from Washington state. “I think that it will boil over and they’ll mend fences.”
As of Friday afternoon, Musk was holding his fire, posting about his various companies on social media rather than torching the president. Trump departed the White House for his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, without stopping to talk to reporters who shouted questions about his battle with Musk.
“I hope that both of them come back together because when the two of them are working together, we’ll get a lot more done for America than when they’re at cross purposes,” Sen. Ted Cruz, a Texas Republican, told Fox News host Sean Hannity on Thursday night.
Sen. Mike Lee, a Republican from Utah, sounded almost pained on social media as Trump and Musk volleyed insults at each other, sharing a photo composite of the two men and writing, “But … I really like both of them.”
“Who else really wants @elonmusk and @realDonaldTrump to reconcile?” Lee posted, later adding: “Repost if you agree that the world is a better place with the Trump-Musk bromance fully intact.”
So far, the feud between Trump and Musk is probably best described as a moving target, with plenty of opportunities for escalation or detente.
One person familiar with the president’s thinking said Musk wants to speak with Trump, but that the president doesn’t want to do it, or at least do it on Friday. The person requested anonymity to disclose private matters.
In a series of conversations with television anchors on Friday morning, Trump showed no interest in burying the hatchet. Asked on ABC News about reports of a potential call between him and Musk, the president responded: “You mean the man who has lost his mind?”
Trump added in the ABC interview that he was “not particularly” interested in talking to Musk at the moment.
Still, others remained hopeful that it all would blow over.
“I grew up playing hockey, and there wasn’t a single day that we played hockey or basketball or football or baseball, whatever we were playing, where we didn’t fight. And then we’d fight, then we’d become friends again,” Hannity said on his show Thursday night.
Acknowledging that it “got personal very quick,” Hannity nonetheless added that the rift was “just a major policy difference.”
House Speaker Mike Johnson projected confidence that the dispute would not affect prospects for the tax and border bill.
“Members are not shaken at all,” the Louisiana Republican said. “We’re going to pass this legislation on our deadline.”
He added that he hopes Musk and Trump reconcile, saying “I believe in redemption” and “it’s good for the party and the country if all that’s worked out.”
But he also had something of a warning for the billionaire entrepreneur.
“I’ll tell you what, do not doubt and do not second-guess and don’t ever challenge the president of the United States, Donald Trump,” Johnson said. “He is the leader of the party. He’s the most consequential political figure of this generation and probably the modern era.”
The world’s richest man could lose billions in his fight with the world’s most powerful politician.
The feud between Elon Musk and Donald Trump could mean Tesla’s plans for self-driving cars hit a roadblock, SpaceX flies fewer missions for NASA, Starlink gets fewer overseas satellite contracts, and the social media platform X loses advertisers.
Maybe that is. It all depends on Trump’s appetite for revenge and how the dispute unfolds.
Joked Telemetry Insight auto analyst Sam Abuelsamid, “Since Trump has no history of retaliating against perceived adversaries, he’ll probably just let this pass.”
Turning serious, he sees trouble ahead for Musk.
“For someone that rants so much about government pork, all of Elon’s businesses are extremely dependent on government largesse, which makes him vulnerable.”
Trump and the federal government also stand to lose from a long-running dispute, but not as much as Musk.
Tesla robotaxis
The dispute comes just a week before a planned test of Tesla’s driverless taxis in Austin, Texas, a major event for the company because sales of its EVs are lagging in many markets, and Musk needs a win.
Trump can mess things up for Tesla by encouraging federal safety regulators to step in at any sign of trouble for the robotaxis.
Even before the war of words broke out on Thursday, the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration requested data on how Musk’s driverless, autonomous taxis will perform in low-visibility conditions. That request follows an investigation last year into 2.4 million Teslas equipped with full self-driving software after several accidents, including one that killed a pedestrian.
A spokesman for NHTSA said the probe was ongoing and that the agency “will take any necessary actions to protect road safety.”
The Department of Justice has also probed the safety of Tesla cars, but the status of that investigation is unclear. The DOJ did not respond immediately to requests for comment.
The promise of a self-driving future led by Tesla inspired shareholders to boost the stock by 50% in the weeks after Musk confirmed the Austin rollout. But on Thursday, the stock plunged more than 14% amid the Trump-Musk standoff. On Friday, it recovered a bit, bouncing back nearly 4%.
“Tesla’s recent rise was almost entirely driven by robotaxi enthusiasm,” said Morningstar analyst Seth Goldstein. “Elon’s feud with Trump could be a negative.”
Carbon credits business
One often-overlooked but important part of Tesla’s business that could take a hit is its sales of carbon credits.
As Musk and Trump were slugging it out Thursday, Republican senators inserted new language into Trump’s budget bill that would eliminate fines for gas-powered cars that fall short of fuel economy standards. Tesla has a thriving side business selling “regulatory credits” to other automakers to make up for their shortfalls.
