Watch a 98-Year-Old World War II Vet Absolutely Demolish a Tesla With a Tank

Posted on May 20, 2025 by Danzig

Crushing Fascism

A 98-year-old World War II veteran, who served in the British Army, absolutely destroyed a Tesla vehicle with the license plate "FASCIM" in a recently shared YouTube video.

As first spotted by Gizmodo, veteran Ken Turner used a Sherman tank, one of the most widely used tanks used by the US and its western allies against the Nazis in World War II, to turn a navy blue Tesla into a pancake.

The video was uploaded by the British anti-Brexit and anti-conservative political group Led by Donkeys to send a clear message.

"Elon Musk, the richest man in the world, is using his immense power to support the far-right in Europe, and his money comes from Tesla cars," the group wrote in the video's caption. "We’ve crushed fascism before and we’ll crush it again."

Tesla Smackdown

The symbolic stunt highlights Musk's embrace of extremist and racist views. The mercurial CEO has used his considerable platform to further unhinged conspiracy theories and spread hurtful anti-immigrant rhetoric.

And who could forget president Donald Trump's post-inauguration celebration, during which Musk performed not just one but two Nazi salutes?

He has appeared at a rally for the Alternative for Germany party — a growing, far-right nationalist contingency boasting ties to neo-Nazism — and attended meetings with Italian right-wing populist political party Lega.

As a result, anti-Musk sentiment has soared, giving life to an international protest movement, dubbed "Tesla Takedown."

It's a terrifying new predicament, with experts warning of the rise of technofeudalism, ruled by a tiny number of "broligarchs," like Musk.

To some, it's an eerie deja vu of some of the darkest chapters in recent human history.

"I’m old enough to have seen fascism the first time around, now it’s coming back," said veteran Turner in the latest video — before crushing the Tesla in a tank.

More on Elon Musk: As Sales Continue to Plummet, Tesla Is Considering a Massive Payday for Elon Musk

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Watch a 98-Year-Old World War II Vet Absolutely Demolish a Tesla With a Tank

Tesla’s Robotaxi Launch Is Already an Enormous Mess

Posted on May 20, 2025 by Danzig

As Tesla prepares the slated June launch of its Robotaxi service in Austin, Texas, there's a pretty big elephant in the room.

Failure to Launch

As Tesla prepares for the slated June launch of its robotaxi service in Austin, Texas, there's a pretty big elephant in the room: that its autonomous driving services leave a lot to be desired.

As Forbes reports, the serious safety concerns surrounding Tesla's so-called "Full Self-Driving" may result in CEO Elon Musk's robotaxi service being dead on arrival.

"It's going to fail for sure," billionaire and longtime Tesla critic Dan O'Dowd told Forbes.

Along with founding defense and aerospace contractor Green Hills Software, O'Dowd established a nonprofit, The Dawn Project, whose main purpose is warning the public about the dangers of unproven self-driving tech, particularly Tesla's FSD, and lobbying against its legality.

Still, he's done some of his own research to reach his Tesla-negative stance.

"We drove it around Santa Barbara for 80 minutes, and there were seven failures," he told Forbes. "If there had not been a driver sitting in the driver's seat, it would’ve hit something."

Highway To Hell

It's not just O'Dowd questioning Musk's plans to launch a driverless ride-hailing service in Austin.

As Electrek reports, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) tapped Tesla earlier this week to release its FSD data ahead of the robotaxi launch next month. The agency — which is investigating Tesla for several safety defects — became concerned that the robotaxi launch may use FSD, which has proven to be quite dangerous.

"The agency would like to gather additional information about Tesla’s development of technologies for use in 'robotaxi' vehicles," wrote Tanya Topka, the NHTSA's defect investigation investigator, in an email obtained by Electrek, "to understand how Tesla plans to evaluate its vehicles and driving automation technologies for use on public roads."

Around the time that the NHTSA letter was revealed, The Information reported that as of April, Tesla had not yet started testing its autonomous cabs without safety drivers.

Outstanding Questions

As Forbes notes, there's still a lot we don't know about the Robotaxi launch, including when exactly it will happen and how it will operate.

Neither Tesla nor the city of Austin has been very open about those plans with the media, and the only thing anyone has gleaned so far about it is that it will be much more limited than expected, with a maximum of 20 self-driving Model Ys trawling specific areas of the Texas capital.

