Crawling out of Donald's arse

 From Ben Jennings

Raise your hand

 By Mike Luckovich

Bugger off to Mars

 By Patrick Chapatte

Livestreamed execution

 The axis of evil.  By Mike Luckovich

Staying on Twitter made you worse

By Anil Dash 

Saving civilisation

 By Pat Bagley

Immigrants are destroying America

 By Mike Luckovich

Fear + ignorance = hate

 I don't know who drew this.  If you do, drop me a line on my Mastodon or Bluesky accounts.

(ReformUK is a far-right UK party, which Elon Musk enthusiastically supports)

Elon Musk dines alone

 

The emperor's new mandate

 From Pat Bagley

Accidents will happen

 By Australian cartoonist Mark David  from Independent Australia

Elon Musk, stud

 By Bill Amend

Elon's X-ray specs

By Ben Jennings 

I was just stretching

 

Musk's politics lost Tesla 1 million car sales

 

From Electrek

We’ve been talking about the impact of Elon Musk’s venture into politics on the Tesla brand for years, but now a new study from the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) is putting some staggering numbers to it.

According to a new working paper, Musk’s “polarizing and partisan actions” have directly cost Tesla over a million vehicle sales in the US alone.

The study, titled “The Musk Partisan Effect on Tesla Sales,” argues that without this effect, Tesla’s sales would have been 67% to 83% higher between October 2022 and April 2025. That’s an absolutely massive number, and it suggests Tesla’s recent sales slump isn’t just about “increased competition” or “pent-up demand” being satisfied.

It’s about the brand.

The researchers from Yale and NBER didn’t just run a poll. They dug into county-level, monthly new vehicle registration data for all EVs and hybrids from March 2020 to April 2025.

They used a “difference-in-differences” analysis. In simple terms, they tracked how sales trends changed in heavily Democratic-leaning counties versus heavily Republican-leaning counties. The “treatment” event that broke the trend? Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter in October 2022.

Here’s what the data shows:

Before Oct. 2022: Counties with more Democrats showed an increasing preference for Teslas compared to Republican counties. This makes sense, as we know EV adoption has historically been higher among liberal-leaning buyers.

After Oct. 2022: The trend dramatically reverses. As Musk’s political activities—including “relaxed content moderating of far-right and extremist voices” and massive campaign contributions—ramped up, Democratic-leaning counties began “shifting away from Tesla purchases”.

The study is blunt, noting Musk’s actions “antagonized his most loyal customer base”.

The paper runs two different models to quantify the damage, and the results are “remarkably similar”.

Aggregated from October 2022 through April 2025, the “Musk partisan effect” cost Tesla between 1.0 and 1.26 million vehicle sales.

Again, that’s in the US alone. Tesla’s sales in Europe have also been crashing over the last 2 years. Some of that has been attributed to Musk’s political activism, but Tesla is also facing tougher competition in Europe, where more EV models are available due to fewer protectionist rules.

Zubrin's take on Elon's Mars plans

Elon Musk has revealed his true nature over the last year.  I used to admire him, believing that he wished to make the world a better place.   I no longer think that.  Nevertheless,  I am going to continue to report news and opinions about SpaceX's Starship,  as I have been a keen follower since it was first announced nearly ten years ago, and because I believe that mankind should go to Mars.

Starship remains far ahead of any competitor.  There's the DreamChaser, but it's been in development for 20 years, and its first lauch has just been postponed again.  Jeff Bezos's New Glen reusable booster has only just had one launch, which wasn't completely successful.  Unlike SpaceX, which has landed its booster, and will soon land Starship, New Glen has yet to return safely to base.

Starship had its first successful flight two days ago, after several failures.  SpaceX's development method is to test its rockets in action, see what's wrong, fix the issues, and then test again.  It's taken 10 Starship launches to get its first success, and there is still a long way to go.  Reusable rockets are essential, to cut costs, and for Starship, that means getting the heatshield tiles to work.  Perhaps another 10 launches will be needed for the technical problems with the heatshield to be solved.  A first step will be to launch Starship and let it land at Starbase, rather than into the sea, so that the engineers can see what's wrong by inspecting the damage to the tiles, the hull and the fins.

Despite the technical difficulties, I have no doubt that Starship will over the next couple of years become as reliable a workhorse as the Falcon 9.  But will it be the foundation for a Mars city?  Well, probably not.  

