Elon Musk speaks at the Qatar Economic Forum.

Elon Musk speaks at the Qatar Economic Forum.

#ElonMusk

Source: Reuters

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Europe is our weakest market. We're stronger everywhere else, so
our sales are are doing doing well at this point.
We don't anticipate any any meaningful sales shortfall, and the
you know the obviously the stock market recognizes that since

(00:22):
we're now back over a trillion dollars in market caps,
so really the market is aware of the situation. So
it's it's already turned around.

Speaker 2 (00:29):
But sales still down compared to this time last year
in your in Europe.

Speaker 1 (00:36):
Okay, and yes, but that's that's true of all manufacturers.
There's no except questions.

Speaker 2 (00:45):
Does that mean that you're not going to be able?

Speaker 1 (00:48):
Does that mean you're quite weak?

Speaker 2 (00:50):
Okay, but you would acknowledge when you that what you
are facing. Okay, let's just take it as Europe, what
you are facing is a significant problem. This Tesla is
an incredibly aspiration national brand. People identified with it, it
saw it, they saw it as being at the forefront
of the climate crisis. And now people are driving around
with stickers in their car saying I bought this before

(01:11):
we knew Elon was crazy.

Speaker 1 (01:14):
And there are also people who are by buying it
because Elon's crazy, or however they may view it. So, yes,
we've lost some sales perths on the left, but we've
gained them on the right. The sales numbers at this
point are strong, and if we've seen no problem with them.

Speaker 2 (01:31):
Mad So what I mean?

Speaker 1 (01:34):
You can just look at the stock price if you
want the best insider information. The stock market analysts have
that and stock wouldn't be trading near all time eyes
if it was not. If things weren't, They're fine. Don't
worry about it.

Speaker 2 (01:54):
Okay, I was citing sales figures rather than share price.
Well tell me then, how committed you are to Tesla?
Do you see yourself and are you committed to still
being the chief executive of Tesla in five years time? Yes,
no doubt about that at all.

Speaker 1 (02:15):
Well no, I might die, Okay, sure to that. Let
me see you I'm dead? So slight?

Speaker 2 (02:25):
Does that mean that the value of your pay doesn't
have any bearing on your decision?

Speaker 1 (02:36):
Well that's not really Sorry discussion in this forum. The
I think, obviously there should be a conversation for if
there's something incredible is done, that compensation should match that
something incredible was done. But I'm confident that whatever the

(03:00):
whatever some activist posing as a judge in Delaware. Happens
to do will not affect the future compensation.

Speaker 2 (03:07):
This is the judge you twice struck down the fifty
six billion dollar pay package that was that was awarded
to you. I think the value on the basis on
the current value of stock options.

Speaker 1 (03:19):
Yeah, not a judge, not a judge. The activist who
is causplaying a judge in a Halloween costume.

Speaker 2 (03:26):
Okay, that's your characterization. I think the on the current
value of stock options. I think the actual justice according
to the law, on the current value of stock options.
I think the value of that pay package stands at
about one hundred billion dollars. Are you saying you are
relaxed about the value of your future pay package. Your

(03:47):
decision to be committed to Tesla for the next five
years as long as you are still with us on
this planet is completely independent of pay. No, it's not independent.
So pay is a relevant factor then to your commitment
to Tesla.

Speaker 1 (04:06):
A sufficient boarding control such that I cannot be ousted
by activists investors is what matters to me. And I've
said this publicly many times, but let's not have this
whole thing be a discussion of my list pay. It's
not a money thing. It's a reasonable control thing over
the future of the company, especially if we building millions,
potentially billions of humanoid robots. I can't be sitting there

(04:31):
and one going to get tossed out by for political
reasons by activists. That would be unacceptable. That's all that matters. Now,
let's move on.

Speaker 2 (04:39):
Okay, Well just one question, move on, Well, one question
before we move on to other companies, which is that
I wonder if some of what you've has happened to
Tesla in the last few months, did you take it personally?

Speaker 1 (04:56):
Yes?

Speaker 2 (04:58):
And did it make you re great? Any of you
all think twice about your political endeavors because it is
I I.

