“Elon Musk’s Chainsaw Massacre: A Love Letter to the Unhinged”

Here are a couple of snarky headline choices for your letter:

Dear Fellow Americans,

Well, here we are. Another day in this magnificent experiment of democracy, and another moment that leaves us wondering if we’ve collectively slipped into a dystopian satire written by an AI programmed with nothing but Ayn Rand novels and WWE promos.

Let’s set the scene: A grand hall filled with self-proclaimed “patriots” foaming at the mouth in anticipation. CPAC, that annual festival of paranoia and performative cruelty, was in full swing. But this year, the headline act wasn’t just the usual parade of conspiracy theorists, fascist apologists, and folks whose understanding of the Constitution is roughly equivalent to a fourth-grader’s book report on “Captain Underpants.”

No, this year, CPAC’s crowning moment featured Elon Musk gleefully wielding a chainsaw before a sea of rabid Trump cultists, Christian Nationalists, and libertarian cosplayers who have mistaken tax cuts for the Second Coming.

Yes, you read that correctly. Elon Musk. Chainsaw. CPAC. Because nothing screams “visionary leadership” quite like a billionaire pretending to be Jason Voorhees in front of a crowd that would trade their firstborn child for a chance to make their neighbor’s life slightly worse.

Chainsaws, Doge Policies, and the Economy’s Death Rattle

You may be wondering: Why is Elon Musk, the self-proclaimed genius who bought Twitter and promptly turned it into a digital landfill, on stage with a chainsaw? Well, dear reader, because apparently nothing excites the modern right-wing psyche more than the symbolic destruction of… everything.

You see, Trump—our spray-tanned fever dream of a president—has decided that the best way to “own the libs” is to obliterate the American economy in real-time. His DOGE policies (because why not base an economic platform on a meme cryptocurrency?) have torched stability, slashed protections for workers, and sent livelihoods spiraling into oblivion.

But instead of concern, sadness, or, I don’t know, a basic sense of human decency, Musk and his audience celebrated. They hooted, they cheered, they filmed themselves grinning ear-to-ear as their fellow citizens’ lives crumbled around them. Nothing quite captures the spirit of modern conservatism like billionaires revving up chainsaws while middle-class Americans lose their jobs.

One might ask: Why? Why is the downfall of working Americans cause for revelry? Why do Musk and his merry band of Ayn Rand fanboys experience joy at widespread suffering? When did we get to the point where cruelty isn’t just the policy—it’s the entertainment?

Elon’s Love Affair with Christian Nationalists

And let’s talk about Musk’s newfound love for the Christian Nationalists, that merry band of theocrats who believe Jesus wrote the Constitution in perfect English while carrying an AR-15.

Musk, who once marketed himself as a secular, free-thinking, Mars-bound libertarian, is now playing footsie with the very people who think science is a communist plot and that burning Harry Potter books is a reasonable way to spend a Tuesday night.

It turns out that when your wealth depends on perpetuating rage and division, cosplaying as a pious, Bible-thumping warrior against the woke mind virus is good for business. Never mind the whole “Musk has like 12 kids with 9 different women” thing—these fine, upstanding Christian warriors don’t let minor details get in the way of their holy crusade.

Now, he stands before them, chainsaw in hand, ready to chop down regulations, workers’ rights, and whatever is left of our sanity. And these people—many of whom have lost their jobs due to Trump’s catastrophic economic policies—are… thrilled?

What exactly is the appeal here? Do they just enjoy watching rich men play supervillain? Are they so conditioned to equate suffering with patriotism that they no longer care who’s actually inflicting the pain?

The Billionaire as the Messiah of the Dumbest Revolution in History

At what point did we decide that billionaires should be our cultural and political gods? What exactly is so “anti-establishment” about worshiping the richest men on the planet as if they were action movie heroes?

Elon Musk, a man who inherited his wealth from an apartheid-era emerald mine, has managed to convince a large swath of Americans that he is one of them. That his struggles—fighting SEC regulations, dodging child support, throwing tantrums over pronouns—are their struggles.

Somehow, Musk is both the free-market tech king and the champion of the little guy who just wants to chug Bud Light without being confronted with the horrors of diversity. It’s an amazing feat of propaganda, really. A man worth over $200 billion has convinced his followers that the real enemy is… the librarian at your local school who put a book on gender identity in the kids’ section.

And so, Musk revs his chainsaw. His fans scream with delight. The stock market flails, jobs evaporate, and somewhere in the distance, a hedge fund manager buys his fifth yacht. The revolution has arrived, and it looks an awful lot like a scene from “Mad Max” directed by an incel.

Where Does This End?

So, where does this bizarre, nihilistic circus of destruction take us? How much longer can we pretend that economic devastation is a party trick, that billionaires cosplaying as lumberjacks is a substitute for governance, that chainsaws and cheap theatrics can disguise the fact that we are actively cheering for our own downfall?

Will we have a new reality show where Musk and Trump compete to see who can bulldoze the most low-income housing in 30 minutes? Will CPAC 2026 feature Jeff Bezos using a wrecking ball to demolish food banks while the audience chants “USA! USA!”?

At some point, we have to wake up. We have to stop being entertained by our own destruction. We have to stop worshiping billionaires who wouldn’t spit on us if we were on fire. We have to stop believing that cruelty is a virtue and that our suffering is some kind of patriotic badge of honor.

Or, we could just sit back, let Musk fire up that chainsaw again, and laugh while everything burns.

The choice is ours. But if history tells us anything, I wouldn’t bet against the flames.

Sincerely,
An Extremely Exhausted Fellow American,

Julie Bolejack, MBA