On his platform. Last night, Elon Musk endorsed the far right German political party alternative for Germany, AfD for short, saying, quote, only the AfD can save Germany now. This is a group that has been labeled as extremist by Germany's own government. [00:00:18] One of its founders has been charged in the past with promoting Nazi slogans. I saw that you noticed this on X. Can you talk about your reaction to this? Yeah, I mean, this is not normal. That was the Democratic senator from Connecticut, Chris Murphy, reminding the [00:00:37] American people that we now live seemingly permanently in a world of unprecedented, as I referred to, you know, people refer to Elon Musk as the de facto president elect. And, you know, I'm not the first one to have done that, but I don't need to tell any of you that. [00:00:55] Musk endorsing a far right German party is very concerning. You all know that. Here are some more from Senator Chris Murphy. So aft AfD is essentially the neo-Nazi party in Germany. They exist to try to rehabilitate the image of the Nazi Party, and they [00:01:12] have all sorts of very dangerous ideas about ridding Germany of anyone who is not naturally born in that country. They are an extremist group, and it is just extraordinary [00:01:28] that maybe the most important adviser to the president of the United States, somebody that has been, you know, parading around the halls of Congress as a key adviser to the president, is endorsing a neo-Nazi party. What does it tell you inside Germany? I mean, I don't know what it tells me. [00:01:45] What we know is that what Elon Musk thinks tends to eventually be what the president of the United States thinks. In response to Murphy's segment on CNN. Musk responded on X, calling Murphy a huge liar. He then went on to claim the AfD policies are identical to those of the US [00:02:03] Democratic Party when Obama took office. I don't think there is a single difference. So Elon Musk and his supporters who took that claim and ran with it, have been getting torched on social media because of it. For one, it would appear that people really actually believe that just because [00:02:19] the Nazis called themselves socialists, that they were actually promoting and fighting for the ideals of socialism. So a lot of Musk fanboys are on X naturally agreeing with his assessment. But Mark Cuban, Trump and Elon Musk's billionaire foe responded to all of this [00:02:36] using none other than grok the XAI bot to disprove Elon's claim. So this is according to grok, which apparently is woke now. The alternative for Germany, AfD most closely resembles the Republican Party in the United States, particularly in its current, [00:02:52] more right wing to far right incarnation. So parallels between the AfD and the modern day Republican Party include strong nationalism and patriotic rhetoric, i.e. America First. A strong anti-immigration stance and emphasis on border security, [00:03:08] Anti-globalist sentiments, and viewing international cooperation as a threat to national sovereignty. Conservative values and opposition to progressive social change, for example, rights pertaining to the LGBTQ community and conservative economic policies [00:03:23] such as lowering taxes and lessening government intervention. As for Elon's claim, however, that the AfD is the same as the 2008 Democratic Party, let's see about that. The AfD, for one, is considered to be far right and nationalist, whereas the 2008 Dems were Liberal Democrats ranked to be more liberal than [00:03:43] 77% of the US Senate at that time. The AfD is anti-immigrant, anti-refugee and Islamophobic. They support mass deportations and the expulsion of migrants and their descendants. The 2008 Dem supported a path to legalization for illegal immigrants. [00:03:59] The AfD promotes traditional family values and culture, and they oppose gay marriage. The 2008 Dems did the opposite. They made strides for the for the LGBTQ community, including repealing Don't Ask, Don't tell. And the AfD denies man made climate change. [00:04:15] The 2008 Dems invested in clean energy, and they were critical of foreign governments who were not doing more to combat it. And finally, the AfD has strong ties to Russia and China, and they also are questioning whether or not Germany should even be a part of NATO anymore. And the Obama Dems, they maintain their close ties to NATO and their allies. [00:04:36] So, Jake, the thing I don't understand is that if Elon is so pro AfD and if Elon is saying that the AfD is basically just Obama 2008, then is Elon and his supporters now saying in the most roundabout weirdo way [00:04:51] that he actually likes the Obama Democratic 2008 platform? - It's a very confusing hot take. - Yeah. So it's interesting because it was so unnecessary. And he went out of his way to support this far right party in Germany. [00:05:08] To make what point? Why Germany? Why that particular party? Yeah. Makes a great and hilarious point that. Wait, are you saying. Well, I really wanted to support Barack Obama when he, you know, as he first came out. So I found a far right party in Germany that I thought was similar to Obama. [00:05:28] Really? Really. You're trying to celebrate Obama right now, and that's why you picked the far right party in Germany. Okay, that doesn't make any sense, of course. And so yeah, did Obama break the record on deportations? He did. So if you want to say, oh, I see one similarity there, did Obama take forever [00:05:45] to get to legalizing same sex marriage? Yeah, but he got there right. But otherwise there's no comparison here. It's absurd. And so and I'm not going as far as calling them neo-Nazis or whatever. Because I don't have enough information on that. And I don't trust Dana Bash or any Democratic senator, but their [00:06:03] policies are already disastrous enough. But there's a second irony here, which is, wait, you love that anti-immigrant party? Awkward. You're an immigrant, Ellen. You came here from South Africa. Just because you're white doesn't mean you're not an immigrant. [00:06:19] Okay? Like I don't. Under what logic are you not an immigrant? But no, no, no, I get kicked the gay immigrants out. Immigrants suck. Oh, yeah. I mean, unless they're rich. Unless they're white, right? Unless they're, you know, from running away from the fact that [00:06:35] there's no more apartheid in South Africa. I don't know, I don't know, but the idea that you're anti-immigrant is absurd. It's absurd. It's ridiculous. But yet you seem to be in that camp. Look. It's another. I get it, guys. There's a difference between undocumented immigrants and immigrants that came in the legal way, like I did and Elon Musk did. [00:06:52] But for him to say, oh, I'll take a far right party in a random other country. Of all of them, Germany. And I love that they're massively anti-immigrant. And by the way, again, I don't know all the details of this particular party, but in a lot of European, [00:07:07] far right parties, they're not just against undocumented immigrants, they're against all immigrants. So nothing but hypocrisy, as far as I can see here. And I mean that that is kind of what it means that he is white, though he is not really an immigrant, at least not functionally. [00:07:24] Right. I mean, if nobody sees him that way, then nobody is treating him as an immigrant. So a lot of the problems and a lot of the struggles that immigrant communities face, he is completely separate from that. Right? He doesn't get the stigma that so many others are subjected to for being immigrants. He's a billionaire. [00:07:40] He has ties with governments all around the world. He has so much money that he can go live in a yacht in the middle of the ocean. He can go live in outer space. It doesn't matter. He doesn't have a country, or at least that is how people see him, and that is how his supporters see him. And the fact, you know, the fact that they even are so derogatory towards immigrants [00:08:00] is funny to me because yeah, like this. Especially because he came over illegally, didn't he? Like, he's not better than most people, apart from the fact that he just has all this money now, and he came from money, and a lot of the people who are moving because they don't have a choice, and they're doing it because they don't have a choice, because [00:08:17] something is going on in their country, probably something that we caused. And, you know, they're there. They had to leave their homes. You know, they're not here in the United States or wherever they are by choice. That wasn't their first choice to leave their homes and just come over here. 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