Speaker 1 (05:14):
Did what needed to be done, uh, the violent antibody reaction,
and I'm just I'm not someone who's ever committed violence,
and yet massive violence was committed against my companies, massive
violence was threatened against me. Who are these people? Why
would they do that? How wrong can they be? They're

(05:38):
on the wrong, on the wrong side of history, and
that's an evil thing to do to go and damage
some pointocent person's car, to threaten to kill me. What
strong are these people? I have not harmed anyone. So
something needs to be done about them, and a number

(06:01):
of them are going to prison and they deserve it.

Speaker 2 (06:05):
You're well, you're referring to the attacks on Tesla showrooms,
but I.

Speaker 1 (06:11):
Think, well, it's into showrooms and burning down cars is unacceptable.
Those people will go to prison, and the people that
funded them and organized them will also go to prison.

Speaker 2 (06:22):
Don't worry, wouldn't you, wouldn't you or wouldn't wouldn't you
acknowledge that some of the people who turned against Tesla
in Europe were were upset at your politics, and very
few of them would have been violent in any way.

(06:42):
They just objected to what they saw you say or
do politically.

Speaker 1 (06:48):
Well, it's certainly fine to object to political things, but
it's not it's not fine to resort to violence and
hanging someone in effigy and death threats. That's obviously not okay.
You know, that's absurd. That is in no way justifiable
at all in any way, shape or format. And some

(07:11):
of the legacy media and nonelests have sort of justified,
which is unconscionable. Shame on them.

Speaker 2 (07:16):
Let's talk about your other companies. Then, in other business areas,
SpaceX I saw that you said in a speech at
the West Point Military Academy recently that the future of
warfare is AI and drones, and obviously defense is an
increasingly booming sector. With the state of the world at
the moment, do you see SpaceX moving into weaponized drones?

Speaker 1 (07:49):
You certainly ask interesting questions that are impossible to answer.
So SpaceX is is the space launch leader, So SpaceX
doesn't do drones. SpaceX builds rockets, satellites and its terminals.

(08:11):
So SpaceX has a a very dominant position in space launch.
So of the mass launch to orbit this year, SpaceX
will probably do, China will do the remain half half
of the remaining amounts of five percent, and the rest
of the world, including the rest of the US, will

(08:32):
do about five percent. So SpaceX will do about ten
times as much as the rest of the world combined,
or twenty times as much as China, which is in
China is doing actually a very impressive job. The reason
for this is that we're putting it into orbit the
largest satellite constellation the Walls have ever seen by far,
So I think at this point about maybe approaching eight

(08:53):
percent of all active satellites in orbit are SpaceX and
they're providing high high mad with global connectvity throughout the world.
In fact, this connection is on a SpaceX connection. So
I think this is a very good thing because it
means that we can provide low cost by bandwidth internet
to pass the world if don't have it or it's

(09:14):
very expensive. And I think the single biggest thing you
can do to look people out of poverty and help
them is giving them an Internet connection, because once you
have the Internet connection, you can learn anything for free
on the Internet, and you can also sell your goods
and services to the global market. And we want to

(09:36):
have knowledge by the Internet and the ability to engage
in commerce that this is going to greatly improve quality
of life for people throughout the world. And it has.
And I'd just like to think anyone in the audience
who may have been helpful and you know, with Starlink
and getting it to approved in their country. And I

(09:58):
think it's doing a lot of good in the countries
that have a pret of it, which is I think
this point one hundred and thirty countries are very happy
with it. I don't currently into space space actually getting
into the weapons business. That's something that's not an aspiration
we're freaquent. We're frequently asked to do to do weapons programs,
but we have justified a client.

Speaker 2 (10:17):
Do you envisage SpaceX or indeed starlink as a separate
entity publicly listing in the near future or at all.

Speaker 1 (10:30):
It's possible that starlink may go public at some point
in the future.

Speaker 2 (10:36):
And what would be the what would be the time frame,
what kind of time frame you consider it?

