Quote of the Day
At 10:01 a.m. on June 12, 2026, Graham Platner, the freshly minted Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate in Maine, posted the following on X:
“Elon Musk just became the world’s first trillionaire.
Let’s make sure he’s also the last.”
No policy proposal. No discussion of tax brackets, carried-interest loopholes, or regulatory reform. Just a flat, public declaration that the existence of a single individual who has accumulated more wealth than any human in history is an intolerable moral emergency that must be prevented from ever happening again.
The sentence is not a critique of monopoly power, regulatory capture, or government favoritism. It is a death sentence pronounced on the category of human being who creates at scale.
It is the purest distillation of socialist psychology yet uttered by a major-party Senate candidate in the United States: Excellence has occurred. Make sure it never occurs again.
This is not an aberration. It is the logical endpoint of everything Platner has signaled since he entered the race.
…
The correct response to “Let’s make sure he’s also the last” is not a technocratic defense of marginal tax rates.
It is a full-throated defense of the right of human beings to achieve without limit and without apology. It is the recognition that the alternative to Musk-scale creation is not a more equitable distribution of existing goods.
It is a slower, poorer, grayer world in which the best anyone can hope for is to be slightly less mediocre than their neighbors.
Maine does not need another politician who resents the existence of greatness.
It needs a political culture that treats the creation of a trillion dollars of value as evidence of national vitality rather than moral emergency.
The man who can make reusable rockets routine, who can force the automotive industry to electrify faster than it wanted to, who can put global communications infrastructure in orbit while governments dither…this man is not the problem. He is the proof that the problem is elsewhere.
Graham Platner’s tweet is a window into the soul of a politics that has given up on creation and now contents itself with the management of decline.
The only question left is whether the voters of Maine…and eventually the country…will ratify that surrender or reject it with the same ferocity that built the civilization now under attack.
The first trillionaire exists.
The question is not whether we can prevent another. The question is whether we still have the will to produce one.
LHGrey
June 12, 2026
The Last Trillionaire Must Die: Graham Platner’s Envious Death Wish and the Socialist Pathology of Resentment
See also the post on X.
I wish I could write like her. I am left nearly speechless after I read anything she writes.
The Democrat party seems to have a worsening case of Platner fascist-itis.
I’m all for that, but I want it to happen by deflation.
I don’t have a problem with that.
“No policy proposal. No discussion of tax brackets, carried-interest loopholes, or regulatory reform.”
Yes, it’s Twitter, not Substack. She’s being disingenuous.
“the alternative to Musk-scale creation” So there’s only one? No other options here? You sure about that?
And to the “Musk-scale creation” part, apparently she doesn’t know he’s a trust-fund baby whose daddy gave him a bunch of money buy things, and he bought his way into Paypal and Tesla, both of which somebody else *created*. My biggest problem with the Musk story is all the people trying to claim he’s a genius, when all he did was have the right amount of money at the right time. Clever? Sure. Reasonably bright? Probably. Genius? Not even close. A genius wouldn’t have been given DOGE and then made a complete dog’s breakfast of it.
Though one can argue he got what he needed: removal of the oversight of his businesses. Doesn’t take a genius to do that when you have the President behind you writing executive orders.
Here’s a detailed look at Musk the grifter. His theory as to how we solve the problem I find less than appealing, but the breakdown of Musk’s grift is on point.
https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/elon-musk-trillionaire
A taste:
“It wasn’t like Elon Musk invented some amazing capacity. He didn’t do something transformational for the world. He didn’t harness electricity. He didn’t invent the transistor. He didn’t invent rocket flight. He didn’t invent satellite technology. He didn’t even make them much better.
What he did was learn how to game the system. He took what America built through generations of investment and generations of hard work and turned it into a profit center for himself. He took American loans, American intellectual property, American space, American airwaves, and turned them into a wealth engine for one man.
Today they crown the first trillionaire. They’ll say he earned it. The truth is simpler and uglier. He’s a welfare trillionaire. Half a billion in government loans, tens of billions in government contracts, sixty years of our research. We made him.”
