I was sitting down yesterday, having a juice with a co-founder of an EV startup (of sorts) and we turned to the topic of executives. Who is the best person to lead a startup car company? Is it a car designer? A gearhead? An engineer? A cold, serious businessperson? I don’t think there’s a definitive answer to this question, but whatever Lucid is doing hasn’t worked yet.
For this Morning Dump I’m going to recycle a now semi-famous TMD headline: “I’m Not Convinced Stellantis Can Stick The Landing.” Stellantis was still making money then, and their CFO was telling people that the second half of the year would be a big return to profits. I didn’t buy it, mostly because it didn’t make any sense. Two years later the executive team was gone and the company had to do a major reset, admitting to basically all the issues I pointed out in that article. Lucid is somehow both in better and worse shape than Stellantis, though I don’t think it’s quite fatal. If they’re lucky, they’ll be like the Knicks at the half last night, and we all know how that ended.
There are numerous threats out there, though, with President Trump admitting the USMCA is dead because America doesn’t need anything from Canada or Mexico. Cool. At least we know how the War in Iran will end; oh, wait, we don’t, which is another risk in the car market for non-EV makers. This is getting bleak, so at the very least let’s end with the good news that Ford is able to get aluminum from its supplier in New York.
Extremely Likable Lucid Engineer Is No Longer At Lucid
So, I’m sitting on the High Line in New York talking to this co-founder, whom I will not name but has a long history in the automotive industry. He’s not from the US and he was marveling at all the Fisker Oceans in New York. I was able to wow him with the Oceans of NYC game. He’s now playing it, meaning that there’s at least one exec trying to find Oceans in New York right now, which is amusing to me.
“Building cars is hard,” he said, remarking that he thought the Fiskers he was getting as Ubers were half-baked, but that he appreciated how difficult it was to build anything, let alone something as complex as a car. Between Thomas Ingenlath at Polestar and Henrik Fisker at various failed iterations of Fisker, car designers have a lousy track record as CEOs. Lucid started with an incredible engineer and built a car that, if you live in the United States at least, is still probably the best EV sedan. The company then went on to build one of the best three-row SUVs of any kind on the planet, though even that car worried David, who was among the first to drive it:
I’m a former engineer, I have a number of friends who work at Lucid, and my conversation with CEO Peter Rawlinson was nothing short of epic. Lucid is an organization run by the best kind of nerds obsessed with maximizing efficiency, and that’s usually a good thing.
But with the Lucid Gravity, I have a suspicion that engineers won most of the arguments with designers, and I have always been firmly in the camp that thinks designers should tell engineers what to do, thereby compelling them to come up with interesting technical solutions. I don’t think it should be the other way around, because design is simply too important, especially in this price class.
I went to an investor day held by the company, and Lucid execs made it clear that they had a grasp on many of the problems. Sitting on a huge amount of cash from the Saudi Public Investment Fund, the company has more runway to figure out its challenges than most, even as it loses big money on every car. It’s also going to make vehicles for Uber, assuming the robotaxi market is something people will care about. The Lucid Cosmos is going to be one of three vehicles on that platform. Like Rivian with the R2, Lucid thinks the under-$50k two-row crossover EV segment, so completely dominated by Tesla with the Model Y, is the place to be. Maybe? Honestly, the Comsos did look a little like it was still beholden to the extreme efficiency that is the company’s greatest achievement and its largest obstacle.
This is all to say that the company is still in a very long transition period to anything that doesn’t generate endless giant losses. I covered a lot of this at the end of Q1 when the company suspended its own production estimate and missed even the low expectations it had to clear:
With the Gravity out the door, Wall Street was looking for the company to make about $440 million and only lose the equivalent of about $2.64 per share. By those measures, Q1 was a big miss, with a loss per share of $3.46, and revenue of $282.5 million. Overall, the company lost $989,485,000, which rounds uncomfortably to $1 billion.