With all that uncertainty, one would not blame Musk for pushing back the robotaxi launch — but if history is to once again repeat itself, he won't give up the ghost until the very last second.

More on Robotaxis: Elon Musk's "Robotaxis" Have a Dirty Secret

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Emails Show Elon Musk Begging for Privacy While Siccing His 200 Million Twitter Followers on Specific Private People He Doesn’t Like

Posted on May 9, 2025 by Danzig

Elon Musk has repeatedly tried to protect his own privacy at all costs while also showing a shocking disregard for other people's privacy.

Billionaire Elon Musk has demonstrated an extreme level of disregard for other people's privacy. He has a long track record of singling out specific private individuals to siccing his lackeys after them.

But when it comes to his own privacy, it's an entirely different matter.

It's a glaring double standard, with the mercurial CEO repeatedly trying to protect his own privacy at all costs. Case in point, as the New York Times reports, his staff tried to keep the construction of a ludicrously tall fence and gate to his $6 million mansion in Austin, Texas, hidden from the public.

Emails obtained by the newspaper show that Musk's handlers tried to make public meetings allowing neighbors to speak out about his plans private instead. His staff also argued that the city of Austin should exempt him from state and federal public records laws, efforts that ultimately proved futile.

The Zoning and Planning Commission ultimately voted to deny Musk the exceptions he was asking for to turn his mansion into a Fort Knox of billionaire quietude.

Yet while he goes to extreme lengths to keep his own affairs private, Musk's track record of invading other people's privacy — often using his enormous 200 million follower base to make other people's lives miserable — is extensive, to say the least.

In February, the mercurial CEO was accused of publicizing the occupation of the daughter of judge John McConnell to his hundreds of millions of followers, after her father unfroze the Department of Education's federal grants.

Musk has also accused Wall Street Journal reporter Katherine Long of being a "disgusting and cruel person," after she reported on how Musk had armed a severely underqualified 25-year-old to infiltrate the US Treasury's payments system earlier this year.

In 2022, Musk took to Twitter to send his lackeys after Duke University professor and automation expert Missy Cummings for allegedly being "extremely biased against Tesla."

Late last year, Musk extensively bullied US International Development Finance Corporation employee Ashley Thomas on X-formerly-Twitter, resulting in major harassment by his followers on the platform.

But his capacity to receive criticism — much of it deserved, considering his actions — has been abysmal.

"It’s really come as quite a shock to me that there is this level of, really, hatred and violence from the Left," Musk whined during a Fox News interview in March after his gutting of the government and embrace of extremist views inspired a major anti-Tesla movement.

"I’ve never done anything harmful," he claimed. "I’ve only done productive things."

"My companies make great products that people love and I’ve never physically hurt anyone," Musk complained in a tweet at the time. "So why the hate and violence against me?"

More on Musk: Elon Musk Is Having Massive Drama With His Mansion's Neighbors

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Emails Show Elon Musk Begging for Privacy While Siccing His 200 Million Twitter Followers on Specific Private People He Doesn't Like

Tesla Stock Is Soaring for the Funniest Possible Reason

Posted on April 5, 2025 by Danzig

For the first time in forever, Tesla stock is on the rise — and it happened right after news broke that Elon Musk's may be leaving government.

Tesla released some terrible news about sales this morning, but then a funny thing happened: after an initial crash, its stock started to rise significantly.

Why? Well, it seems a lot like it has to do with a Politico story reporting, per three unnamed insiders, that president Donald Trump had been telling confidantes of Musk's upcoming departure in a few months — purportedly to focus on his many businesses, and not because he can't get security clearance due to drug use.

Though both the White House and Musk himself have spun the reporting as "garbage" and "fake news," the writing was nevertheless on the wall. By the time the markets closed, Tesla was trading for about $282 a share, in a 5.3 percent increase from the $254 price per share it held when markets opened this morning.

The stock jump is all the more telling in context, considering that just 48 hours ago, Musk's electric vehicle company was trading at $259 per share — right after the multi-hyphenate himself admitted that his government work was hurting Tesla's stock price.

Just a few weeks ago, Wedbush analyst Dan Ives said in a note to investors that Musk needed to "change the narrative" to save his EV company. Its brand image, the longtime Tesla bull wrote, was suffering from a "tornado crisis" due to massive backlash against the billionaire's draconian politicking — and the only way out of it was to "formally announce Musk is going to balance DOGE and being Tesla CEO."

