Could Elon Musk become vice president, and eventually president? By Hal M. Brown

Last night I posted a second blog for the day: "The quickest exit for Elon Musk will be if he steals Trump's thunder. If he goes if this is a good or bad thing? "  It featured 11 AI images of Musk like the one below. The image above is also AI.

This morning I got to thinking about how Musk could end up as vice president and be positioned to become the next president. If the United States had a President Musk the richest man in the world would become the most powerful man in the world. 

Musk, the star man, has boldly gone where no man has gone before.

He has actually moved into Mar-a-Lago. 

I wouldn't be surprised if he manages to not only have a White House office but a bedroom there. Perhaps Melania can move into her parent's house. Then Musk could have her bedroom. 

Historically there have been 10 very influential First Ladies (see list).  Eleanor Roosevelt is probably the best known. Musk could end up being the first person Trump sees in the morning and the last person he sees at night with pop-in rights to the Oval Office thoughout the day.

If the sun could shine in the White House he'd literally be Trump's shadow. He'd be the shadow president. He'd have to be careful not to throw shade on Trump and he'd have to play his ambition cards very close to his chest. One thing I think he has in common with Trump is that he doesn't have a true best friend. Perhaps they could, for the first time in their lives, have a true best friend. 

One thing he has in common with Trump is that he seems to spend as much time posting and re-posting on his X page (here) as Trump does on Truth Social. You can follow Trump's posts there without subscribing on the Trump's Truth website (here).

When I see how uninhibited Musk is in the scene below I can see how this lack of restraint is attractive to Trump. Trump tries to losen up physically as evidenced by his attempts to dance.

When I see photos like the one below I see more affection coming from Trump than I see him expressing for anyone except Barron. This includes Melania. 

When I look at the photo below I wonder what is going on in J.D. Vance's mind.

I think it is fair to say that Vance wasn't happy when he saw the photo below:

Below: This was on TikTok (here). I don't know if is real or AI but it went viral (read article) so it hardly matters. Vance, if he saw it, can't be happy about it.

While there has been considerable speculation about who would be more dangerous to democracy a president between Trump and, should he die or become seriously ill, J. D. Vance. 

I haven't seen anyone address the possibility that Musk could become vice president and thus be positioned to become president either during the next fours years or in the next election.

Trump can fire anybody in the Executive Branch except Vance. Presidents can't fire vice presidents. They either have to die or resign for the president to nominate a new vice president:

25th Amendment: Whenever there is a vacancy in the office of the Vice President, the President shall nominate a Vice President who shall take office upon confirmation by a majority vote of both Houses of Congress.

If Trump wanted to replace Vance with Musk he'd have to persuade Vance to resign, or get rid of him in other ways - Considering the Supreme Court decisions on presdiential immunity I'll leave it to you to ponder on what methods he might employ if Vance didn't agree to leave gracefully.

I haven't give any thought to how differently Musk would govern than Trump, or J.D. Vance who seems to be 100% behind implementing the 2025 Project. Neither Trump nor Vance have what I'd call a social conscience. Musk's biographer says "Elon Musk doesn't have a natural feel for empathy or emotions, says his biographer who's followed him for three years" (read article in Business Insider).

My friends and I have concluded that J. D. Vance would be at least as dangrous to democracy if he was president as Trump. We haven't dicussed who would be a president who is more dangerous to democracy between Trump, Vance, and Musk. I have only begun to think about it today.

I think all three would want to govern in a dictatorial manner. I think Trump would be the most ruthless and bloodthirsty dictator intent on revenge against his enemies. Trump is sadistic. Vance and Musk don't really seem to enjoy watching people who cross them suffer. They may have enemies but I haven't seen examples of their wanting to inflict pain on them and want to enjoy seeing their lives ruined.

Addendum:

On graph of how boring a president could be, Trump will not be boring, anything but. He's a perfomance artist. Between the weave, the nicknames, the hyperbole, those he picked to be at his Madison Square Garden rally, and his willingness to do the outrageous (like some of his Cabinet picks) he's a Pandora's box of provocation. Vance would be a boring snoozer. Musk is also a performance artist. He might be even less boring than Trump. 

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The quickest exit for Elon Musk will be if he steals Trump's thunder. If he goes if this is a good or bad thing? By Hal M. Brown

 

If there are more articles like this on RawStory ( here and below) Elon's days sitting next to Trump at Thanksgiving and other celebrations and munching Big Macs at his table on an airplane may be numbered:

It took me a few minutes to make the images below using Perhcnace Photo AI.

Elon doesn't have to make and sell these as $99 NTF trading cards like Trump did. 

It would be easy enough for someone else to do. While I am not about to try to make money off of this I'm sorely tempted to start a website offering them for donations of any amount to something I'd call the Make Elon Greater Than Trump PAC. 

Of course it would be utterly stupid for anyone to send me money for images I'd just email to them. Who would be stupid enough to send money for the Elon astronaut series?

The whole point would be for Trump to think Elon is behind this and getting publicity for being the brains behind Trump. Thus we'd have the pièce de résistance.