Having the vision to have reusable rockets is a fundamental change. NASA briefly tried with DCX but nobody was willing to break with the Received Knowledge that carbon fiber was superior to plain old metal. I was at Rocketdyne and my BIL managed the tests for the Linear Aerospike engine.
Enter SpaceX who went back to Stainless Steel and actually worked from Day One to have reusable rockets. Now the fleet leader Falcon 9 has over 30 flights closing on 40. Raptor engines have become dramatically simpler over the years, Booster coming back to base and being caught. All innovations.
Musk isn’t the engineer, he is the visionary who says “I want a reusable rocket, what do we need to do” and then pays his money to make it happen.
But he didn’t originate that vision. Lots of folks have wanted to build re-usable rockets, going back to the days of the Space Shuttle, they just didn’t have the money to make it happen. Today NASA is funded to about $23 billion, while SpaceX works with several times that.
Same was true of Tesla…somebody else had the vision, he just had the money to make it happen.
He’s just a wallet with legs. If he hadn’t started with daddy’s money to begin with we wouldn’t be having this conversation.
“Lots of folks have wanted to build re-usable rockets, going back to the days of the Space Shuttle, they just didn’t have the money to make it happen.”
Money was definitely not the problem. The federal government threw LOTS AND LOTS AND LOTS more money at the problem.
I don’t care who came up with it. Elon Musk made it happen.
I don’t care how he made it happen. The idea has indeed been around for decades, and NOBODY else did it. He did.
It doesn’t matter if he’s a certifiable genius. That is utterly irrelevant.
Elon Musk has made the world a better place for all of humanity. Very few of the “big ideas”, if any, are original to him. So what? He actually made them happen, and he did it for LOTS less money than others were already spending (to say nothing of the radical reduction in launch costs he has brought about), so it’s not “he’s a wallet with legs”. That’s completely absurd.
Don’t know why I’m surprised with this coming from you. Ridiculous, absurd disconnection from reality is pretty common from you.
Here, John, is an example of the kind of thing I am talking about:
https://x.com/DigitalSamIAm/status/2066151604273721785
“Elon Musk was awarded (note: not given) cost-per-result contracts to perform a service for the US government. The total of those for SpaceX specifically is ~$22B, which includes repaid loans, state tax incentives, etc. ”
snip
“End result? SpaceX & Elon lowered the cost of getting 1 kg into LEO by 95-97% vs what NASA was paying previously. ”
math math math….
“So: SpaceX saved the US taxpayer more than the total value of contracts it earned on a single project, PLUS provided the US government with the requested services (put stuff in LEO) at the best possible price.”
To put it another way, he saved the government billions of dollars and charged them less than than the savings. That’s a win, full stop. Same things done, less money (representing less resources) spent.
This is the kind of thing that makes the world a better place. I don’t care how easy you say it is or how it wasn’t his ideas or whatever other BS you want to spew – NO ONE ELSE ACTUALLY DID IT.
It’s been sitting there, waiting decades for anybody else to do, and no one did. He did. The proper thing to say in that situation is, “Thank you.”
“I don’t care how he made it happen”
As usual, that’s where we differ, because I don’t think “the ends justify the means” is a good philosophy, either ethically or historically.
” I don’t think “the ends justify the means” is a good philosophy, either ethically or historically.”
To be absolutely and ridiculously clear, “I don’t care whether he personally did the science or just bankrolled it (per your claims) or anywhere in between”.
I think that was already quite sufficiently clear for anyone arguing in good faith, but well…. you’ve demonstrated that you aren’t doing that, so there you go.
Rape? Wut? I don’t know where that came from. But when you say “I don’t care how…” I don’t see any other interpretation than “it’s so important that this happen that I’m not concerned with the methods used.” How exactly does one *not* interpret that statement that way?
“Rape? Wut? I don’t know where that came from.”
The same place as your “the ends justify the means” silliness.
It was intentionally ridiculous, trying to be as intentionally ridiculous as your deliberate misinterpretation.
