Is Musk a Bond villain or America's salvation?

Having failed to convince voters President Donald Trump is the demon who will destroy democracy, progressives are making Musk the target of their renewed resistance movement. Musk, they warn, is the evil genius guiding Trump’s dark hand.

Their fearmongering portrays the billionaire entrepreneur as a villain in a James Bond movie, out to use his vast wealth, tech savvy and influence over the president to infiltrate the government and make the United States another subsidiary of his X empire.

I don’t dismiss the possibility that Musk is up to something sinister. Nor am I aloof to concerns it may be self-interest rather than patriotism that is motivating his role as architect of the administrative state restructuring. He’s a strange dude, with a questionable world view.

But I also recognize hysteria and hypocrisy when I see them, and both are at work in the left’s vilification of Musk.

“Nobody elected Musk” is their rallying cry. True. There are only two elected members of the executive branch — the president and vice-president. Presidents are allowed to appoint advisors to help with the massive job of running the government, and they’ve always done so.

Nobody elected Hillary Clinton when her husband made her an adjunct member of his cabinet and put her in charge of overhauling the nation’s health care system. Nobody elected the White House cabal who apparently ran the nation during Joe Biden’s incapacitation. And nobody elected the bureaucrats heading federal agencies who are acting on their own to make policy and spend tax dollars while claiming immunity from accountability.

The Democratic Congress members who are storming empty federal buildings to protest Musk’s aggressive cost-cutting have forfeited through decades of inaction their credibility in attacking Trump and Musk for acting.

The dastardly duo is doing what voters elected Trump to do: fixing a broken government.

Cutting the size, cost and power of the bureaucracy is essential to the nation’s survival. The United States will post a near $2 trillion budget deficit this year despite a healthy economy. The federal government now routinely spends one-third more than it takes in.

The national debt is approaching $37 trillion. That amounts to $107,000 for every citizen, and $323,000 for every taxpayer. Debt payments will consume more than $725 billion this year.

Congressional Democrats stood on the steps of the Social Security Administration building and warned Musk will strip recipients of benefits. That is happening anyway. Social Security and Medicare will be insolvent in less than a decade if nothing is done. And nothing is what Democrats and Republicans have been doing for decades to head off the coming collapse.

Someone must act to bring fiscal sanity to America. If it’s not Trump and Musk, who will it be? Every politician ever elected declares cutting waste and inefficiency as a top priority, yet it never gets done. This time it might.

I am nervous about a legion of juvenile tech nerds roaming unfettered through government files. I also detest any president bypassing the regular lawmaking process to govern through executive orders. Trump has a Republican Congress; he should use it to enshrine his agenda in the law, where it will be harder to undo.

And I’ll admit to getting weary of Trump’s stream of consciousness policy making and inability to establish a hierarchy of urgency. Banning paper straws and the minting of pennies should not make the first 100 days to-do list.

But I also strongly believe that the bureaucracy should not serve itself and its own priorities. The president should have control of executive agencies. And those agencies should be fully transparent and accountable.

They aren’t now. Instead, they are spending outrageous amounts of money in ways that run counter to national strategic interests, convinced their power is more enduring than that of any president or Congress.

Musk is brilliant. Brilliance is a quality long missing from Washington. If he can help Trump to finally corral a runaway government, our grandchildren will have a shot at living in an America still able to support their dreams.

(COMMENT, BELOW)

Previously:

• 01/24/25: Justice and PR shouldn't mix

• 12/17/24: It wasn't Reagan, but Carter who made me a conservative

• 12/17/24: Those battlin' Republicans are back at it

• 12/11/24: There are no righteous political parties

• 12/04/24: Musk hopes to make budget cutting cool

• 11/11/24: Trump is back; blame Dems

• 10/31/24: Money isn't talking in the presidential race

• 06/25/24: Veep choice could allay fears about Trump

• 04/10/24: Migrant rhetoric matches border reality

• 03/13/24: Biden speech failed the moment

• 07/13/23: Stop feeding the Meta monster

• 12/22/22: Twitter Files expose Dem/Big Tech bond

• 04/17/22: Abortion ruling empowers states

• 04/08/22: Inflation isn't a Biden talking point

• 03/24/22: Hunter's laptop finally gets some light

• 03/03/22: Biden offers no reset

• 02/28/22:Giving up COVID, keeping mask, fist bumps

• 01/17/22:Biden, Dems roll dice on agenda

• 01/03/22: Can't hide from COVID behind jabs, masks

• 12/23/21:Manchin stood with his people in killing Biden's bill

• 11/04/21: For Dems, 'not Trump' not enough

Nolan Finley is conservative editorial page editor of The Detroit News.