Speaker 1 (10:42):
I mean no rush, no, I mean no rush to
your public. The public is, I guess, a way to
you know, potentially make more money, but at the expense
of a lot of public company overhead and inevitably a
whole bunch of lawsuits which are very annoying. So really
something needs to be done about the share shareholder shareholder

(11:04):
at road of lawsuits in the US because it allows
plaintiff's law firms who don't represent the shareholders to pretend
that they represent the shareholders by getting a puppet plaintiff
with a few shares to initiate a massive lawsuits the company,
and the irony being that extreme irony that even if

(11:26):
the class they purport to represent were to vote that
they don't want the lawsuit, the lawsuit will still continue.
So how can it be a class action representing a
class if the class were against it? And that's the
bizarre situation with Ground in the US that needs it's
a diary to perform as anyone's running public company. You've
experienced this. It's an absurd situation that needs to change.

Speaker 2 (11:50):
Well, do you think Donald Trump might change it? You've
certainly got his ear. I imagine that you've put this
to him. Is this something you're trying to change before
any alnk Ipo.

Speaker 1 (12:02):
Well, we need, we need a law to be passed.
The trouble being that you need sixty Senate Senate voters
and the Democrats will vote against it. The the the
plaintiff's bar is I believe, the second and largest contributor

(12:23):
to the Democratic Party. That's that's the issue. At the
state level, this can be solved, and I should say
Texas recently passed a law which at at least the
state level made Yes, it's much more reasonable because you
have to get at least one in thirty three shareholders
to agree that they are part of a class of

(12:46):
shareholders three. This is a This will be really helped
with privilege lawsuits.

Speaker 2 (12:54):
Okay, let's talk about AI, which is in so many
of your businessnesses and in all our worlds in different ways.
It's one of the big changes the development of generative AI.
Since you last spoke to this forum three years ago,
you're in this space, of course with Grop which almost

(13:15):
everyone will know. You co founded open ai and then left,
and you've obviously got a legal battle with open ai
and Sam Altman. I wonder if you could say something
about the status of that, because you were together in
Saudi Arabia with the president last week, with Sam Altman
in the same place at the same time.

Speaker 1 (13:36):
In the neighborhood.

Speaker 2 (13:38):
So does that mean you are pushing ahead with the
lawsuit against open ai.

Speaker 1 (13:45):
Yes. So I came up with the name open ai
as an open source and as a nonprofit, and I
founded AI opening I for the first roughly fifty million dollars,
and it was intended to be a nonprofit open source company,

(14:06):
and now is they're trying to change that for their
own financial benefit into a for profit company that is
closed source. So this would be like let's say you
you finded a nonprofit to help reserve the Amazon rainforest,
but instead of doing that, they became a lumber company
chopped down the forest and sold the word. You'd be like,

(14:28):
wait a second, that's not what I funded. That's opening eye.

Speaker 2 (14:32):
They've made some changes to their call for instructure, though,
haven't they since in recognition of of what you've said?

Speaker 1 (14:40):
Now that's just what they told the media.

Speaker 2 (14:43):
Okay, they have part they have partly walked back their
plan to restructure the business. I guess that's made no
difference to how you feel about it. So you determined
to see them in court, of course, Well, that's that's
certainly going to be one to watch. I also wanted

(15:04):
to ask you about AI and regulation because when you
were here last talking to John Nickolthway, you had some
pretty strong words about the risk that AI poses, and
you said that you really felt what the US was
missing was a federal AI regulator, that you know, something
along lines of the Food and Drug Administration or the

(15:25):
Federal Aviation Administration. Now you're clearly now in a zone
where you're more you're more on the cutting regulation side
than wanting new regulators. So has your view changed on
the need for an AI regulator?

Speaker 1 (15:38):
Well, that that I don't think there should be regulator.
Is you think of regulators like referees on the on
the field. In sports, there should be some number of referees,
but that you shouldn't have so many referees that you
can kick the ball without hitting one. So in many
and most fields in the US, that the regulatory burden

(16:01):
has grown over time to the point where it's like
having more referees than players on the field. So and
this is a natural consequence of an extended period of prosperity.
It's very important to appreciate this. This is happened throughout history.
When you have an extended period of prosperity with no
existential war, there's no there's no cleansing function for the

(16:27):
for unnecessary laws and regulations. So what happens is that
every year more laws and more regulations are pasted, because
you know, legislators are going to legislate, regulators are going
to regulate, and you will get the steady pile of
more and more laws and regulations of a time until

(16:48):
everything is illegal. And let me give you an example
of a truly absurd situation under the Biden administration, Space
EFFX was sued for not hiring asylum seekers in the US. Now,
the problem is it's actually illegal for SpaceX under itard

(17:08):
in National Traffic and Arms regulations to hire anyone who
is not a permanent resident of the United States, because
the preface being that they will take advanced rocket technology
and return to their home country if they're not a
permanent resident. So we're simultaneously in a situation where it's
illegal to hire simul science use and is also illegal

(17:28):
to hire asylum seekers, and the Widen's Departner of Justice
chose to prosecute us despite both paths being illegal. Down
if you do, Down if you don't.

