A week and a half ago I posted this on LinkedIn and it now has 2.6 million impressions and nearly 1.8 million accounts reached, so far - it just keeps growing.
Why did this catch the attention of so many people? Read below and let me know what you think.
*DARK MAGA*
If you're a little confused about what Musk is trying to achieve with DOGE, here's the breakdown:
Elon Musk and Peter Thiel cofounded a company that became PayPal.
Other executives at PayPal went on to found or lead other huge tech companies including YouTube, LinkedIn, Reddit, Affirm, and many VC firms.
This group became known as the PayPal mafia because they exerted an outsized influence on Silicon Valley.
Peter Thiel mentored a young JD Vance and helped him get set up in his first VC firm.
Peter Thiel and the PayPal mafia funded JD Vance's successful Senate run. Amazing because he had absolutely zero political experience.
Thiel and Musk all but forced Trump to choose JD Vance as VP in exchange for funding his presidential campaign.
The three of them, plus a lot of other tech billionaires subscribe to an ideology called the Dark Enlightenment espoused by this super weird, creepy dude: Curtis Yarvin aka Mencius Moldbug.
Yarvin preaches that the media and academia represent "The Cathedral" that secretly controls power and must be dismantled.
He advocates for a corporate run, monarchy, led by a CEO-Dictator.
Says that Democracy is an "outdated software" and openly opposes it and that:
- Government agencies should be dismantled and The U.S. should be broken up into "patchworks" controlled by tech oligarchs.
- That the elite tech billionaires should rule because they have the intelligence to "fix" society
- That the "masses are asses" too dumb to govern themselves.
The strategy is to gut the government via R.A.G.E - Retire All Govt Employees to make government incapable of operating.
Then to replace government with private corporations.
To eliminate elections because they are "obsolete"
To use distraction and chaos to prevent public resistance.
Trump is their useful tool to be disposed of as soon as they can wrest control.
This is why Elon wears a black MAGA hat. They are not Trump supporters, they are "Dark MAGA"
This isn't a hypothetical. The plan is already in motion:
- Musk, Thiel, and their network are actively dismantling democratic institutions.
- JD Vance, the “MAGA heir,” is being positioned to help implement this transition.
- The public is too distracted to realize what’s happening.
- If successful, democracy in America will be permanently replaced by a corporate-run authoritarian state.
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That's it. Now that you understand that you can see how everything that's happening fits within that lens.
Now the only question is what do we do about it?
That's my Dark Ted Talk. Thanks for listening.
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Sources:
This is a summary of Shane Almgren’s amazing post. Go deeper here.
https://substack.com/home/post/p-157052044
In case this sounds tin-foil-hatty, here’s a dozen other sources:
The Guardian, US (12/24): The Obscure Dark Enlightenment Blogger Influencing the Next US Administration - “The aftermath of Trump’s election victory has seen actions and rhetoric from Trump and his lieutenants that closely resemble Yarvin’s public proposals for taking autocratic power in America.” And “The growing parallels between the incoming administration’s actions – especially Vance’s views – and Yarvin’s suggestions raise questions about his influence.
The New Republic, July, ‘24 - Where JD Vance Gets His Weird, Terrifying, Techno-Authoritarian Ideas - “Vance is a Thiel creation. And like his billionaire benefactor—who once wrote, “I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible”—Vance embraces a radical ideology hell-bent on destroying government as we know it. And they got these ideas, at least in part, from Yarvin.”
New York Times, (1/18/25) Interview with Curtis Yarvin - “(Yarvin) argues that American democracy should be replaced by what he calls a “monarchy” run by what he has called a “C.E.O. - basically his friendlier term for a dictator.
The Butterfly Revolution, (2022) (paywall) - Yarvin’s step-by-step manual on ending constitutional government/turning the US into a totalitarian state.
The Imminent Neoreactionary Threat (2/5/25) (February 5, 2025) An important evidence brief and warning from a bipartisan group of governmental experts and insiders give an overview of the Dark Enlightenment players and plan, as well as an agency-by-agency assessment of the plan’s specific implementations and the inherent immediate dangers to US security through the first week of February,2025
An anonymous letter from twenty-one Silicon Valley executives, (Feb 5, 2025) 21 Silicon Valley execs, all former followers of Yarvin’s “Dark Enlightenment” warning that Musk and a cadre of billionaire followers of Yarvin’s movement are actively working to destroy the government and crush America’s constitutional order.
Rachel Maddow, (September, ‘24) Why You Should Care About JD Vance’s Real Agenda on Vance, Yarvin, and the neoreactionary belief system.
Yarvin Interviewed on the Claremont Institutes’ “American Mind” podcast by Michael Anton, who has since been named Director of Policy Planning at the State Department.
The plot in action (Feb 19, ‘25) - Journalist Gil Duran’s compilation of how the actions of the Administration line up with Yarvin’s plan through mid-February, ‘25..
Journalist Gil Durán video laying out Yarvin’s plan and how it is being implemented.
The Financial Times (Feb 10, ‘25) The strange political philosophy motivating Musk
The New Yorker (Feb 26, ‘25) - Techno-Fascism Comes To America
I think the public does see what’s happening but doesn’t have leadership on their side to help take them down, short of storming the white house. We need an action plan, solutions, not rallying cries
I think there are 2 “players” involved. This Dark MAGA & The Heritage Foundation. Idk if they are working together. I hope they aren’t and their opposing desires to be in charge will be their downfall. Wishful thinking maybe …