DAVID MARCUS: How leftist lunatics are red-pilling Tesla owners
Ever since he came down the golden escalator, Donald Trump has been winning over demographic groups his critics thought would never back him. But who could have predicted a decade ago that liberals seeking to save the planet by driving electric cars would ever take the red pill?
Well, it's happening now because violent Leftist lunatics have decided that Tesla owners deserve scorn normally reserved for Nazis and child molesters.
ELON MUSK SHOCKED AT DEMS' ALLEGED ‘HATRED AND VIOLENCE,’ LAMENTS DERANGED ATTACKS ON TESLA PLANTS
It’s quite a turn of events. In 2008 when Elon Musk’s Tesla launched its first electric car, he was the Left's hero who would save us from the clutches of Big Oil. Eager environmentalists scooped up the cars and lavished their enigmatic creator with praise and gratitude.
But proving the point that if Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny or Mother Theresa supported Trump, Democrats would turn on them on a dime, Musk, now one of Trump’s closest advisers, is neck-and-neck with the Orange Man for the title of man most hated by far-left kooks.
Much of that ire, of late, is directed at Teslas, and their owners.
Let's take a survey of just a few of the incidents of vandalism, now being called domestic terrorism by Attorney General Pam Bondi, in just the past two weeks.
Perhaps even worse than this fairly large-scale violence and vandalism are the reports of individual Teslas and their owners being targeted, having their vehicles keyed, or spray-painted with swastikas.
Take the case of Avi Ben Hamo, reported in the New York Post. The 45-year-old Jewish man saw another man exit a Subaru, finger-trace a swastika in the dust on Ben Hamo’s Cybertruck and return to his car. There was no word on whether NPR was playing on the Subaru’s radio.
A shocked Ben Homa said he felt himself "burning inside."
"People hating [Tesla owner] Elon Musk is one thing, but to do something like this is next level," he said. "I’m speechless. That’s just wrong. I don’t understand how someone thinks because I bought a car it gives them the authorization to do this."
On Etsy and Amazon, there is a bull market for stickers for Tesla owners to put on their EVs that read "I bought this before Elon went crazy," or "Anti Elon Tesla Club," which is a bit like Yankees fans banding together to create an anti-Derek Jeter club.
It isn’t clear if these stickers, like lamb's blood over the door lintel, offer these vehicles or their owners any protection. But it must make those owners consider if this hatred, directed against them, is really fair.
While it is never wise to underestimate the liberal American’s capacity for self-loathing, there comes a point when even the land-acknowledgement set wants to drive to work without being treated like a fascist pariah.
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According to Grok, the AI generator on Musk’s X platform - which ought to know - somewhere between 2.5 and 3 million Americans own Teslas, and every one of them today has to wonder if they will face harassment after they take off from their charging stations – if the charging station itself hasn't been destroyed by violent whackos.
Politics is, as the saying goes, just politics, but that starts to change when people feel it impacting their daily, personal lives. Why did Trump do so well with young men in the last election? According to many I spoke with, it was precisely because they felt personally demonized by the left.
By all accounts, Tesla owners love their cars. Almost 90% say they would buy another, the vehicles regularly rack up automotive awards, and some of their features, like driverless mode, seem almost out of "The Jetsons."
Rich celebrities like singer Sheryl Crow may be in a position to wave goodbye to their Teslas in viral videos. After all, they can buy cars the way most of us buy Lifesavers. But the average Tesla owner is in no position to do that.
That leaves the drivers of Musk’s wonder vehicles with a choice: Do they accept the recriminations and potential violence of the Left as just and righteous, or could they maybe, just maybe, decide that the American Left has lost its mind, and swallow the Trumpian red pill?
Time will tell.