Speaker 2 (17:39):
My question specifically about a regulator for AI, which you
said three years ago was needed, and you said we
need to be proactive on the regulation of AI rather
than reactive. Have you changed your mind on that?

Speaker 1 (17:54):
No, of course not. No, of course not. What I'm
saying is that there should be summer recently on the field,
a few referees, but you shouldn't have a field jam
packed with referees, uh that such that you cannot kick
the ball in any direction without hitting one. So the
the fields that have been around for a long time,

(18:14):
such as automotive, so aerospace, you know, if the sort
of food and drug industries are overregulated, but the new
fields like artificial intelligence are underregulated. In fact, there is
no regulator.

Speaker 2 (18:32):
At all, so they should be. Do you still think.

Speaker 1 (18:34):
That, Yes, I'm simply saying, which I think is just
basic common sense, that you want to have at least
you want to have a few referees in the field.
You don't want to have an army of referees, but
you want to have a few referees on any given field,
in any given sport or any given arena, industrial arena,

(18:56):
to ensure help that public safety is taking care of
of But you already has. So there's a there's a
there's a proper number of referees. Like I said, it's
actually very easy to visualize this when compared to sports.
If the whole field is packed with referees, that would
look absurd. But if there were no referees at all,

(19:17):
your game is not going to be as good.

Speaker 2 (19:19):
Okay, So let's then talk about your new world, your
your role advising government. You are in this unique and
unprecedented position of having billions of dollars worth of contracts
with the federal government yourself, mostly through SpaceX and also
now an insight does knowledge of it because of those

(19:40):
can you see that there is a conflict of interest
or a potential conflict of interest in broad terms, just
through that very fact.

Speaker 1 (19:51):
I don't think so. Actually, there have been many advisors
in throughout history and the US goverment and others who
have had economic interests, and I am silutely an advisor.
I don't have a formal power. And that's a president
can choose to accept my advice or not, and that's

(20:12):
that's how it goes. If there's a single contract that
any of my companies that have received that people think
is somehow not was awarded improperly, it would immediately be
front page news, to say the least. And if if
if I hadn't mentioned it something, my competitors would. So

(20:32):
if you're not seeing that, then the cliller is not
a complex of interest. The Yeah, there's.

Speaker 2 (20:38):
Another way though to look at it. That For example,
you have many competitors, whether it's companies like Boeing or
companies would like to do more of the kind of
work you do for NASA Blue Origin Rocket Lab. And
because DOGE is in every federal government department, you or
people who work for DOGE and you are the driving

(21:01):
force behind it, have an insight into those companies affairs
and those companies relationships with the federal government.

Speaker 1 (21:11):
Now, all we do is we review the organization to
see if if the organization has departments that are no
longer relevant, and and then are the contracts that that
are being awarded good value for money? In fact, frankly,
the bar is not particularly high. Is there any value

(21:31):
money in a contract? And if there's if there isn't,
then we may make recommendations to the secretary. The secretary
can I choose to take those actions or not take
those actions, And that's it. And then any action that
that that is as a function of DOGE is posted
to the DOGE website and to the doge dog got

(21:52):
at doge handle on the x platform. So it's it's
complete tran transparency. And I have not seen any a
case where where so that's my large it's even been
an accusation of conflict because it is completely and utterly transparent.
That's it.

Speaker 2 (22:11):
And what about the international dimension. Now, let's think about Starlink.
Starlink is obviously a very very good internet service. It's
sought after all over the world. It's critical to the
frontline in Ukraine. It has also had more contracts coming
its way, and there is some evidence that companies are
allowing access to it because they want to be close

(22:33):
to the Trump administration and send the right signal. So
bloomberat It broke news today that the South African government
is working around the rules on black ownership in order
to allow starlinkin and that is being done on the
eve of the visit the President Ramaposa is going to
make the White House. Do you recognize that as a
conflict of interest?

