Tesla at issue, SEC wanting to punish Elon Musk. Websearch, stories here, here, here and here for detail.
Are Republicans sincere in preaching "Job Creator" dogma, where it is technological innovation or entrepreneurial large-scale risk taking that does lead to movement from an entrenched status quo to a more promised land? It sure appears to not be so.
It appears that entrenched short-sellers and Wall Street gamblers chasing short term quarterly market swings are favored, along with entrenched auto manufacturers here and abroad, over such an entrepreneurial poster child.
What Musk did was tweet notice of a future intent and/or desire to go private so that short-term profit seekers would have less opportunity to torpedo the company he founded and built to where entrenched auto industry types worry.
He believed that in taking such a future step he had a secure financial source, but nobody knows the future with certainty. He gave timely notice of a present intent along with a belief that future implemention was possible/likely, his sole sin being to say "secured" when nothing about any financing is final unless and until papers are signed and funds accordingly transferred. Terms and conditions are the hobgoblins that can queer any deal, up to the very last minute. Cold feed are not uncommon in even small deals. Musk reevaluated and quite promptly backed away from the belief secure financing existed at a level sufficient to go private, now. He did not disavow his belief that going private would be in the best interest of the company, which it is his ultimate duty to protect; not to maximize callous traders' will to turn short term quarterly or more frequent profits on trades, damn the consequences - chips falling where they will, not my fault, etc.
Musk wears the white hat. The dog pack trying each for his own purposes to bring Musk down wear black hats to fit their dark intentions.
Where's Trump?
Cutting more real estate deals with Russian emigree oligarchs, not caring a whit about a sane energy future and wanting to penalize instead of rewarding innovation and entrepreneurship?
Is there any other explanation? Why is Musk being pilloried? Where is the press in not seeking FOIA documents about how the SEC decided to act, emails from whom to whom, all that which would show possible institutional/regulatory powers in bed together to take Musk to the cleaners?
Is "Fleece the Innovators" the new slogan for baseball cap politicking?
UPDATE: Viewpoints may differ. FURTHER.
FURTHER: Sept. 28 N.Y. Times and Sept 29 WaPo show that even the headstrong have good lawyers and other advisers, once they hit the big income thresholds. Yet comparing the two reports, Musk, in a sense, got his way. Stung, will Musk let the lawyers pre-approve any further Twitter usage? Or will headstrong prove to have a degree of stupid to it also? The settlement proves the adage that disputes are better settled than litigated.
The Elihu Root Quotation. (Root was closer to Fred Trump's generation than Donald's and Michael Cohen's, but I digress.)