Here's the brain behind Trump featuring the Elon as Einstein collection. Elon is far richer than Trump could ever. It would be ridiculous to compare his intellect to the buffoon who says he has the Biggest Brain.

This is the follow-up to this blog: Could Elon Musk become vice president, and eventually president?

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Will teenaged anti-trans bigot be the first kid to get the Medal of Freedom? By Hal M. Brown

 

There is a good case to be made that Donald Trump wouldn't have won the election had he not made the lie about schools changing the gender of children a major issue.

I lived in the town of Middleboro (sometimes spelled Middleborough) for 20 years having moved there to grow cranberries on my late wife's family farm. Having moved to Oregon I keep up with a close friend there and have a Google News search for news about the town. This is how I came across this article.

I saw the article shown above (link here) this morning. It was just above a story about someone who had cranberry bogs down the street from where we lived.

I don't think there many still living famous people who are from Middleboro. I know of professional wrestler Rick Fuller, pictured on top of the page, who is a well liked townie. My close friend in Middleboro knows him very well. As far as I can tell he still operates Anything Goes Removal there. There are a few more listed here.

Tom Thumb and his wife lived there when they retired. The house they lived in has been made into a little museum.  

I am quite sure nobody from the town has made it onto the Law and Crime website (read article).

The case also made Education Week (read here)

This is a Friend of the Court brief filed in support of the school's decision.

In this election Massachusetts went clearly for Harris. Middleborough went for Trump 7,807 (57.2%) to Harris' 5,642 (41.3%).  In 2020 the town voted 53.1% for Trump and 45.7% for Biden so the Republicans did even better in this election. If this is any indication there must be many people who applaud the fight this kid and his family are engaged in for his right to wear a t-shirt in school that has been adjucated to be a type of bullying.

Here's an excerpt from the article published in Boston.com:

Eighteen state attorneys general from mostly Republican-led states are voicing their support for the Massachusetts middle schooler who claims his First Amendment rights were violated when he was banned from wearing a “There are only two genders” shirt to school last year. 

Liam Morrison, a then-seventh grader at Nichols Middle School in Middleborough, was sent home from school in March 2023 after he refused to change his t-shirt. A District Court judge found that his rights were not violated, and a United States Court of Appeals agreed in June.

The case was filed on behalf of Morrison and his family last year by two conservative Christian groups, Alliance Defending Freedom and the Massachusetts Family Institute. The groups have said they will appeal to the Supreme Court. 

Middleboro is obviously a politically divided town. When I lived there I was on a diversity committee along with school administrators, church, and community leaders. But there has always been a very conservative, I would say bigoted, side of the town. When the Wampanoag Mashpee tribe wanted to open a Native American casino there the town made the national news. Many residents were so adamently opposed to this not only because of the gambling but because of the number of non-White people who would move to the town to work in the casino that they said if it opened they would move. They said there would be a migration from cities like Fall River and New Bedford to the south which would be like the Ho Chi Minh Trail since many Asians lived in thos cities. People were complaining that 30 different languages would be spoken in the schools.

Up until now Simone Biles has been the youngest person to receive the Medal of Freedom (see Axios).

She is not only the greatest gymnast of all time but one of the greatest athletes ever. 

It wouldn't surprise me if the teenaged brainwashed bigot who is no doubt the hero of the anti-trans crowd for his daring act of wearing a t-shirt that will make lots of other students very uncomfortable can claim that he's an anti-woke hero. It wouldn't surprise me if Trump, who always knows how to own "woke" liberals, has already had someone suggest that this kid should be award the Medal of Freedom. I wouldn't be surprised if see videos and photos of this kids standing next to the man who is, I have no doubt, his hero when this medal is clasped around his neck.

I see this kid as a victim. He has been brainwashed into bigotry. I only hope, Medal of Freedom or not, as he grows up and gains critical thinking skills and perhaps becomes aquainted with trans and other members of the LGBTQ+ community he sees the errors of his ways.

The more famous he becomes now the more impact an eventual mea culpa will have.

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The only upside I can see of a President Trump is that he scares the sh*t out of some of our enemies, by Hal M. Brown

 

Consider this from the NY Times article Hamas Faces a Future Without Its Most Important Ally (subscription)

And Iran, which supports Hamas and Hezbollah, seems keen to avoid a direct fight with Israel, at least for now. Iran’s air defense systems were devastated in an Israeli attack in October, and after the victory of President-elect Donald J. Trump, the Iranians appear to have called off a reprisal attack.

There's no way that the authors of this article could know that Trump's election was the reason Iran hasn't attacked Israel. After all Trump isn't president yet. The point is still made. 

While Russia may benefit from Trump being president when it comes to Ukraine, other countries on Trump's bad side may decide it's the height of reckless insanity to incure the wrath of someone who has to prove he's Rambo on steroids.

Unfortunately the countries that may be on the receiving end of the rage of Trump when they don't bend at the knees before him may include Mexico and Canada. He's already threatened to take military action against Mexico.(See addendum below) 

Does he figure that since the United States won the first Mexican-American War which led to Mexico ceding present-day California, Texas, New Mexico, Utah, Nevada, and parts of several other states to the United States he'd easily win the second war with Mexico.