Speaker 1 (22:54):
Now? Of course, first of all, you should be questioning
why is there why are the racist laws in Africa?
That's the first problem. That's what you should be attacking.
It's improper for the racist laws in South Africa. The
whole idea with what Nelson Mandela, who is a great man, proposed,
was that all races should be on an equal footing.
Is South Africa. That's the right thing to do, not

(23:15):
to replace one set of racist laws, but another set
of racist laws which is ubslutely wrong and improper. So
that's that's the deal, that all races should be treated
equally and there should be no preference given to one
or the other. Whereas there are now one hundred and
forty laws in South Africa that give that basically gives

(23:38):
strong preference to to if you're if you're black South
African and not otherwise. And so now I'm in the
subsurd situation where I was born in South Africa but
cannot get a license to operate installing because I'm not black. Well,
it looks it looks looks like that, right, it looks
like that's about to change. I just asked you a question,
Please answer. Does that seem right to you?

Speaker 2 (24:00):
Well, those rules were designed to bring Those rules were
designed to bring about an era of more economic equality
in South Africa, and it looks like the government has
found a way around those rules for you.

Speaker 1 (24:15):
Ask your question.

Speaker 2 (24:17):
This is this is your interview. Everyone wants to hear from.

Speaker 1 (24:19):
You, yes or no.

Speaker 2 (24:21):
Not for me, Not for me to answer. I have
got a question for you about about your government work
and the amount of savings raceless loves. This is not
for me to answer. Come on, now, you wouldn't be
trying to dodge a question.

Speaker 1 (24:40):
Question answer you answer?

Speaker 2 (24:42):
I say, I think if you I'm sure you can
have that conversation directly with the South African government if
you want to. I want to ask you about the
total I want to ask you about the total around.
I want to ask you about the total amount that
you're planning to save through doses work. Before the election,
you said it was going to be at least two trillion.

(25:04):
The number currently on dose DOGARV is one hundred and
seventy billion dollars. That's a big change. What happened to
the two trillion.

Speaker 1 (25:15):
Or do you expect it to happen immediately? Well?

Speaker 2 (25:17):
Is it going to happen because dose is supposed to
run till next July.

Speaker 1 (25:21):
I mean your question is episode in this fundamental premise?
Are you assuming that on day you know, within a
few months this instant two trillion saved.

Speaker 2 (25:30):
No, I'm not sure. I'm just asking you. Is that
still your aim?

Speaker 1 (25:33):
Then? Is it still your aim to get amount of time?
Have we not made good progress given the amount of time?

Speaker 2 (25:40):
That's exactly what I'm asking. So is it still your
aim to go from one hundred and seventy billion to
two trillion?

Speaker 1 (25:49):
The ability of those to operate is this function of
whether the government and doesn't quit. The Congress is willing
to take our advice. We're not the dictators of the government.
We are the advisors, and so we can advise, and
the progress we've made thus far I think is incredible.

(26:09):
Those teams do incredible work, but the magnitude of the
savings is proportionate to the support we get from Congress
and from the executive branch of the government in general.
So we're not the dictators. We are the advisors. But

(26:30):
thus far, for advisors with the DOG team, to their credit,
has made incredible progress.

Speaker 2 (26:40):
You've talked about four billion dollars a day being saved,
but that that won't get which is an I think
everyone can agree that combating waste and inefficiency in government
is a very good thing, but if you add that up,
is not going to get to two trillion over the
lifetime of DOG. I'm sorry, the four billion, the four

(27:04):
billion a day, if those are going to run till
next July, is not going to get you to two
trillion dollars. But you still say it's your aim, so
we'll take that as read.