There’s more news, and it’s making people who watch the company a bit uncomfortable. Founder and original CEO Rawlinson stepped down last year, replaced temporarily by another guy, who has then been permanently replaced by new CEO Silvio Napoli. In what feels like a big moment for the company, Lucid announced the departure of Emad Dlala, one of the longest-tenured Lucid employees. As TechCrunch reports:
In a statement to TechCrunch, Lucid Motors confirmed Dlala’s departure and said the company is “transforming its organization to accelerate innovation and strengthen execution under CEO Silvio Napoli.”
As part of that transformation, Lucid Motors said that Vivek Attaluri, the company’s vice president of vehicle engineering, and Marc Solsona Palomar, its vice president of software, will now report directly to Napoli.
“Emad Dlala has elected to leave the company to pursue other opportunities. We thank Emad for his many contributions over the years and wish him continued success in his future endeavors. Lucid remains focused on streamlining our organization and processes to fully leverage the strength of our team and will communicate further actions soon,” the company said in a statement.
Dlala declined to comment.
I went to get a photo Dlala and I got the screenshot above, which just about says it all. Someone at Lucid wasted no time in getting rid of even the photo of the one exec that everyone seemed to like. People are not taking it well. I think a good representative is Out Of Spec‘s Kyle Conner, who wrote on X:
It’s fair to say that Lucid is now no longer the company we’ve known
Emad’s passion for the products and customers was unmatched – I’ve had multiple midnight calls with him discussing challenges and wins (not that he would *ever* complain to me about a video I made ????).
On one occasion I was lucky enough to join his recurring team breakfast gathering at HQ… it was refreshing to see how he led a talented group of engineers with openness, understanding, and high expectations.
It’s sad to see him go at such a critical time for the brand[.]
This is a super pivotal moment for the brand, I agree. The company has to show it can move in the right direction, it has to organize itself around a coherent vision, and it has to produce cars at a scale that keeps its Saudi investors from deciding to walk away. Is Napoli the guy? Some think so, and it’ll take guidance from someone who isn’t beholden to the design or the engineering teams to succeed in the market. They need someone who can be there at the right moment to glide past the defense and tip the ball into the hoop.
They need an OG, if you catch my drift.
Ok, So The USMCA Is Probably Dead
There’s a great delivery in the first act of the musical Hamilton when both Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr are seconds at someone else’s duel, foreshadowing the big event in Act II. Burr tries to get Hamilton to admit that duels are stupid and that nothing anyone said was worth dying over. Hamilton sort of agrees, and then goes on to explain all the issues at hand.
Burr, played perfectly by Leslie Odom, Jr., lets out a resigned “Ok, so we’re doing this…”
That’s how I feel about the President’s move to get rid of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA). While I think most people have known that it’s probably going to end up with a trio of bilateral agreements that the next President is going to have to sort out, even as of this week people were still talking about how to fix USMCA. According to President Trump, via Bloomberg, the USMCA is as good as dead:
“I’m not looking to renew it,” Trump told reporters Wednesday at the White House. “Because to be honest with you, the United States does much better. We don’t need anything that Canada has, we don’t need anything that Mexico has, but they need everything that we have, and they have to treat us better.”
I do think America needs both Mexico and Canada, and it’s especially true that the automotive industry needs both countries. Hopefully, this is just going to be a negotiating tactic.
Chinese Consumers Aren’t Buying Gas Cars, Which Is Bad For American Companies
The conflict in Iran will end, eventually, I’m sure. Until then, the higher gas prices are collapsing the market in China, which is a place where American and other automakers still need customers.
Sales at General Motors’ main China joint venture, SAIC-GM, plunged for the second straight month in May on higher pump prices after growing in the first quarter on an uptick in demand for gasoline models.
China’s new-car volume continued to slide last month as oil prices stoked by the war in Iran coupled with a stagnating economy to impact overall demand.
Industrywide deliveries of new sedans, crossovers, SUVs and multipurpose vehicles fell 22 percent to 1.51 million in May, with gasoline models plunging 37 percent to below 559,000, according to the China Passenger Car Association.
Global brands, still deriving the bulk of their sales from internal combustion products, continued their retreat as domestic players with stronger electrified lineups better weathered the downturn.