Obviously, Musk isn't exactly following that advice by insisting that Politico's reporting, which was later corroborated by NBC, is somehow false. Regardless, the markets have spoken — and it seems like even they think he's full of crap.

For months now, Tesla has been shaken not only by anti-Musk protests, but also by investor anxiety about whether or not the company's figurehead is asleep at the wheel.

In an obvious reference to DOGE's cruel attempt at getting government employees to justify their jobs, Tesla investor and celebrity photographer Jerry Avenaim jokingly tweeted, "Please share five things you did for Tesla shareholders this week."

"Or are you working remotely?" Avenaim continued. "Asking for all of us."

Is Musk gonna get his eye back on the ball after all? Or will he dig his heels in for more culture warring?

It's impossible to tell right now, but Tesla shareholders may be in for a nasty surprise in the morning: after a White House event announcing draconian new tariffs, Tesla's stock is again getting hammered in after-hours trading.

More on Tesla: Musk Says Government Will "Go After" Tesla Critics

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Tesla Investors Suddenly Terrified as They Realize Musk Has Dug Their Grave

Posted on April 5, 2025 by Danzig

Tesla's horrendous first quarter numbers have some of its backers rethinking a few things. Namely, their CEO Elon Musk, whose once immense starpower is now inverting on itself.

Still haunted by last year's sales slump — the first annual drop in its history — Tesla has kicked off 2025 with a worrying omen that it may repeat the unwanted feat: a 13 percent drop in first-quarter deliveries. As the company faces widespread protests fueled by anti-Musk sentiment, the diagnosis is obvious.

"This is our first look at the impact of recent brand damage — and it appears to be the primary driver behind this quarter's delivery decline," Deepwater Asset Management managing partner Gene Munster wrote on X, as spotted by Reuters. "These growth rates will likely deteriorate further this quarter." Annual deliveries, Munster predicts, will slip by 9 percent.

"I estimate brand damage cost Tesla around 80k deliveries in the quarter," Munster added in another tweet.

The problems are very much material, too. Musk made a big and brash gamble with the Cybertruck, a heterodox pickup truck with bold styling and an exorbitant price tag. And less than 50,000 of them have actually shipped — nowhere near the 250,000 units sold that Musk promised investors before the stainless steel trapezoids started rolling off the lot last year.

To some fans and investors, the big Cybertruck push was a slap in the face. They had long begged Musk for a small, affordable Tesla that could sell in high volumes. Instead, what they got was a vehicle that weighs 7,000 pounds and costs upwards of $80,000. Even if the fabled affordable EV does come, investors don't sound confident that Tesla will nail it. Gary Black, managing partner of Tesla shareholder The Future Fund, worries that if the cheaper vehicle is simply a barebones version of an existing model, this year's deliveries and profits "will go much lower," he told Reuters.

The rest of the Tesla lineup, meanwhile, is no longer as titillating in a market full of exciting EV options.

Tesla is also getting smoked by its Chinese competitor BYD, which recently usurped Musk's company as the world's largest EV automaker, selling over 4 million vehicles and raking $100 billion in revenue in 2024. Tesla sold 1.79 million and took in $97.7 billion over the same period.

It's impossible to ignore what Musk has recently positioned as Tesla's next big thing: the robotaxi business. At the unveiling event of a "Cybercab" prototype last year, Musk dubiously promised that pivoting into offering self-driving cabs would rake in trillions of dollars. But as the company struggles to refine its existing autonomous driving software options like Full Self-Driving, there's immense uncertainty over when — if ever — it can start rolling out such a vision.

All the while, the mere act of driving around in a Tesla has become stigmatized in a way that would've been unthinkable just a few years ago. Tesla cars and dealerships alike are being targeted with vandalism, while owners are ruthlessly mocked.

The degree of hate has surprised even Tesla skeptics. JPMorgan analyst Ryan Brinkman, who has long been bearish on the company, said in a report Friday that first quarter deliveries confirm the "unprecedented brand damage we had earlier feared."

But "if anything," Brinkman added, "we may have underestimated the degree of consumer reaction."