Speaker 1 (27:18):
There's there's, there's, there's what doge I mean? I fail?
You're somewhat trapped in the NPC dialogue tree of a
traditional book journalist, so it's difficult when when I'm conversing
with someone who's trapped the dialogue of a conventional journalist
because it's like talking to a computer. So, uh, doge

(27:39):
is an advisory group. We are doing the best we
can as an advisory group. The progress made thus far
as an advisory group is excellent. I don't think any
advisory group has done better in the history of advisory
groups of the government. Now, we we do not make
the laws, nor do we control the the judiciary, nor

(28:01):
do we control the executive branch. We are simply advisors.
In that context, we're doing very well. Beyond that, we
cannot we cannot take action beyond that because we are
not some sort of imperial dictator of the government. There
are three branches of government that that art some degree
opposed to that level of cost savings. Unless let's let's

(28:26):
let's not criticize whether there's a four trillion. Instead look
at the fact that our sixty billion has been saved
and more. We say too.

Speaker 2 (28:37):
And as I said, I think everyone can agree that
cutting waste and indeed fraud in any government and being
responsible with taxpace money is a very good thing. So yes,
I can see, I can see that you're proud of
that work. I do want to ask you about USAID
and the comments that Bill Gates made the other day,

(28:59):
which I and I know that you called himim. I
know you've said that already.

Speaker 1 (29:05):
I wanted and I'm just who does Biggs think he
is to make comments about the welfare of children, given
that he is before quent to Jeffreystein.

Speaker 2 (29:17):
Okay, well, he's he's he said he regrets those and
he's spent. He spent. He spent a lot. He spent
a lot of his own money on on philanthropy around
the world over the years. My question to you is
have you looked at the data to check if he
might be right that the cuts to U s a

(29:39):
I D might cost millions of lives.

Speaker 1 (29:44):
Yes, I'd like him to pursure us any any evidence
whatsoever that that is true. It's false. The what we're
found with US cuts and by the way, they haven't
an open cut. The of the U s a D
that we found to be even slightly useful, we're transferred
to the Stage Profits, so they've not been deleted. They've
cerly been transferred to the stage department. But many many

(30:07):
times over with U SAD and other organizations when we've
when they said, oh, well, this is going to help
you know, children, or it's going to help some uh
disease eradication or something like that. And then when we
ask for any evidence whatsoever, I say, well, please connect
us with this group of children so we can talk

(30:28):
to them and understand more about their issue. We get nothing.
We don't We don't even try to prevent a show.
We should come up with a with a show orphan
meaning like it's sort of like, well, can we at
least see a few kids, like where are they if
they're in trouble, we'd like to talk to them and
talk to their caregivers. And then we get a thing

(30:49):
as a response, because it's what we find is an
enormous amount of fraud and graft.

Speaker 2 (30:57):
I put this example.

Speaker 1 (30:58):
Very little actually gets of it, kiuse if anything at all.

Speaker 2 (31:01):
Okay, let me put this example to you because you
grew up in South Africa, so you will know the
impact of HIV AIDS well. And this is why I
asked about the data the US led on international efforts
to combat HIV AIDS treatment prevention. And there's an initiative
called pet File which is credited with saving twenty six
million lives in the last twenty years. It was part

(31:24):
of the foreign aid freeze. Then there was a limited waiver.
Its services are disrupted, and unaid says if permanly discontinued,
there will be another four million AIDS related deaths by
twenty twenty nine. So if you look at that example,
which is backed up by data. In twenty twenty three,

(31:44):
six hundred and thirty thousand people died of AIDS related illnesses,
then perhaps Bill Gates's figures are not wrong. Millions of
lives could be lost.

Speaker 1 (31:54):
First of all, the program, the AIDS medication program, is continuing,
so your fund moral premise is wrong. It is continuing. Now,
do you have another example.

Speaker 2 (32:09):
Not in its entirety, not in its entirety the program
there's a limited waiver, and UNAIDS have said that not
all of the services that were previously funded by USA
IDEA continuing. So that's that's why, that's why I put
that example to you.

Speaker 1 (32:28):
Okay, well, which ones aren't being funded?

Speaker 2 (32:30):
I'll fix it right now for okay. Well, actually they're
all on the un unaid's website, so you'll be able
to see them. But mostly they are to deal with
Mostly they are to do with prevention, and for example,
the rollout of a drug called glenna kappavir, which was
hailed as one of the biggest breakthroughs against AIDS for

(32:50):
many years, which came out last year. So if you
are perhaps, I'm sure UNA's would be delighted if you're
able to look at that again.

Speaker 1 (32:58):
Yes, but well, if if in fact this is true,
which I doubt it is, then we'll affix it.