I've talked before about Zubrin's plans.  He points out that there are no great grasslands or oceans on Mars, and that we can't colonise it in the same way the New World was colonised.  We will have to grow all our food inside domes or caverns.  The initial populations on Mars will be limited by this.  He also argues that a "Starboat" (a rendering is shown below), about 1/5th the size of the Starship, would be much more practical, because the energy needs to produce propellant for Starship for the return journey to Earth would require 60,000 square metres of solar panels, which by themselves would need 3 Starships, and therefore another +-20 launches of refuelling tankers.  A Starboat would require only 1/5 of that.  In addition, a "Starboat" could be lifted  fully fuelled from Earth into orbit by a Starship, ready to head to Mars, and would not require in-orbit propellant transfer.

Musk is fixated on having just one workhorse: Starship.  Yet it has already morphed into 4 distinct variants:  the passenger Starship; the fuel tanker; the cargo version with its huge bay door; and the Moon landing vehicle.  One more wouldn't make much difference.

A concept for "Starboat"

Here is a video about Robert Zubrin's take on Musk' Mars plan.

Will we get to Mars?  Yes.  Will Mars have a million inhabitants by 2060?  I doubt it.  

But the first scientific bases will expand, and eventually there will be small towns with a few thousand inhabitants living in domes and caverns.  It will take decades to reach a Martian population of a million.

Meanwhile, the need to make it all work will be powerful technological driver, providing incentives to develop the technology needed for a space civilisation, all of which will be good for Earth.  Think for example of the need for vat meat and fish, for air and water purification systems, for workable, safe, small nuclear reactors, for plant varieties which can flourish in very different conditions from on Earth, and for more efficient, cheaper and faster transportation between Mars and Earth.  Just as space has already led to incredibly useful new technologies on Earth--solar panels being just one--so will Mars lead to improvements in Earth-based technology and science.

The Muskratic Party

 By Matt Wuerker

Thank you

I started this blog in July 2010.  I felt I had something to say about economies and economics, about politics, and about the environment, and not enough people to say it to.  When I first started, you had to use HTML to write the blog (you still have to use it now, sometimes, to fix mistakes), I had no idea how to post graphs to the blog, and I didn't even have a Twitter account to promote the blog.  I've learnt a lot since then.

In the first month, I got 3 views.  In August, 1.  In September, 17.   Talk about exponential growth!  By July 2012, this had grown to 247.  Last month, May, nearly 15 years later, there were 39,950 visits!  I wonder how many of them are from AI scrapers, though.  Am I too cynical?

So I wanted to say thank you, to all of you who read my ramblings.  My interests are my own, and I'm sure many people aren't interested in the things I am.  I find the world fascinating.  It's interesting to see connections, to understand how things work, to consider how public policy should shift to make the world a better place.  I'm more interested in good policy and good government than in any left or right view of the world, though I incline leftish.  It's just so happened that most of the damaging policies and laws have come from the Right and oligarchs since I started this blog.

15 years ago, I had become convinced that neo-liberalism was wrong, and that it would lead to greater and greater inequality and division, and I was right.  

I was wrong about action on climate change.  I kept on hoping that, given the inescapable logic of the impending climate catastrophe, we would (collectively) act to slash emissions.  But there was organised and cynical opposition and lies from powerful and wealthy interests; there was hypocrisy and greenwashing from politicians and elites; and too many ordinary people felt helpless in the face of the fossil fuel juggernaut.  But I am not giving up.  We must keep fighting.  Every 0.1 degree of heating avoided is absolutely worth it.  If I have played some small part in galvanising ordinary citizens into action,  I'm glad.

What will the next 15 years bring?  

Well, I think neo-liberalism is in its death throes.  Covid showed conclusively that governments can do some things better than the private sector.   And China's success in creating new renewables industries from scratch shows that government-driven industrial policy can work.  The triumph of Trump and MAGA in America shows the perils of ever rising inequality, and may yet galvanise the Democratic Party to become a real workers' party.  Will they ever support a rising minimum wage?  A wealth tax?  High taxes on billionaires?  Taxing companies like we used to in the 50s and 60s?  We'll see.

Will we make it to Mars?  It would be an extraordinary achievement.  I know the Left thinks it's a waste of money, and that we should fix up Earth first.  But as I have argued on these pages, I am convinced that setting up even just a scientific outpost on Mars will engender a technological revolution which will improve our lives right here on Earth.  Will it be Elon who gets us there?  Doesn't look like it right now, as he visibly disintegrates.  Yet, until his lurch into far-right lunacy, he had transformed EVs and Space.   Maybe he's the only one driven enough and rich enough to make it happen.  The Trump administration is too corrupt and inept.   He made EVs cool.   And others followed his lead.  Will others follow the path he's created to cut the costs of space?  

