777
submitted 10 months ago by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world

Summary

Tech leaders who once backed Trump are fed up as his second term descends into chaos.

Venture capitalists and startup founders complain about erratic policies and feel burned by crypto bro schemes like $Trump coin, which tanked after launch.

Appointing David Sacks as "crypto czar" only fueled suspicions of cronyism, while proposed defense budget cuts leave companies like Anduril and Palantir reeling.

Even billionaire allies like Jeff Bezos are souring as tariffs and economic uncertainty hit their bottom line. "Everyone is annoyed," says one disillusioned founder.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[-] mrsjmccrimmon@feddit.uk 216 points 10 months ago

“When tech people got involved in the government, they thought Trump was going to take more of a surgical approach and act less like a wrecking ball."

What about his first term, insurrection and campaign and everything about and around him suggested it’d be anything other than a wrecking ball approach???

[-] fluxion@lemmy.world 129 points 10 months ago

Billionaires have done a lot these past few years toward outing themselves as being just as stupid as any other random dumbass.

[-] blarth 77 points 10 months ago

They are. They just lack morals and empathy. They’re incapable of feeling shame for exploiting other humans.

[-] TheLowestStone@lemmy.world 39 points 10 months ago

They were also all extremely lucky at least once.

[-] manxu@piefed.social 13 points 10 months ago

I think that's the key. We attribute to them special qualities because we like to think in terms of cause and effect. But they all seem to have just been there at the right time with the right people and the right thing.

They show us there is nothing special about them every time they try to do something new and miserably fail. Think the money Meta spent on VR, or the way Musk alienated users and advertisers on Twitter.

We are basically beholden to lottery winners.

[-] anomnom@sh.itjust.works 4 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Birth Lottery Sociopaths

2000s indie rock band, or dotcom billionaire?

[-] Generic_Idiot@lemm.ee 3 points 10 months ago

Yeah well I’m not saying it’s entirely luck, but luck is certainly a significant factor in becoming a billionaire.

Right place, right time, right resources at said place and time etc.

They’re not super geniuses better than anyone else, they just had a lot fall their way, and had the work ethic/psychopathic tendencies to capitalise on it.

[-] SwingingTheLamp@midwest.social 1 points 10 months ago

In about 2018, I think, a team of researchers put together a mathematical model of how markets work. What they found is that wealth just naturally accumulates to a few people. It's inherent to how markets work, and it's more or less at random; in their simulation runs, every person started out in an equal position.

It's all luck. It doesn't even take being in the right place at the right time, although that helps. Since us humans operate on narratives and just-world fallacies, it's really easy for us to construct a post hoc story about why a certain billionaire succeeded. But it's all luck.

(I remember that I read about this research in Scientific American, but I don't have the link handy.)

[-] jpreston2005@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago

Here's that Scientific American article. I keep it in my bookmarks because it's one of the articles that easily disproves countless bullshit theories. Also an article my dumbass drumpf loving father refuses to read.

[-] jj4211@lemmy.world 13 points 10 months ago

His first term was pretty milquetoast during his term, at least in the ways that these stakeholders cared about. Yeah, he mucked with some trade relationships but largely backed down except for China, and China is a thorn in their side too. The economy basically looked similar to most presidential terms for the last 30 years (except for George W Bush, who had very subpar economic results). Yeah he did some horrible stuff and some incompetent stuff, but economically, his term was just fine (except for 2020, which derailed everyone).

The 2020 election, January 6th, and Trump's continuing behavior in the wake of that, and the PJ2025 associates that swarmed around him should have been the sign that he was too dangerous to risk. However they could have still thought that Trump's behavior was more of a show for riling up a base, and his second term would still give them a chance to have him shuffle off to a golf course while the big boys got what they wanted like usual.

This term, there just are no winners, at least domestically, and lots of losers.

[-] Benjaben@lemmy.world 6 points 10 months ago

Naked greed has a way of making even the orangest turd seem to sparkle like gold.

this post was submitted on 26 Mar 2025
777 points (99.0% liked)

News

35774 readers
1991 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil


Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.


2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.


Obvious biased sources will be removed at the mods’ discretion. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted separately but not to the post body. Sources may be checked for reliability using Wikipedia, MBFC, AdFontes, GroundNews, etc.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source. Clickbait titles may be removed.


Posts which titles don’t match the source may be removed. If the site changed their headline, we may ask you to update the post title. Clickbait titles use hyperbolic language and do not accurately describe the article content. When necessary, post titles may be edited, clearly marked with [brackets], but may never be used to editorialize or comment on the content.


5. Only recent news is allowed.


Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.


6. All posts must be news articles.


No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials, videos, blogs, press releases, or celebrity gossip will be allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis. Mods may use discretion to pre-approve videos or press releases from highly credible sources that provide unique, newsworthy content not available or possible in another format.


7. No duplicate posts.


If an article has already been posted, it will be removed. Different articles reporting on the same subject are permitted. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.


8. Misinformation is prohibited.


Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.


9. No link shorteners or news aggregators.


All posts must link to original article sources. You may include archival links in the post description. News aggregators such as Yahoo, Google, Hacker News, etc. should be avoided in favor of the original source link. Newswire services such as AP, Reuters, or AFP, are frequently republished and may be shared from other credible sources.


10. Don't copy entire article in your post body


For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS