It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.....

I suppose I shouldn't have gotten my hopes up.  If you were looking for anything substantive that helped make the case that Trump was going to be a "good President" on policy for the next four years you were left wanting and some real shockers came out of Musk's mouth too.

One of the more ridiculous head-scratchers was on CO2 levels.  Musk claimed that a 1,000ppm level (roughly double today's) would result in "symptoms" (such as headaches and such.)  That's nonsense; typical indoor CO2 levels are around 1,000 ppm, simply because humans and animals are inside and guess what -- they exhale it, and exchange with the outside along with indoor plants are both small enough that yes, it typically runs around double the outdoor level.  There's nothing dangerous about that whatsoever.

The 8 hour "Action Level" (e.g. a working person's shift) is 5,000 PPM or 0.5% -- ten times the current atmospheric level.  Are there low-level human effects before that point?  Probably, in some people. But may I note that during the last few years where mask mandates were in force three quarters of all people in a study published on PubMed had levels over 2,000 ppm, which is a level that can lead to some symptoms and nearly one in eight exceeded the 5,000ppm OSHA occupational exposure limit which, by OSHA, is considered dangerous enough issue to restrictions in the workplace.  So given these facts are all the people hyperventilating about CO2 levels also vehemently against masks -- and were they from 2020 forward?  Nope.

What Musk did point out, entirely accurately, was that attempting to "remove carbon use", were we to actually do it, would lead to mass starvation along with both collapse of our economy and civilization generally.  In this he's entirely right.  Among things you cannot have without the use of petrochemicals (e.g. oil) are insulation on wire (thus no electricity), modern sanitation material (e.g. waste plumbing and modern supply materials), shingles (asphalt is mostly oil and the fiberglass "core" is also petroleum-reliant) so the routine shingle is not available, virtually every manner of medical device, even the most-mundane (e.g. the tube for the IV bag, and the bag itself, are both petroleum products), computers, phones, televisions and similar (plastics and electronic components) and more.  Never mind modern farming (fertilizer is largely made from natural gas), mechanized equipment such as combines, tractors and similar all run on diesel fuel.  Those who wish to "de-carbon" our economy are welcome to go first; you wouldn't make a week if you actually attempted it.

The bit on nuclear energy was equally cringe-worthy.  So were the wild mischaracterizations of what was said on social media regarding Hiroshima and Nagasaki.  The point was that even intentional release of nuclear material (in the form of bombs) didn't end life in those two cities nor result in a hellscape that would persist for a million years.  Indeed, neither did that happen at Chernobyl, despite that event being a result of deliberate operation of the reactor outside of known safety limits.  I will note that not one casualty has thus far been recorded from a civilian nuclear power plant in the United States, although certainly the use of nuclear power is not without risk.  It was good to hear a bit of conversation on the fact that behind every unit of GDP is a unit of energy even if neither of the two participants appeared to grasp that this was, in fact, what they were talking about!  That's truly unfortunate and I'd love to spend time with Trump in an attempt to bring him to understand the basic fact that has underlaid every civilization throughout the time of humanity on this planet -- but I doubt I'll get the opportunity.  Of course neither brought up higher-efficiency fission technology we know works either -- like LFTRs, which were proved to function at ORNL more than fifty years ago and could be used to produce both a nearly-unlimited (500+ year!) supply of both liquid petroleum for transportation use and electricity..

Elon tried to lead Trump somewhat on the issue of inflation and the economy generally, but I doubt Elon has actually studied the root of the present issues in detail -- or he just didn't want to go there.  Like it or not the MTS is not a suggestion box; its where the government spends money and from that it is clear that the spiraling cost of medicine is where the lion's share of the problem lies.  If we don't fix that the rest doesn't matter.  Not one word was uttered on that point, and yet if there is something that would be worth voting for (rather than voting against a candidate) that would be it.  Just as an example last month $88.5 billion was spent on interest while personal income taxes took in $154 billion.  This is somewhat better than last month (which had some calendar effects) but still is a frightening 50%, roughly, of all personal tax receipts and Medicare and Medicaid spending between them was materially higher than personal income tax receipts -- $197 billion.  For comparison defense -- all in -- was $67 billion.

If we don't deal with the cost issues in medicine and not on an incremental basis either -- more like a chainsaw-style basis, right here and now -- the rest doesn't matter and approving "more drugs faster" will make it worse since new drugs are, of course, covered by patents.  Yet there was not one sentence from either of them on this point, nor on the fact that both parties, Trump included, were the cause of the inflation we've all dealt with due to the crazy spending spree by the Federal Government over the last four years.  Trump was in fact responsible for all of it in 2020 as he was still in office but Biden has not done anything to return that spending to former levels, and there is no indication he (or Harris, should she win) will.

The most-troubling of all, however, was the tiptoe game around the Rule of Law generally.  For example Trump raised his usual immigration points but didn't point out that the laws to conclusively and immediately resolve it are already on the books -- specifically, 8 USC 1324 which criminalizes at a felony level assistance to illegal immigrants in the United States, including housing, employment and transportation.  The elephant in the room is that despite the rhetoric both parties want the situation we have today and both sides of the aisle are lying about the inability to resolve the problem without "new laws."  We need nothing other than to enforce what's been on the books since the 1950s and any Executive can do so because control of the DOJ, FBI and law enforcement in general not only rests with the Executive it is the duty of the Executive to faithfully enforce the law.

A law that is ignored is not cured by passing another one (that will probably be similarly ignored) and Trump had four years to enforce 8 USC 1324 and deliberately did not.

I finally gave up before the discussion ended; I had learned nothing I didn't already know, both men had made statements that belied a lack of understanding rather than deliberate deceptions and there was nothing that led me to believe that a serious policy response was in the offing should Trump win for any of the serious issues facing the United States.

I would have been better-served in terms of my time to put a movie on and pour a couple of fingers of decent Scotch instead.