The poll shows that public views of Musk are increasingly polarized, with Republican support of the billionaire rising while Democratic support falls.

Elon Musk’s support among Democrats has withered to a new low as he has embraced Republican politics, according to a national NBC News poll.

Only 6% of Democrats in the poll, which was conducted Sept. 13-17, said they had positive feelings about Musk, while 79% said they had negative feelings. The numbers were flipped for Republicans, with 62% having positive feelings toward him and 14% negative feelings. Independents were split, 31% to 36%.

The poll shows that views of Musk are increasingly polarized, reflecting the transformation of his public image in recent years from that of an environmentally aware automaker crusading against fossil fuels to that of a conservative activist aligned with former President Donald Trump.

  • ByteOnBikes@slrpnk.net
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    2 months ago

    Haha I think I met one!

    Dude was a eco-friendly pro-Kamala pro-weed driving a Tesla.

    When I made a joke about buying a Tesla before Elon went crazy, he kinda sheepishly shrugged and then excitedly talked about all the new things Tesla is coming out with.

    • SpaceNoodle@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      Full Self Driving super soon except you still need to intervene regularly and also robotaxis will never work so it’s pointless anyway!

        • Zron@lemmy.world
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          2 months ago

          The worst part is we could definitely have a mars base with today’s technology.

          It’s just not economically or scientifically necessary to set up. Robots can do 99% of what a human can on mars, scientifically speaking, and if they break we can just build another one. If someone dies on mars, it’s gonna global news for weeks.

          And mars doesn’t exactly have a huge open pit of platinum or something we want to mine, so there’s no economic incentive to set up a colony.

          Musk just wants to sell the sci-fi vaporware fantasy to shareholders because SpaceX has one viable product and he’s desperate for no one to notice that.

          • Logi@lemmy.world
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            2 months ago

            SpaceX has one viable product

            Two. I can’t even figure out whether you’re ignoring Starlink or their space launch business. But yeah, the Elonville on Mars obsession makes about as much sense as the Cybertruck.

            • Zron@lemmy.world
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              2 months ago

              I honestly don’t consider starlink to be a SpaceX product.

              I’d technically owned and operated by them because SpaceX owns starlink LLC, but they did it that way to boost their launch contracts for their one viable product: falcon 9 launches.

              So since they wanted to split starlink off into its own company, that just so happens to rely 100% on SpaceX for all contracts, then I’ll give it to them. Starlink is its own company. Which means SpaceX still only has one product.

          • dgmib@lemmy.world
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            2 months ago

            Which is good because mars will be about the only inhabitable planet in the solar system if Trump has another term.

      • v_krishna@lemmy.ml
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        2 months ago

        Waymo is already operating fully autonomous self driving taxis in SF. Price point is about the same as uber/lyft, a bit cheaper since no tip. And they are all hella nice Jaguars. The difference is Waymo uses lidar and radar to make it work (and also did intensive mapping of city streets). Still needs a lot of work to scale (they do dumb things, but so do human drivers, and are limited to the city so I can’t take one to or from my home in Berkeley yet) but they fully exist and are a viable option today.

        • RinseDrizzle
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          2 months ago

          Man, after years as a valet ages ago I’m so anti Jaguar. Every single time one came through, it had problems. Owners constantly griped about it being in and out the shop a bunch. Nice at a glance, but plenty of the “luxury” brands are apparently made with fucking plastic and band aids.

        • webadict@lemmy.world
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          2 months ago

          Waymo sucks. They get stuck a lot, tend to cost as much or more than Uber and Lyft, and you basically hope they don’t get stuck trying to navigate around situations because you basically wait until remote assistance fixes it. Also, if you live anywhere near where they park the things, you want Waymo to die in a fire because they honk. ALL. NIGHT. LONG.

        • SpaceNoodle@lemmy.world
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          2 months ago

          I know, I’m in the industry.

          Edit: downvotes? Oh, I guess I’m not. Good job, y’all.

    • ShepherdPie
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      2 months ago

      Being excited about technological progress at Tesla or SpaceX doesn’t mean you’re a fan or supporter of Musk. These companies are full of thousands of engineers doing this work while the absentee CEO is spending his time shitposting and driving Twitter into the ground.

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          2 months ago

          I 100% agree with that and think they need to kick him to the curb. What influence and publicity he could generate for the companies 10 years ago is now long gone and has now transformed into a giant liability.

          • Furbag@lemmy.world
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            2 months ago

            I’m honestly shocked that the board hasn’t gotten rid of him yet. he’s just a massive source of problems for them. My suspicion is that he is so good at creating controversy that they can time their watches to it, so to speak, and buy/sell their positions in the company while Elon takes all the heat from the SEC for insider trading, not the crooked board members who know he’s a total whacko but acknowledge the reality that he has a lot of gullible techbros with too much money on their hands hanging on his every word and they will rush to buy Tesla stock or Dogecoin or whatever if Elon says he’s making market moves when he’s actually running his classic pump-and-dump schemes.

            • ShepherdPie
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              2 months ago

              There’s gotta be some truth to this as I was astounded that they approved that $50+ billion payout that he recently received after threatening to quit. In recent years, Tesla has really floundered and is rapidly losing marketshare with each passing day mostly due to Musk’s actions. In what world does that deserve a singular payout valued higher than most corporations earn in an entire year?

      • WalnutLum@lemmy.ml
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        2 months ago

        It’s important to take Tesla and SpaceX at face value and not to extrapolate future success based on what they’ve accomplished.

        Edit: for anyone that follows SpaceX’s current shenanigans, seems like they’ve been using the FAA to scoot permits to launch without proper authorization from other agencies (notably the EPA)

        Shit is getting VERY juicy: https://fixupx.com/RepKiley/status/1839066996274516417

        They’ve even got representatives just kind of going along with their demonstrably false narrative for the ride.

      • Kalysta@lemm.ee
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        2 months ago

        Unfortunately that CEO is giving them all a bad name. And the cybertruck is enough of a disaster that it’s destroying the reputation of Tesla by itself.

        I don’t know if you can call the cybertruck progress when it’s fucking up basic stuff already worked out in normal cars. Like manual door releases.