It's not Matt Taibbi (or Substack), it's Elon

The world's most interesting billionaire has developed a love-hate relationship with Twitter - and anyone who stands up to him

Elon Musk is tired.

He’s been tired, and making mistakes, ever since he wrapped himself up in the tar baby (trigger alert) that is Twitter. Along the way he’s lost $24 billion on the little bird, by his own estimate.

Now Musk has made his worst mistake yet.

On Thursday, he picked a fight with Substack, a company one-one-thousandth Twitter’s size. Then he doubled down by attacking Matt Taibbi, a veteran investigative reporter who has done months of work at Musk’s invitation on the Twitter Files, the effort to open Twitter’s archives to examine how governments, non-profits, and companies tried to force Twitter to censor tweets and ban users.

In 48 hours, Musk has burned up what’s left of his credibility as a free speech champion. And he’s ensured the mainstream media will forever treat the Twitter Files - a key reason he bought Twitter - as a joke.

Too bad, because the Files contained some interesting revelations, though not the gotcha on Dr. Anthony S. Fauci that Musk so foolishly promised months ago.

I suspect Musk is acting out now in part because of his frustration that the Files failed to deliver on Fauci, but what do I know? Musk doesn’t talk to me either. Not anymore.

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(ELON MUSK MAY NOT SUPPORT JOURNALISM, BUT YOU STILL CAN.)

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But once upon a time, he did. Not so long ago I too was part of the Twitter Files effort. I even watched Musk (start to) eat a hamburger.

We had been talking for an hour or more in the top floor corner conference room on Twitter headquarters about Fauci, the fertility crisis, interest rates, and the “woke mind virus.” All Musk’s faves. It was like being inside his Twitter feed, without the memes.

Maybe Musk is different with models he wishes to bed (though I doubt it, he can bed them anyway), or celebrities of equal status (if any exist). But with me, he seemed to be exactly as he seems to be in public. Smart, driven, but always on blast, a man used to talking rather than listening.

And why not? When your fortune runs eleven or twelve places, people will listen even if you don’t have anything to say - as the English royals have proven - and Musk doesn’t have that problem. (I will say that when I mentioned my 50th birthday was the next day, he offered to have a cake for me at headquarters; I think he meant it. I had to say no. I was flying the redeye. I have now turned down money from Elon in 2020 and a cake this year. Dumb and dumber!)

Finally his trusty assistant came in and offered him a hamburger. He took her up on it, and she brought it in, on a paper plate. It looked overcooked. I showed myself out, leaving the world’s richest (or second-richest? Depends on the day, but whatever, he’s not poor) man to eat his unappetizing dinner alone. Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown, I thought.

A few minutes later, he came out of the office. We said goodbye. He told me again to find the world the truth about Fauci and tell the world. I told him I would - if it existed in the Twitter archives.

I didn’t want to make a promise I couldn’t keep. I wasn’t sure it did. Fauci is a very careful man, and he had already under oath denied having any direct contact with anyone at Twitter, except his daughter, who worked there for a time.

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I didn’t have the chance to investigate Fauci, though, because when I finished my first and only piece from the Twitter Files, Musk got upset with me. The piece was solid. It was about how a Pfizer board member had pushed Twitter to hide posts that might have damaged sales of Pfizer’s mRNA shots.

From the Twitter Files: Pfizer board member Scott Gottlieb secretly pressed Twitter to hide posts challenging his company's massively profitable Covid jabs

Musk wasn’t mad at first, at first he was happy with what I’d written - happy enough that he quote-tweeted it:

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But then Musk (encouraged by a group of right-wing bootlickers who tell him publicly and privately he can do no wrong) decided that I should have posted the entire article on Twitter rather than writing it here on Substack and linking to the highlights on Twitter, though I had told him I would do exactly that.

So he deleted his tweet and then blocked me. (He has since unblocked me, partially, though I can no longer send him direct messages.)

To be clear, his irritation had nothing to do with what I had written. It was because he deemed me insufficiently loyal.

Now Taibbi has joined me on his enemies list - though we are among the only serious journalists who stand outside the left-wing media consensus that Musk claims to hate.

Taibbi’s sin was standing up for Substack, after Musk suppressed Substack articles posted to Twitter. The change makes it far harder for Substack writers to get their articles read. This move may sound academic, but it isn’t, because Substack is a subscription-based business that makes money for writers, while Twitter is an advertising business that makes money from them.

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But, fundamentally, Musk is correct not to trust real journalists - as opposed to bootlickers on either the right or the left - to be loyal to him.

Because we are not loyal to Musk or his billions, or even to Twitter or Substack. We are loyal to free speech and the right to report and debate. For us Twitter is a tool - a powerful, free tool to reach the largest possible audience, hopefully without government or corporate interference.

I hoped Musk saw Twitter the same way, but in fact he doesn’t seem to see Twitter in any coherent way. Is it a public square? A business? A way for Elon Musk, chief twit, to tweak his enemies and express his opinions to the world?

Musk can hardly call himself a free speech champion if he cuts access to competing sites - especially one crucial to the independent writers he claims to value most.

But as an investment, Twitter has failed spectacularly. Musk’s effort to squeeze money from its users is not working. He appears to have threatened to charge legacy blue checks to keep their authentication as an April Fool’s joke - unless he was serious but forced to back down when he realized most top users would not agree and Twitter could not function if they were not authenticated.

Meanwhile, Musk’s very public instability, from Prosecute/Fauci on down, has upset the advertisers on whom Twitter still depends.

If Musk has a long-term or even short-term plan for Twitter, that plan is not evident. He is simply flailing from crisis to crisis.

For his sake, and Twitter’s, I hope he slows down and tries to run Twitter more like a business.

And less like a score-settling (and half-broken) toy.