But I edited it out almost immediately after I posted it (we only get 5 minutes to edit, after all) for something much simpler, and you hadn’t responded until very recently, so I’m surprised you saw it at all… Maybe do a refresh?
John may get emails of the comments. Hence, your edit didn’t show up in his “channel.”
Ah. Yes, I see comments in email and then just hit Reply, so tend not to see edits….
Didn’t realize you even had that implemented. Probably should have. Nice.
Ever notice that Schussler rarely comments on posts about guns, which are the main thrust of this blog?
It’s difficult for a leftist to pretend to support the Second Amendment.
I do try to stay on topic with the blog of the day, and since that’s not the subject of today’s blog post….
But if you like we can chat about optics…I’m trying to decide on what red dot to get for my new G48. Recommendations? Ideally can co-witness with irons, but I can get tall irons if necessary.
That quote from Platner is about what you’d expect from a hardcore communist + nazi.
It’s telling that for other communists like Sanders there is no evil great enough to justify refusing to support a fellow communist.
Did he beat his wife after the post?
Will he celebrate the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact with esteemed CPUSA (D) party member comrade kommissar Bernie Sanders?
Y’know……
I try to be tolerant. Really tolerant. And patient. Really
patient.
And exceptionally tolerant. I understand not everyone comes from the same place. I understand not everyone has the same experiences, the same education, the same family. We’re all different, in our own unique ways because of genetics, family, country, area within a country, city within an area, neighborhood within a city. “Difference” – within limits – is not only accepted, it’s expected.
But….in this country, in its states, its cities, its neighborhoods, “Difference” is expected to be moderated over generations, reaching a common level within a generation or two, or three, that common level approaching a standardized norm that has long been previously established. Individual cultures are not discarded, or disdained, but rolled into the common culture, enriching it, with the proviso that the common culture is predominant and most important, and welcomes the parts of one’s previous culture that offer enrichment of the common one.
I recognize, and understand, fully, that “people” are not standardized, that every one of us is different, however slightly or greatly, but….there is a “norm” around which the “people” overwhelmingly unite; there are “people’ who deviate from that “norm” in various ways, which gives us the artists, the musicians, the actors, the atheletes, the….whomever….who stretch the boundaries of “normal” and introduce us to other viewpoints, other perspectives, to consider other things, and all that has value, great value to a society, a “people” who are not constrained by rigid formality, a “people” that is driven by its own exceptionalism, by its individuality, by its own desire for accomplishment and achievement, regardless of whatever the remainder of the planet may desire or approve.
That, as far as I can tell, has pretty much been the intent, format, structure and result of what we commonly refer to as “America,” a unique place, so unique that prior to the late 1700s such had never existed before anywhere on this planet, nor has been exactly replicated anywhere since.
That existence has value, so much value that it cannot be disregarded, that it cannot be ignored, that it must – at any cost – be preserved; it is our legacy to preserve it and that legacy deserves our full respect and committment.
To that end I must reconsider my tolerance and patience. I caution that testing the limits of both, or either, may not be as productive an exercise as one might expect.
I believe that, far from being alone, I am one of not just many, but a very great many, and that we understand – and respect – the history, and heritage, of Our Country even if others do not.
Musk is the first trillionaire with the following caveats:
– In Recent Times
– That we have clear documentation of.
There have been fabulously wealthy people in the past, many of which owned entire countries as their personal fiefdoms.
Also, due to the above mentioned inflation, a trillion today is equal AT MOST a couple of billion in 1900, and even less further back – i.e. Musk isn’t that far ahead of where Carnegie or Rockefeller were more than a century ago.
I’m tired of the hype and poor reporting which is obviously politically driven…
True, a trillionaire ain’t what it was in 1926.
