Steve Bannon potty trains Elon Musk: 'We're going to rip your face off'

The Point: Elon Musk's attempt to swallow the MAGA movement whole has encountered a chokepoint: former Trump advisor Stephen K. Bannon. I am not a fan of either man, but I understand the value of a divided opposition. This fight – or is it a negotiation? – reveals tension points in the Nerd Reich's alliance with Trump's MAGA movement. Let's take a deeper look.

The Back Story: Steve Bannon, the influential MAGA political svengali who recently got out of federal prison, appears to strongly dislike Donald Trump's new puppet master, Elon Musk.

"We're going to rip your face off," Bannon warned Musk recently on his War Room podcast.

Seems intense.

Bannon went on to compare the wealthiest man in the world to a child with attention deficit disorder. He also suggested that Musk and his fellow "nerds" should "sit back and study" politics before trying to boss the MAGA movement. A sample of Bannon's brutal banter:

They're like little boys. They fantasize, like, being the hero, the adoration. The worst thing that happened to this guy is the adoration he got from the crowds at president Trump's rallies in the run up to the election.

You can see him jumping around like, you know, he looked like Andrew Giuliani when – remember when Rudy was getting sworn in, back the first time he beat Dinkins, I think – and Andrew Giuliani's on the thing, and you know, bouncing around and, you know, couldn't, you know, he had a little bit of ... A.D.D., I think. Andrew at the time, he was a little boy bouncing around, couldn't keep still. My mom used to say, "you got ants in your pants." Right? The old school, before you got a slap upside the head. Now he's bouncing around the stage, Elon's bouncing around the stage, sucking it all in. He, he's finally the geek that the high school class says, "oh, you're a cool kid."

And he just dancing around. [T]he look is like, you know, he's seen heaven's parted and he's seen nirvana. And now the adoration of the crowd's not there because they understand what a scam it is.

The Andrew Giuliani comparison seemed like an odd throwback, so I looked up the video. During Rudy Giuliani's mayoral inauguration in 1994, his exuberant young son stood on the dais, raised his hand and pretended to take the oath of office along with his father. Ouch!

Bannon went further this week, calling Musk a "truly evil guy, a very bad guy" in an interview with an Italian newspaper. He promised to keep Musk out of the White House and also threw of few punches at Musk's fellow Nerd Reichsters, Peter Thiel and David Sacks:

Peter Thiel, David Sacks, Elon Musk, are all white South Africans ... He should go back to South Africa. Why do we have South Africans, the most racist people on earth, white South Africans, we have them making any comments at all on what goes on in the United States?

Talk about a pot-versus-kettle moment. When Steve Bannon calls you racist...

This outbreak of contretemps between two of Trump's most prominent supporters is perfectly understandable. Musk, a relatively new addition to Trumpworld, is overdoing things. President Musk is behaving like someone who spent $44.3 billion to buy the Republican Party – which, to be clear, he did.

But you're not supposed to trumpet this in front of the masses. Our prevailing form of oligarchy requires a certain amount of subtlety and finesse. There's even a science – lobbying – a legalized form of corruption that is popular and lucrative at nearly every level of government in every jurisdiction in the country. But this art of influence has rules, and it is bad form (and often a crime) to break them.

On the 'menu'

In 2009, a prominent Washington lobbyist decided to host a fundraiser for Sen. Dianne Feinstein. For some reason, the lobbyist decided to model the fundraiser invitation after a restaurant menu. The menu offered Feinstein's chairmanship of the Senate Intelligence Committee as a "first course." It also listed her other committee assignments as scrumptious dishes available to anyone who could write a (paltry) $1000 check. The invite leaked to the press and became a scandal (a minor one, as these things go. See: Abramoff, Jack). I was Feinstein's communications director at the time. She was shocked and mortified, and she canceled the fundraiser immediately. Feinstein was morally upstanding as far as politicians go, but the shocking little menu exposed an unsavory truth about our system: money buys access.

