We have all heard a joke similar to this one:
A doctor, Elon Musk, a little boy, and a priest were flying on a small private plane. Suddenly, the plane developed engine trouble. Despite the pilot’s best efforts, the plane started to go down. Finally, the pilot grabbed a parachute and yelled to the passengers that they had better jump, and he bailed out.
Unfortunately, only three parachutes remained.
The doctor grabbed one of the parachutes and said, “I’m a doctor. I save lives, so I must live to save others’ lives,” before jumping out.
Elon Musk then said, “I’m the richest man in the world, and rich people are the smartest people in the world. Therefore, I deserve to live.” He also grabbed a parachute and jumped.
The priest looked at the little boy and said, “My son, I’ve lived a long and full life. You are young and have your whole life ahead of you. So, take the last parachute and live in peace.”
The little boy handed the parachute back to the priest and said, “Do not worry, Father. The smartest man in the world just took off with my backpack.”
After Tesla released its earnings statement yesterday (April 23, 2025), many savvy investors wondered aloud if Elon Musk actually does anything at Tesla. They speculated that he was just a gadfly figurehead who bought into the company at an early stage (Musk was not a Tesla founder.) Moreover, they speculated that the Tesla board, consisting primarily of Musk’s friends and family, is completely in denial about Musk’s hard shift into Trump’s MAGA world. Faithful to the MAGA worldview, Musk and the Tesla board are blaming Democrats and the Deep State for the demise of Tesla.
Investor Ross Gerber said after being on an investor call with Musk and Tesla executives, “What it seems like from the call is they’re in complete denial of his actions causing this result, and it’s these leftists that are attacking him because he’s in the government, is what he seems to think,” he said. “Then they minimize the effect on the company. I think they are just completely delusional at this point, including Elon.”
The Musk delusion continues as he promises robotaxis and driverless Teslas. He has been promising driverless cars for over a decade, and all we see are fatalities. Other driverless car manufacturers are far ahead of Tesla.
Gerber commented further: “Everything was pretty standard Elon gibberish through the first part of the call, with the same promises and false statements that he normally makes. But then the questions got to robotaxi, and that’s when I got spooked,” he said. “It was a simple question into robotaxi and it turned into him stuttering for 10 minutes.”
Without a doubt, Tesla has created a viable electric vehicle that was a magnet for those wanting to move away from fossil fuels in mostly wealthy, liberal regions of America. Tesla caught the automobile industry flatfooted around 2013. The company was founded in 2003 by Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning in San Carlos, California, and Elon Musk became an early investor. After struggling with design and the typical startup issues, the federal government loaned Tesla $465,000,000 in 2009 to keep the company afloat. By 2012, Tesla had manufactured less than 3,000 vehicles. Subsequently, tax incentives allowed EV and hybrid car makers to gain market share from conventional gasoline-powered vehicles. Until Musk decided to become a government efficiency expert and take a chainsaw to the federal government, Tesla was the clear winner in the EV market. The typical Tesla owner was from an educated, upwardly mobile family in a Blue State.
After President Trump invited Musk to take over the federal government, something interesting happened. Suddenly, many Teslas stuck signs in their windows that said, “I bought this EV before I knew Musk was crazy.” Teslas around the world were vandalized. Tesla’s sales evaporated overnight. Tesla’s market value plummeted by 50 percent.
Today, strange counter-protestors are coming to Musk’s defense. The Proud Boys are now driving their large gas-guzzling pickups around Tesla dealerships in support of Musk. Does Tesla believe it can live without sales in Blue States, Europe, and Asia? Musk’s recent behavior, plus Trump’s tariff wars with Europe and Asia, should hurt Tesla even more.
As mentioned, Tesla has many advantages. However, Musk seems delusional about himself, the government, and Tesla. Aside from the adage about burning the candle at both ends, his alienation of Tesla’s target market is a dereliction of his fiduciary duty. If a salesman in a Tesla dealership in Council Bluffs, Nebraska, started acting bizarrely, he would be fired. However, should Musk be retained if he acts bizarrely? Interestingly, the Tesla stock price rose after it was announced that Musk would leave his DOGE role next month. I am sure some short sellers will say that after the last four months, Musk’s RETURN to Tesla would hurt Tesla.