More on Tesla: Tesla Stock Is Soaring for the Funniest Possible Reason

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Tesla Investors Suddenly Terrified as They Realize Musk Has Dug Their Grave

The Only Thing Sadder Than This Cybertruck’s Gaping Wound Is Its Bumper Sticker

Posted on December 3, 2024 by Danzig

A Cybertruck owner waited two weeks for Tesla to patch up his car's bumper, and the sticker he plastered on it makes the bad situation worse.

Crash Course

A Cybertruck owner waited two miserable weeks for a Tesla collision shop to patch up his car's torn bumper, and the sticker he plastered on the vehicle makes his bad situation worse.

"I bought this after I knew Elon was awesome," reads the bumper sticker, which the truck owner shared as part of an explanatory post on X-formerly-Twitter.

It's meant to be a defiant response to the much more popular stickers sheepishly disclaiming that a Tesla's owner bought the vehicle "before we knew Elon was crazy" — but after the accident, it feels more like a sad trombone.

Boulevard of Broken Teslas

While waiting for repair parts, the collision shop had stripped part of the Cybertruck's steel body to reveal the white exoskeleton beneath.

"I want Tesla to be the best," pleaded the Cybertruck owner, whose X name identifies them only as "Tryangle." But the "truck was perfectly drivable, and it's just been sitting in the lot for 10-plus days torn down."

"No one can give me a clear idea of when parts will be available, or when things will be completed," Tryangle continued. "I feel like my truck is being held hostage."

One man's woe here speaks to a larger issue with Musk's most passionate followers: they'll endure anything to feel close to the billionaire. They don't mind that the $74,000-and-up Cybertruck clearly isn't as invincible as advertised, or that it's a nightmare to service, and that it sometimes bursts into flames.

As for Tryangle, his Cybertruck is now fixed and back in his possession — and he couldn't be more thrilled.

"I ordered my @cybertruck five years ago," he recently wrote on X-formerly-Twitter. "Never has anything in my life been worth the wait like the Cybertruck has! (Sorry to my wife, baby boy, and future children.)"

More on the Cybertruck: Warning! Do Not Expose Cybertrucks to Common Magnets

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Tesla Factories Caught Spewing Toxins Into Air, River, Sewer

Posted on December 3, 2024 by Danzig

Tesla's plant in Austin, Texas is leaking huge amounts of hazardous wastewater into the city's sewer, violating local environmental guidelines.

Tesla's plant in Austin, Texas has been leaking huge amounts of hazardous wastewater into the city's sewer, violating local environmental guidelines.

As detailed in public records obtained by the Wall Street Journal, the Elon Musk-led company also allowed a massive casting furnace to spew toxins into the air after its door refused to shut.

These environmental problems continued to be a problem for months. While Tesla bosses were aware of them, they forced employees to come up with short-term fixes, according to the report, all in an effort to avoid slowing down production.

The news once again highlights Musk's disregard for environmental regulations. Now that he's aligned himself with president-elect Donald Trump, Musk has vowed to "delete the mountain of choking regulations that do not serve the greater good" as part of his so-called "Department of Government Efficiency," or DOGE.

In short, Tesla's egregious environmental shortcomings underscore the conflict of interest as the mercurial CEO attempts to dismantle the environmental rules by which his companies currently have to abide.

It also marks a turning point for a billionaire who once was seen as a pioneer in renewable energy and an ally of environmental causes.

According to the WSJ, Tesla's factory in Fremont, California has gotten more warnings for air pollution rule violations than almost any other car plant in the state. Over just the past five years, the factory violated air pollution permits 112 times and failed to address shortcomings with equipment designed to minimize emissions.

Meanwhile in Austin, employees were afraid to speak up over environmental concerns, citing fears of being fired.

"Tesla repeatedly asked me to lie to the government so that they could operate without paying for proper environmental controls," one environmental compliance staffer said, according to a 2024 memo obtained by the WSJ.

The EPA's criminal-enforcement division has since opened an inquiry into the staffer's allegations.

While production was ramping up at the Texas factory, a massive six-acre pond of wastewater was slowly being directed into Austin's sewer system, without Tesla ever getting permission.

During rainstorms, Tesla even dumped chemicals into the nearby Colorado River, turning it an alarming shade of brown.

After the unnamed environmental compliance staffer refused a Tesla executive's request to lobby Austin's water regulator to downplay its frequent violations of chemical limits, the staffer was abruptly fired.

It's a sad reality for a company that was once hailed as popularizing the answer to gas-guzzling combustion engines.

