Photo: Gage Skidmore via Flickr
Keep your friends close, and your enemies even closer, they say, and while "enemy" might be too strong a word to describe the relationship between Elon Musk and the U.S. President, Donald Trump, they certainly don't see eye to eye on a number of aspects.
Donald Trump referred to global warming as a "hoax," and that was even before he was elected to head the country. However, he also said a lot of other weird, even absurd things, so everybody hoped they were all ramblings meant to earn himself a few votes, and not de facto opinions.
In other words, we thought he would show a lot more common sense than he actually did. Elon Musk's decision to become a councilman for the President was regarded as odd, to say the least, but the Tesla CEO must have thought that, given the circumstances, it's better to be on the inside of where things important to your business are decided rather than outside. And if you can change the man's mind about global warming in the process - or at least plant some doubts - then all the better.
After Donald Trump had announced he was pulling the U.S.A. out of the Paris Agreement, it became obvious that it's not so much his beliefs that are driving his actions, nor the will of the Americans, but a completely different agenda that no counseling can affect. As a result, Elon Musk announced his resignation from the presidential council in a message on Twitter: "Am departing presidential councils> Climate change is real. Leaving Paris is not good for America or the world."
The Tesla CEO was not alone in openly criticizing Trump's decision. Numerous other members of U.S. business circles condemned the move, as well as countless politicians, mayors, and so on. Some states or cities have vowed to keep working toward the Paris Agreement target regardless of the U.S. policy, which has now placed the country in the select company of Nicaragua and Syria, the only other two nations that did not sign the Paris Agreement. And Nicaragua only declined to sign it because it was "too weak," having made up its own set of more aggressive goals since.
In other words, we thought he would show a lot more common sense than he actually did. Elon Musk's decision to become a councilman for the President was regarded as odd, to say the least, but the Tesla CEO must have thought that, given the circumstances, it's better to be on the inside of where things important to your business are decided rather than outside. And if you can change the man's mind about global warming in the process - or at least plant some doubts - then all the better.
After Donald Trump had announced he was pulling the U.S.A. out of the Paris Agreement, it became obvious that it's not so much his beliefs that are driving his actions, nor the will of the Americans, but a completely different agenda that no counseling can affect. As a result, Elon Musk announced his resignation from the presidential council in a message on Twitter: "Am departing presidential councils> Climate change is real. Leaving Paris is not good for America or the world."
The Tesla CEO was not alone in openly criticizing Trump's decision. Numerous other members of U.S. business circles condemned the move, as well as countless politicians, mayors, and so on. Some states or cities have vowed to keep working toward the Paris Agreement target regardless of the U.S. policy, which has now placed the country in the select company of Nicaragua and Syria, the only other two nations that did not sign the Paris Agreement. And Nicaragua only declined to sign it because it was "too weak," having made up its own set of more aggressive goals since.
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