But today, on the basis of a forecast I read off my smartphone and confirmed by checking multiple computer forecast models on the basis of my degree in atmospheric science, I set my programmable computer thermostat that controls the heatpump on my house to 70F to keep ahead of the 83F exterior temperature. The insulation in my walls did their part. Meanwhile, I’m playing a computer game on a personal computer, but that game is actually installed on a network attached storage appliance with 108T of RAID protected disks in another room, accessed over a 10G network. While I’m doing that, I’m drinking some cold Guinness extra stout, which would be an imported beer if Guinness hadn’t established a brewery in Pennsylvania to supply their American customers. Incidentally, my cat is eating a veterinarian prescribed urinary health diet both wet and dry, and excreting it into a computer controlled litterbox that is tracking her weight and how often she goes to the box. In a few months, my son will start college in New York, closer to the Rockefeller’s and Carnegie’s neck of the woods, and the whole family will partake partake in the miracle of flight to take his stuff to college in our baggage allotment and leave him there. Not that he’ll be truly gone the way I was went I was dropped off at college; he can communicate from nearly anywhere by text, video and email that he need us to put more money in his bank account so he can pay for things by waving his phone at the pay-point. He’s going to study mechatronics and maybe someday design robots that will colonize the Moon or Mars. If I’m lucky, he’ll take it easy on our finances by getting a scholarship from the Air Force ROTC detachment on that private college’s campus. Today, however, I sent my daughter off for a 30 minute drive from my country estate to pick up three pizzas, and bring them back home in an electrically heated specialized pizza bag plugged into the car’s electrical system.
Meanwhile, in summer 1926, the Carnegies and Rockefellers were sweating in their large mansions with the household staff cleaning and cooking by hand because most of the household appliances like washers, dryers, and refrigerators weren’t available to anybody at any price. The richest people in the world still had iceboxes, and their at-home entertainment was books, newspapers and the radio.
Everything in italics is the luxuries a 1926 Carnegie couldn’t dream of.
People like Platner…and countless more of his associates…exist because we allow them to exist. And as long as they are allowed to exist they will. And their disease will spread.
I hate to break it to everyone, but Platner is going to beat Susan Collins like a red headed stepchild.
Why?
Voter turnout.
Trump has driven away about 20% of the voter coalition that got him the popular vote win in 2024. All that is left is a portion of the boomercons, and that won’t be enough.
The Republican party is right back to where it was in 2012.
Isn’t Susan Collins one of the three “Republican” Senators who votes with the Dems on 90% of everything?
If so, losing her seat isn’t a catastrophic loss to most of us, since the vote counts won’t change much.
In fact, if it prompts the GOP to put forward fewer RINOs in the future, it’s a long-term win.
Platner: “Let’s make sure [Elon]’s also the last [trillionaire].”
Funny, coming from the party that consistently pushes policies that almost seem intended to drive inflation to record levels, guaranteeing that Elon won’t be the last trillionaire. There were lots of billionaires in old Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo), where hyperinflation devalued the zaïre currency to where 5 million zaïres was worth less than one U.S. dollar; $200 in your bank account makes you a “billionaire.” With that exchange rate, the house where I grew up is now worth about 2 trillion, and we were middle class, not “wealthy” by most measures.
That is, of course, unless they succeed in bringing about their socialist utopia, in which everyone will “own nothing and be happy.” Zero trillionaires, but only because everyone lives in equal poverty.
If that’s their plan for making sure there are no more trillionaires, hard pass from me, thanks.
———
Another thing Platner is (conveniently) not mentioning, is how many people Elon employs through all of his various ventures — both via direct employment and indirect employment in his companies’ supply chains — and how much they earn.
Elon’s companies are estimated to employ 160,000-180,000 people directly, with another 700,000-800,000 in the supply chain. That’s nearly 1 MILLION people benefiting from his companies, with an annual payroll likely in the tens of billions.
While that’s still an order of magnitude or two less than the trillion or so Elon is now worth, let’s not pretend that he’s sitting on a giant hoard of cash in a Scrooge-McDuck-style money bin hidden in a SpaceX rocket silo, rolling cigars out of $10k bank notes.
Does Platner employ anywhere near that number, directly or indirectly? No? Hmmm….
My children and I have been multi-trillionaires for over a decade now: https://blog.joehuffman.org/2016/01/20/sharing-the-wealth/.