In his 2006 "Master Plan," Musk promised to help "expedite the move from a mine-and-burn hydrocarbon economy towards a solar electric economy, which I believe to be the primary, but not exclusive, sustainable solution."

Any references to the plan were quietly deleted from Tesla's website in August — highlighting the EV maker and its CEO's newfound disregard for the environment and the rules that were created to protect it.

More on Tesla: Tesla Deletes Elon Musk's "Master Plan"

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Cybertruck Owners Actually Love the Fact That Their Car Could Fly Apart at Any Moment

Posted on December 3, 2024 by Danzig

The reason that people keep buying the Cybertruck is that they actually like the dangerous appeal of its shoddy construction.

Just twelve months since it began shipping out to customers, the Cybertruck is now on its sixth recall — this time for turning into a seven-thousand pound paperweight while driving.

And yet, people keep buying the Tesla pickup. Its owners have adopted a siege mentality against the onslaught of bad press, and perhaps against the world, which isn't very kind to the stainless steel behemoths.

What draws someone to dump $100,000 on a vehicle that reportedly bricks after going through a car wash? One explanation is that it's a sign of the extreme loyalty that Elon Musk inspires in his fans.

But there could be more to it. As an automotive expert suggests, the Cybertruck's shoddiness may actually be what endears it to its edgy buyers.

"The people drawn to [the Cybertruck] don't have quality of construction or safety at the top of mind," Ivan Drury, director of insights at the automotive inventory company Edmunds, told Wired. "That this could be a dangerous vehicle to drive is key to its appeal."

Cybertruck buyers are people "who think 'I don't care if I kill people when I drive this thing down the street,'" he added.

As of October, Tesla has sold over 28,250 Cybertrucks, according to Kelly Blue Book, making it one of the best selling EVs in the country (though this is still a far cry from the 250,000 per year that Musk once estimated).

Its selling points are varied. It's hyped as "bullet-proof" and "apocalypse proof," though your results may vary; Tesla also claims it can off-road and tow and be an all-around workhorse.

For many owners, the reality has been soberingly different. Sloppy construction, discolored body panels and getting stumped by normal truck stuff have all come to define the vehicle since its launch. There have even been reports of brand new Cybertrucks suddenly breaking down.

It's not surprising, then, that the Cybertruck has been recalled at an average of once every two months. If anything, it's surprising it hasn't been recalled more.

But that amount is already alarming. Harl Brauer, an executive analyst at iSeeCars, estimates that the Cybertruck's tally of six recalls make it "worse than 91 percent" of all other 2024 vehicles.

"We aren't comfortable making [lifetime recall] predictions on the Cybertruck at this very early stage," Brauer told Wired. "But so far it isn't doing very well."

Yet according to Drury, Cybertruck owners don't pay attention to details like that. In fact, you can more or less sum up their ethos as a giant "fuck you" to sound car-buying wisdom.

"Cybertruck customers are in it for the stares and glares — they don't care about how many times [this vehicle is] going to be recalled over 30 years," Drury told Wired. "They're buying this car for now, with zero thought to the future."

"A standard auto customer wants to know if a car will last 10 years or will be ongoing good value for money," he added. "A Cybertruck customer doesn't care about any of that. Owning a Cybertruck isn't practical; it's a boast. A boast that 'I have so much discretionary income I can afford to waste it on an impractical car.'"

More on Tesla: Warning! Do Not Expose Cybertrucks to Common Magnets

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The Only Thing Sadder Than This Cybertruck’s Gaping Wound Is Its Bumper Sticker

Posted on December 1, 2024 by Danzig

Crash Course

A Cybertruck owner waited two miserable weeks for a Tesla collision shop to patch up his car's torn bumper, and the sticker he plastered on the vehicle makes his bad situation worse.

"I bought this after I knew Elon was awesome," reads the bumper sticker, which the truck owner shared as part of an explanatory post on X-formerly-Twitter.

Boulevard of Broken Teslas

While waiting for repair parts, the collision shop had stripped part of the Cybertruck's steel body to reveal the white exoskeleton beneath.

"No one can give me a clear idea of when parts will be available, or when things will be completed," Tryangle continued. "I feel like my truck is being held hostage."

As for Tryangle, his Cybertruck is now fixed and back in his possession — and he couldn't be more thrilled.

More on the Cybertruck: Warning! Do Not Expose Cybertrucks to Common Magnets

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