What does $44.3 billion buy? Musk appears to think it buys him the presidency. He has zealously centered himself as the main player in American politics, and he has managed to do the impossible: eclipse Trump. But like the lobbyist who went waving that damn menu around K Street, Musk is breaking an important rule. He is saying the quiet part loud.

Worse, the USA isn't even the only country Musk is currently hoping to own. He is now inserting himself aggressively into the politics of both Germany and the United Kingdom, having already meddled brazenly in the affairs Brazil, Ukraine, Taiwan, and others. One could be forgiven for thinking that Elon Musk plans to eat the world as a first course and then swallow the universe for dessert. There's a Greek term for this kind of thing: megalomania. Walter Isaacson's biography of Musk gave the distinct impression that Musk sees himself as some kind of messiah, and the last year has proven it beyond a doubt. Messiahs, however, tend to meet with bad endings. This is especially true of self-anointed messiahs alleged to engage in heavy drug use. But I digress.

Musk is the richest man in the world. He's also a time bomb balanced on a high wire in a windstorm. Say what you will about Bannon, but he is a creature of politics. He is ruthlessly tactical and strategic. He knows theory as well as practice. Don't mistake this for a compliment. Bannon's political intelligence is part of what makes him dangerous. Musk, on the other hand, is only dangerous because he has infinite money and a messianic lust for power.

That's also what makes him stupid. Musk is a political ignoramus who seems unaware of basic pitfalls. His hyperactive, juvenile style of grandstanding poses a significant threat to the MAGA movement Bannon has worked hard to curate. Musk is a loose cannon with a net worth of $424 billion. He openly pines to convert the cult of Trump into the cult of Musk, and he has no clue that it doesn't work that way – because you can't have two competing daddies, dictators, or kings. Hence the pissing match with Bannon, who likes to view himself as the power behind the throne and has worked for decades to arrive at this moment. He doesn't want it to collapse due to a series of 3 a.m. Elon tweets.

Musk versus MAGA

Bannon and his ilk are hitting Musk where it hurts, and Musk is his own worst enemy in this battle. Earlier this month, he stupidly inflamed a debate over H-1B visas for immigrant tech workers, exposing a key rift between MAGA and the Nerd Reich. MAGA dreams of a nation without immigrants, while the Nerd Reich dreams of exploiting immigrant labor to the greatest degree possible to make a handful of oligarchs even richer. Musk's bumbling approach, compounded by his threat to declare war on his MAGA critics, proved how ill-suited he is for task of Trump whisperer.

MAGA despises immigrants, and Musk in an immigrant. MAGA fears "globalists," and Musk is a globalist on steroids (and other substances, according the Wall Street Journal). Musk is also into a medley of bizarre mad science things, like putting Neuralink chips in people's brains, that have long sparked terror in the conspiracy theory fever swamps of the right. Mark of the Beast, anyone?

Speaking of swamps: Cleaning up "the swamp" of Washington has long been a supposed tenet of the MAGA movement. But Elon Musk is the biggest swamp creature of them all. He's raked in billions of taxpayer dollars from his various government contracts, subsidies, and loans. He's a foreign-born "special interest" in human form. Now he gets to act as co-president, giving orders, making threats, and rolling out policy ideas as fast his his fingers can tweet?

Musk isn't picking items off a menu. He's trying to buy the entire restaurant.

Bannon extends the metaphor:

His power and influence is one thing – the checks he can write. Let's be blunt, he wrote $250 million worth of checks in five months ... unparalleled in a third-party thing to support the ground game. And I am the first to say, understanding and having put together that strategy, he got it and he backed it up with money. The campaign didn't have the money. The RNC didn't have the money. Elon Musk in his engineering brain got it. And he deserves not just respect for that, but he deserves the place at the table. Now, the place at the table doesn't have to be the head of the table, And it certainly doesn't have to be making demands or making orders.

