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https://nypost.com/2026/01/01/us-news/musk-signals-hell-back-republicans-in-2026-months-after-feud-with-trump-and-pledging-to-start-new-political-party/

Billionaire Elon Musk signaled Thursday that he’ll fund Republican candidates ahead of the 2026 midterm elections, arguing the country is doomed if Democrats take control of Congress.

“America is toast if the radical left wins,” Musk wrote on X. “They will open the floodgates to illegal immigration and fraud.

“Won’t be America anymore.”

This morning’s entry comes courtesy of PC Magazine, which yesterday reported, “SpaceX Eyes 1 Million Satellites For Orbital Data Center Push.” That’s not a typo: the space giant seeks official permission to launch one million satellites. ...

SpaceX currently has more satellites than any other company or government, totaling around 9,600. It would even be remarkable if they doubled it.

But a million of them? For what?

The filing explained that the proposed massive satellite array is intended to support artificial intelligence. Here is the formal description from the application:

SpaceX is designing its satellite system to accommodate the explosive growth of data demands driven by AI, machine learning, and edge computing, where processing needs are already beginning to outpace terrestrial capabilities. To deliver the compute capacity required for large-scale AI inference and data center applications serving billions of users globally, SpaceX aims to deploy a system of up to one million satellites to operate within narrow orbital shells spanning up to 50 km each (leaving sufficient room to deconflict against other systems with comparable ambitions). This system will operate between 500 km and 2,000 km altitude and 30 degrees and sun-synchronous orbit inclinations. SpaceX plans to design and operate different versions of satellite hardware to optimize operations across orbital shells.

China’s Highlander has launched an underwater data center in Hainan, the first project like it to be deployed at commercial scale. The energy demands of Ai data centers come largely from the cooling requirements of the servers, and China has answered this question by placing their Ai data centers underwater. This is something that’s been successfully experimented with by Microsoft among others but hasn’t been deployed commercially before now. The benefits of submerged data centers include a reduction of 90% in cooling costs as the ocean’s currents do what fresh water would otherwise; this translates into 40% more compute than a comparable land-based system. When coupled with renewable energy the costs drop further as this project is largely powered by an adjacent offshore windfarm; the company says that it’s 95% powered with renewable energy.

Ah, SpaceX is counting on space to dissipate the heat.

SpaceX is putting out missiles on the moon and into space, it’s not for peaceful purposes.

Ah, SpaceX is counting on space to dissipate the heat.

Dissipating heat in space is extremely difficult because the only mechanism available is thermal radiation, as convection and conduction require a medium like air or fluid, which does not exist in the vacuum of space.

Radiation is the sole method: Heat must be radiated away from a spacecraft as electromagnetic waves, governed by the Stefan-Boltzmann Law, which states that the power radiated is proportional to the fourth power of the absolute temperature and the surface area of the radiator.

Large surface areas are needed: To reject heat efficiently, especially at lower temperatures (e.g., around 300 K), spacecraft require large radiator surfaces—sometimes hundreds of square meters—leading to significant mass and volume challenges.

Elon never explains why the owners of AI would share any wealth at all with anyone else.

They won't.

Patrick says

Elon never explains why the owners of AI would share any wealth at all with anyone else.

They won't.

They will, because there would be more wealth to go around. Compare the life of 2026 with the life of 1926. With all the tech improvements in the last 100 years, notice that it is not just the rich that have cel phones, TVs, jet travel, computers, and medicine. AI will be the same - even now the average Joe can make realistic looking videos and use other AI features like research and composition.

With all the tech improvements in the last 100 years, notice that it is not just the rich that have cel phones, TVs, jet travel, computers, and medicine. AI will be the same - even now the average Joe can make realistic looking videos and use other AI features like research and composition.

Those tech improvement were shared with the general public only because it was so profitable to do that.

Most of Elons money is our tax dollars. SpaceX is all government, satellite internet is mainly government. Cars, those were getting government subsidies for years. When Trump was beefing with Elon, even Trump said that all his businesses are government subsidized. He's a smart man, but most of his wealth does come from finding ways to get government to pay him.

FortWayneHatesRealtors says

Most of Elons money is our tax dollars. SpaceX is all government, satellite internet is mainly government. Cars, those were getting government subsidies for years. When Trump was beefing with Elon, even Trump said that all his businesses are government subsidized. He's a smart man, but most of his wealth does come from finding ways to get government to pay him.

While all that is true, IMO the gov would have spent at least 2X in costs and time for less results without Musk (or with someone else). Whatever amounts he got for his base, the rest of his gains came from the market. I don't really have issue with any of that.

Most of Elons money is our tax dollars. SpaceX is all government, satellite internet is mainly government. Cars, those were getting government subsidies for years. When Trump was beefing with Elon, even Trump said that all his businesses are government subsidized. He's a smart man, but most of his wealth does come from finding ways to get government to pay him.

FortWayneHatesRealtors says

Most of Elons money is our tax dollars. SpaceX is all government, satellite internet is mainly government. Cars, those were getting government subsidies for years. When Trump was beefing with Elon, even Trump said that all his businesses are government subsidized. He's a smart man, but most of his wealth does come from finding ways to get government to pay him.

SpaceX alone has saved the US taxpayer over $40 BILLION. Before SpaceX, we were still paying the Russians $90 million per seat to send astronauts to space on Russian rockets.

Starlink services are also cancelling hundreds of millions that were earmarked to run fiber optic cable to rural areas in the US saving us more money.

This is such a tired and dumb talking point to still claim that Elon's companies are somehow grifting on the US taxpayer.

Elon never explains why the owners of AI would share any wealth at all with anyone else.

They won't.

I still haven't seen AGI yet. Close but not the real deal.

If you spare the wolf, you sacrifice the sheep. Sparing the wolf is shallow, not deep, empathy. - Elon Musk

Also, all it would take is some wealthy folks to distribute that tech as a form of 'charity' and that would be enough.