Speaker 2 (33:02):
Okay, Fine, So finally, political, your political influence. I wondered
whether you have decided yet how much you're going to
spend on the upcoming midterms. Is it you spent a
lot more money on the last US election than you

(33:23):
envisaged when you were speaking here three years ago. Are
you going to continue to spend at that kind of
level on future elections?

Speaker 1 (33:34):
I think in terms of political spending, I'm going to
do a lot less in the future.

Speaker 2 (33:42):
And why is that?

Speaker 1 (33:45):
I think I've done enough?

Speaker 2 (33:50):
Is it because of blowback?

Speaker 1 (33:55):
Well? If I see a reason to do political spending
in the future, I will do it. An currently serious.

Speaker 2 (34:01):
What about political influence beyond the US? How often do
you speak to President.

Speaker 1 (34:09):
I don't speak to President Putin.

Speaker 2 (34:12):
You've never spoken to President Putin.

Speaker 1 (34:16):
I was on a video caller with him once about
five years ago.

Speaker 2 (34:19):
That's the only that's the president.

Speaker 1 (34:23):
Oh, you must I get it.

Speaker 2 (34:26):
Actually, i've heard you. I've heard you speak about it.
For example, in your West Point speech, you said, oh,
I challenged President Putin to uh to was it an
arm wrestle? And I know the Wall Street Journal has
reported your reported conversations. If you're if you're saying they
haven't happened other than once, I'll take that as read.

Speaker 1 (34:44):
Is there a worse publication on the face of the
earth than the Wall Street Journal? I wouldn't use that
tolign up my cage for paragraphics that that that newspaper
is the worst newspaper in the world. And there's you know,
if there's one newspaper that should be pro capitalist, it's
the one of Wall Street in the name, But it isn't.

(35:07):
So I have the very lowest opinion of the Wall
Street Journal. Absolutely answers, and you clearly have believed the
tripe that you've written, that you've written newspapers I.

Speaker 2 (35:17):
Read, I read very widely, and I'm putting these questions
to you so that you have an opportunity to respond
to them. Which you are and for which we're all
grateful to hear. Your response is, okay, we are. We
are out of time.

Speaker 1 (35:28):
So you mentioned it challenging. I did so on on
the X platform. I challenged Vladimir put over the I
didn't talk to him. That was a post on the
X platform.

Speaker 2 (35:43):
That's why. That's why I asked you. And you've and
you've clorified and explained. Thank you. That's that's why I
was asking whether you have had reported conversations and and
you said, we have a.

Speaker 1 (35:55):
Okay, legacy media lize.

Speaker 2 (35:58):
Okay, listen. I thought I might give Grock the last
word because when I asked Groc what your hardest challenge is,
it said the strain of managing multiple high stake ventures
made financial regulatory in public relations crises. And I wondered
whether you recognize that characterization and whether you do think

(36:22):
that this is a pivotal year in your life.

Speaker 1 (36:28):
Well, every has been somewhat piddle, and this one's no different.
So in terms of interesting things that probably our accomplish,
this here there getting starships two be fully reusable, so
that we catch both the booster and the ship, which

(36:51):
will be the first fully reusable or little rocket ever
in history, which would be a profound breakthrough as the
essential breakthrough necessarily to make multi planetarian ultimately become a
space bearing civilization. We've got neural link which is now
helped by patients restore capability using the left of the implant,

(37:15):
where they're able to control a computer simply by thinking.
We'll be doing our first patient to restore blank just
restore to restore site with our blind site implant, which
is the end of this year early next. In fact,
that that first patient might be in the U a E.

(37:35):
Since we have a relationship with you a E and
the Cleveland Clinic clinic there. The I think what's running
on the AI front, we are close to what you
might call a g I or or or digital super intelligence,
and I think we'll see that we are seeing an

(37:56):
explosion in digital superintelligence here. And then we've got to HESLA,
the what will be launching anti based autonomy basically self
driving cars with no one in them in Austin next month.
So it's it's a big year for sure. Many other
things on the in the in the works too. Okay,

(38:16):
I'm a technologist first and foremost.

Speaker 2 (38:19):
Elon Musk, thank you very much for joining us here
at Cutter Economic Forum. Thank you