Nah.... Trump doesn't know details about history so I rather doubt he knows more about that war than it had something to do with Davy Crocket and the Alamo (and he may not remember that we lost that battle).

Trump likes the idea of being in a "trade war" simply because of the second word. He wants to be viewed as a warrior. Whether it's a war of words, a war against the "deep state," a war against fake news, a war against "woke," Trump has to win.  

I doubt there are many people in the entire world who don't know what MAGA means and that Trump wants it to mean "don't f*ck around with me, or else." He wants any adversary, whether an individual, institution, or another country to have an episode of uncontrollable fecal incontinence (there's a slang term for this that involves soiling one's pants) at the mere thought of going up against the country he believes belongs to him.

Addendums/updates:

1)

From Trump team debates "how much" they should invade Mexico, Rolling Stone reports

Excerpt:

Trump's pick for defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, has previously referred to Mexican drug cartels as “terrorist-like organizations poisoning our population” and said on Fox News last year that military action may be required to “put the fear in the minds of the drug lords.” 

Last year, Rep. Mike Waltz, R-Fla., Trump’s pick for national security adviser, also introduced a bill to authorize the use of military force against Mexican drug cartels.

Trump's "border czar" Tom Homan, meanwhile, has claimed Trump will definitely use the military against cartels. “President Trump is committed to calling them a terrorist organization and using the full might of the United States special operations to take them out,” Homan said.

Perhaps these tough talkers don't think that Mexican police and military have tried this, and they know what I assume is the rough terrain where the drug labs and well armed cartel members have their hideouts. Achieving this goal isn't a script for the movie Zero Dark Thirty. While many won't admit it, aside from superlative planning and execution luck played a part in the success of the Osama bin Laden mission.

Does Hegseth think it will be a simple matter to put fear into the mind of drug lords? Is America ready for some of our elite soldiers to come back home in body bags?

2)

For those who sent me messages saying they can't stand to see these delusional images of a muscle bound Trump, this is the real macho man:

Click images to enlarge.

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What happens when a malignant narcsissist is also delusional? By Hal M. Brown, MSW

Clinical psychologist and Donald Trump's niece Mary Trump thinks her uncle is delusional. Below is is what she wrote on her website.

I've highlighted the portion that struck me below:

I wouldn’t be shocked, either. We know my uncle is committed to re-writing the history of his attempted coup. He’s even directed Pam Bondi, his latest Attorney General nominee, to investigate the 2020 election for fraud that does not exist.

Donald is determined to force his delusions into reality, and he will use the Justice Department to help him do that.

In my clinically informed opinion as someone who worked as a psychotherapist for 40 years it isn't only delusions about the coup and his winning the election but his susceptibility to believing other things that are demonstrably untrue that shed light on his psychopathology.

This is from the Wikipedia description of delusional disorder:

Delusional disorder, traditionally synonymous with paranoia, is a mental illness in which a person has delusions, but with no accompanying prominent hallucinations, thought disorder, mood disorder, or significant flattening of affect. Delusions are a specific symptom of psychosis. Delusions can be bizarre or non-bizarre in content;  non-bizarre delusions are fixed false beliefs that involve situations that could occur in real life, such as being harmed or poisoned. Apart from their delusion or delusions, people with delusional disorder may continue to socialize and function in a normal manner and their behavior does not necessarily seem odd. However, the preoccupation with delusional ideas can be disruptive to their overall lives.

Most of the severely mentally ill patients I treated or had in my program had the symptoms of their psychosis controlled with medication. One unmedicated patient I recall with a delusional disorder believed that a famous Hollywood star was in love with him and was sending him mental messages. He ended up at the airport without a ticket trying to board a plane to California insisting the star would pay for it when he arrived.

The consquences of the delusions Trump and some of his supporters seem beset with are far less benign. My client didn't try to hijack a plane. Trump and his delusional cadre of enablers want to hijack our democracy.

Of course some of these people aren't delusional. They are psychopaths. I won't name names here but those who want to inflict pain on others whether they are migrants, so-called enemies of the state, or people protesting peacefully, I am convinced that if clincally evaluated they would be diagnosed as psychopathic personalities. This is "a personality construct characterized by impaired empathy and remorse, in combination with traits of boldness, disinhibition, and egocentrism. These traits are often masked by superficial charm and immunity to stress, which create an outward appearance of apparent normalcy." (Wikipedia)

The psychopaths are people who may or may not be aware that Trump and others who he is influenced by are clinically delusional, but they are more than willing to take advantage of the fact that Trump has these false beliefs.

Combine Trump's malignant narcissism (see The malevolent magnetic malignant narcissism of Trumpworld) which includes a lack of empathy and sadism with his delusions you have a dangerous mix of psyhopathologies which ultimately will not just cause people to suffer but is likely to lead to the loss of innocent life. 

As if this isn't unsettling enough add the phallocentricism of Trump and his hyper-masculine crew (see The penises on the Potomac: the country has enthroned phallocentric rule) we have the real possiblity that we will have a replay of the Kent State Masacre. (See Will it take another Kent State Massacre to convince Trump supporters that he's gone too far?)

 You can read all the coments I post to articles in RawStory here

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