Musk has downplayed the importance of the credits business, but the changes would hurt Tesla as it reels from boycotts of its cars tied to Musk’s time working for Trump.
Credit sales jumped by a third to $595 million in the first three months of the year, even as total revenue slumped.
Reviving sales
Musk’s foray into right-wing politics cost Tesla sales among the environmentally minded consumers who embraced electric cars and led to boycotts of Tesla showrooms.
If Musk has indeed ended his close association with Trump, those buyers could come back, but that’s far from certain.
Meanwhile, one analyst speculated earlier this year that Trump voters in so-called red counties could buy Teslas “in a meaningful way.” But he’s now less hopeful.
“There are more questions than answers following Thursday developments,” TD Cowen’s Itay Michaeli wrote in his latest report, “and it’s still too early to determine any lasting impacts.”
Michaeli’s stock target for Tesla earlier this year was $388. He has since lowered it to $330. Tesla was trading Friday at $300.
Tesla did not respond to requests for comment.
Moonshot mess
Trump said Thursday that he could cut government contracts to Musk’s rocket company, SpaceX, a massive threat to a company that has received billions of federal dollars.
The privately held company that is reportedly worth $350 billion provides launches, sends astronauts into space for NASA, and has a contract to send a team from the space agency to the moon next year.
But if Musk has a lot to lose, so does the U.S.
SpaceX is the only U.S. company capable of transporting crews to and from the space station, using its four-person Dragon capsules. The other alternative is politically dicey: depending wholly on Russia’s Soyuz capsules.
Musk knew all this when he shot back at Trump that SpaceX would begin decommissioning its Dragon spacecraft. But it is unclear how serious his threat was. Several hours later, in a reply to another X user, he said he wouldn’t do it.
Starlink impact?
A subsidiary of SpaceX, the satellite internet company Starlink, appears to also have benefited from Musk’s once-close relationship with the president.
Musk announced that Saudi Arabia had approved Starlink for some services during a trip with Trump in the Middle East last month. The company has also won a string of other recent deals in Bangladesh, Pakistan, India, and elsewhere as Trump has threatened tariffs.
It’s not clear how much politics played a role, and how much is pure business.
On Friday, the Associated Press confirmed that India had approved a key license to Starlink. At least 40% of India’s more than 1.4 billion people have no access to the internet.
Ad revival interrupted?
Big advertisers that fled X after Musk welcomed all manner of conspiracy theories to the social media platform have started to trickle back in recent months, possibly out of fear of a conservative backlash.
Musk has called their decision to leave an “illegal boycott” and sued them, and the Trump administration recently weighed in with a Federal Trade Commission probe into possible coordination among them.
Now, advertisers may have to worry about a different danger.
If Trump sours on X, “there’s a risk that it could again become politically radioactive for major brands,” said Sarah Kreps, a political scientist at Cornell University. She added, though, that an “exodus isn’t obvious, and it would depend heavily on how the conflict escalates, how long it lasts, and how it ends.”
Money can buy power, but Elon Musk paid for someone else to have it. After spending more than $250 million backing Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, an acrimonious schism erupted between the two and swiftly vaporized $150 billion of Tesla’s (TSLA.O)
- Donald Trump said on June 5 that he was “very disappointed” in Elon Musk, after the Tesla CEO repeatedly criticized a congressional budget proposal that is the centerpiece of the U.S. president’s legislative agenda.
- Musk, who backed Trump’s presidential campaign and spent about four months leading a White House effort to slash government costs, then posted on social media that Trump “would have lost the election” without his support. Trump retorted by writing that the “easiest way to save money” for the government would be to “terminate” contracts with, and subsidies for, Musk’s businesses, which include rocket company SpaceX.
- For the day, Tesla’s share price fell roughly 14% while those of Destiny Tech100, a listed closed-end fund that offers exposure to SpaceX, dropped almost 13%.
- Musk later signaled he was open to easing tensions with Trump by agreeing with a comment from hedge fund manager Bill Ackman calling for a detente.
Here’s what Musk stands to lose from the US government:
Tesla, SpaceX, and xAI all could face serious trouble if Trump turns the government on Musk. Let’s take a look at what Musk and his businesses face to lose if the rift worsens:🚀 SpaceX
- $18.5 billion in federal contracts from DoD, NASA
- Starlink contracts to support Ukrainian troops
- Regulatory obstacles from the FAA for Starship launches
🚘 Tesla
- NHTSA regulation of Cybercabs and full self-driving investigations
- “Big Beautiful Bill” may kill EV rebates, add annual $250 EV driver fee
- Business propped up by sales of regulatory tax credits, which made up $595 million last quarter
🤖 xAI + X
- Potential regulatory scrutiny of methane emissions at the Colossus supercluster
🧠 Neuralink
- FDA approvals of human trials for brain implants
🚢 Tariffs
- Every business is sensitive to tariffs for components like microprocessors, steel, and rare earth minerals