Will we cut emissions by 90% by 2050?  Probably yes.  Battery and EV and solar costs will just keep on falling, despite fossil fuel companies and half-witted and corrupt politicians.  And big majorities everywhere now accept the reality of climate change and its likely catastrophic consequences.   So as costs fall, and awareness rises, we'll get action.  Hopium?  Again, we'll see.

I'll keep working on my sword and sorcery fantasy novels and short stories, which I don't normally talk about here.  Eight novels and counting!  I'll keep on learning languages or refreshing those I already know.  This year it's French and Italian, and I'm relearning Ancient Greek.  I'll get back into music--I play the clarinet and the saxophone, but need to practise more. 

And big news (I think so!) is that I'll be starting a linked YouTube Volewica channel soon.   And you can follow the blog on Bluesky or on Mastodon.

Anyway, I hope I'm spared for another 15 years.  The odds are low, but I'll keep going as long as I can, convinced that my informed 99% vegan diet has extended and will continue to extend my life.

Thank you all, again. 

Tesla Is Getting Absolutely Creamed In Europe

From Inside EVs 

Tesla is getting shellacked. Toasted. Wrecked. Destroyed. Choose whatever synonym suits you, the result is the same: The company's European business is collapsing.

That is not an exaggeration. Sales fell a whopping 49% last month in Europe, according to data from the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (ACEA). Don't blame an EV slowdown, either, as purely electric cars are on a bit of a tear in Europe. Sales increased 27.8% in April, to 184,685 units across the European Union (EU), European Free Trade Agreement (EFTA) countries and the United Kingdom.

EVs accounted for 15.3% of the new vehicles registered in those markets, a new high-water mark for an April report. It's a good reminder that, as the U.S. waffles back and forth on EV policy, many other markets are charging ahead.

Now, they're doing so with less reliance on Tesla. Elon Musk's company used to be the biggest name in EV sales, but increased competition and the boss's political meddling have proven to be a toxic combination. Tesla is still the EV sales leader in the U.S., but it's also struggling here. Buyers in Europe have been quick to abandon the brand, too, while Chinese buyers are ditching Teslas for home-grown brands.

It's not clear if Tesla has a solution to this problem. While the company pinned its hopes on the refreshed Model Y, that strategy clearly didn't work. First, Musk tried to blame the sales slump on factory downtime during the transition from building old Model Ys to new ones. Now that inventory levels are up and the factories have been running normally for some time, that excuse isn't holding water, so it looks like the new Model Y hasn't moved the needle.

That means any growth we see from Tesla is going to have to come from either price cuts or new models. The company has already cut its prices repeatedly in recent years, leaving it less room to move down. Plus, with U.S. tax credits on the chopping block, Tesla's products are already about to get $7,500 more expensive in its home market. Just mitigating that change will chew into Tesla's margins, and that's before you account for the increased production costs thanks to new tariffs on auto parts.

New products seem like a better way out, but I'm skeptical they can fundamentally reset the trend here. Elon Musk has repeatedly said that Tesla's value is in AI, not in car-making, and his relentless focus on full self-driving has taken up most of the company's resources. Its products are old—the Model S debuted in 2012 and the Model 3 in 2017, and while both have received refreshes, they are no longer world-beating EVs. Its lone truly new product, the Cybertruck, is a flop. And its next three products seem to be a moderately updated Model Y, a Cybercab with only two seats and, eventually, large-scale production of the Semi.

The gamble, it seems, is that true self-driving technology will reset the value proposition of these vehicles. An even less luxurious, more drab Model Y strikes me as an unappealing offering. But if you can deliver a self-driving car that fits plenty of passengers and cargo and can go 300 miles on a charge for like, $35,000, I can see it working.

The problem is that being a self-driving car company requires one thing above all: Trust. Consumers need to trust that companies offering autonomous driving products have fully validated the safety of the technology. After years of using the public as beta testers, then a year of live-tweeting the destruction of all regulatory bodies, I just don't know if Elon Musk can still inspire that trust among buyers.

Still, it may be the only option he has left. As the European sales collapse shows, this is not the time to keep calm and carry on. Tesla has become a toxic brand in many corners of the world, and its products are less exciting than they used to be.

The company needs a reset, but it may not be getting one soon.

Department of Pure Evil

 By Ned Hartley, in The Beano.