So, this is a negotiation. Bannon realizes that Musk's money bought him a place at the "table." MAGA needs and wants his money, as well as his social media weaponry. But Trump, not Musk, sits at the head of the table of the MAGA cult.

Bannon is trying to teach Musk his place. He understands that Musk is flying too high, like some ketamine Icarus.... and if he goes too far, he'll get burned. Bannon is giving him a preview of the heat.

The Billionaire's affliction

Most billionaires suffer from a terrible and debilitating affliction: sycophantism. Everyone tells them they are great, and no one ever tells them when they are being stupid. They generally surround themselves with people who want their money and who thus have every incentive to engage in flattery and supplication. "Beware of flatterers," warned Machiavelli in the 16th century. But Machiavelli never created an app to deliver burritos, so he is not considered an important thinker in Silicon Valley.

Speaking truth to a billionaire is a great way to lose your job – if you work for the billionaire. But Bannon doesn't work for Musk. This explains why he can talk down to him and treat him like an out-of-control child in need of discipline. You see, a person like Musk is not the type to take friendly advice. Generally speaking, it takes a jackhammer to break through the thick skull housing the average billionaire's massive ego.

Bannon is that jackhammer. He doesn't need Musk to love him. He needs Musk to fear him. And Musk should be afraid. His shift to Dark MAGA overlord has made him extremely unpopular with Democrats who once idolized him. If he goes to war with Bannon and the MAGA base, he will become equally unpopular with Republicans. And, Politics 101: It's a very bad thing to piss off both sides. If Musk becomes the most unpopular man in America, Trump's choice will be easy.

Bannon is not the only person in Trump's orbit to fire a warning shot at Elon.

"I don't welcome people who want to work solo or be a star," Susie Wiles, Trump's incoming chief of staff, told Axios. "My team and I will not tolerate backbiting, second-guessing inappropriately, or drama. These are counterproductive to the mission."

Knives out in Trumpland

Analysis: The alliance between the Silicon Valley Nerd Reich and MAGA was always going to be a shaky affair. Your average tech zillionaire does not have much in common with your average MAGA red hat. They share a common hatred of progressives and the Democratic Party. But there is also much on which they vehemently disagree, like immigration, replacing working class jobs with artificial intelligence, and mating human beings with machines.

Worst of all, Musk and his tech bros appear to think they're in charge now, and they have little use for old schoolers like Bannon.

"The nerds don’t take criticism — they’re a little on the spectrum and lack social skills," explained Bannon. "You can’t run a country by algorithm or by nerds whose companies employ a handful of mathematicians. We’re a country, not an economy."

It's heartening to see these guys ripping at each other's throats. If their alliance frays, Trump will be weakened. (Someone wake up the Democratic Party and tell them opportunity is knocking.)

But remember: This is a negotiation. Bannon is establishing himself as a force to be reckoned with in the court politics of the Trump administration. He is playing by prison rules, picking a fight with the biggest bully in the yard to establish his own dominance. If he can find a way to manage Musk, he becomes more important than ever.

The primary audience for this drama is Trump. Bannon is hitting all the right pressure points, reminding Trump that Musk is a political novice and wannabe usurper who only slithered to Trump's side because he won the nomination. Despite the harsh rhetoric, however, Bannon also seems to be leaving the door open to peace with Musk. That is, if Musk humbles himself enough to take marching orders.

Bannon shares Musk's goal of global dominance. But he wants Musk to learn his place as the money man – not the strategist, and certainly not the leader.

“I support his participation because the enemy of my enemy is my friend,” said Bannon last week, taking a short break from his anti-Musk insult-a-thon.

"Musk just spent a quarter of a billion dollars to elect Trump. If he puts the same amount of money into all of Europe that he put behind Trump, he will flip every nation to a populist agenda. There’s not a centrist left-wing government in Europe that will be able to withstand that onslaught."

It will be on Trump to act as peacemaker. So enjoy the nasty shrieking catfight while you can. Because if these men find a way to stop attacking each other, they'll turn their combined fire on the rest of the world.