Yeesh.
Ford Will Start Getting Aluminum From Its Supplier, Finally
The fires at Ford supplier Novelis were so bad that the company has only just started getting production together, probably costing the automaker billions of dollars. According to the Detroit Free Press, Novelis is finally back:
As Ford continues to push to add 50,000 extra units of trucks to its inventory to partly make up for the lost truck production after the first fire last year, Novelis in Oswego, New York, is finally back online.
In a statement on June 10, Novelis spokeswoman Julie Groover said Novelis restarted the hot mill at Novelis factory in Oswego on June 8 and it is once again operational after being idled since last September.
“Restarting the Oswego hot mill is an important step forward for our operations and, most importantly for our customers,” Steve Fisher, CEO of Novelis Inc., said in a statement. “We are deeply grateful for the flexibility and partnerships our customers have shown, as well as the extraordinary efforts of our employees, suppliers and industry peers who came together to support continuity of supply.”
If you’re Ford, this can’t happen fast enough.
What I’m Listening To While Writing TMD
It’s time for a posse cut!!!!! “Thank You New York Knicks.”
The Big Question
Can Lucid stick the landing?
Top photo: Lucid
QotD: I’ve no clue, because even after all that patient ‘splaining I still don’t feel like I know whether the captains of industry now running Lucid are all out to lunch, or not.
I do know how I feel about this:
We don’t need anything that Canada has, we don’t need anything that Mexico has
Dude. You don’t need anything. You’re living in the lap of luxury on my tax dollars.
And when you say “we,” you mean “me,” because sociopaths are incapable of empathy.
My initial optimism for Lucid has all but evaporated (just like its stock price) after watching the last few Lucid videos on Engineering Explained.
That’s right, he has an Air in Almost Blue Metallic.
*Had. According to the latest video Lucid offered to replace it due to all the reoccurring issues but because it was leased they couldn’t just swap them out so they bought it back and gave him a Gravity as a long-term loan/review vehicle. But it seems the Gravity is having troubles too.
About Lucid.
This reminds me of my favorite restaurant when I was dating my wife. A coworker was a famous foodie and knew that a pair of chefs had decided to open a bistro. It ended up being a go-to place for my wife (to be) and I until it became impossible to find a table because the place was so packed.
2 years later, the place closed suddenly. It wasn’t the food. It wasn’t the customers not showing up. It was that these guys knew how to cook, but didn’t know how to price things or manage staff. They had tons of staff that they paid very well and the best quality of food, but priced everything cheaper than a basic chain.
Lucid feels like this. A group of great engineers that have built a hell of a car.. that have not enough skills in the other parts of selling a car.
I have maintained since design school that a good designer needs to understand some manufacturing and engineering—how things are made, the basic properties of materials, approximate costs to determine viability, etc. It’s a poor designer that draws something that can’t be built anything like its original concept. As conceived, engineers should be able to bring a fairly close version to reality and bean counters should be able to bring it to market near its projected price range. Of course, either of the other two parties could get lazy or cheap and fail on their end, but I saw a lot of would-be designers who were clueless about manufacturing and engineering. Hell, one particular guy couldn’t even seem to grasp the idea that humans would be the intended occupants going by the lack of room for major parts of human anatomy. It takes teams to build cars, so there shouldn’t be as antagonistic a relationship between groups as there often seems to be.
To anyone who might be interested I highly recommend “The History of Industrial Design,” a fascinating series of lectures by Matthew Bird of the Rhode Island School of Design. YouTube HistoryofID. This isn’t just one of the visual arts. Availability of raw materials, manufacturing tools and techniques, ergonomics, usability – they’re all part of the mix.
TBQ: Probably not? Too many market forces against them, even with backing from the Saudis. The luxury market just isn’t big enough, and Lucid’s margins aren’t big enough, and their upcoming products are too late in coming and probably won’t have enough to make them stand out in a very crowded market segment. Not to mention America’s generalized hostility toward EVs.
And (at least this American’s) dislike for the Saudis regime. Brutal dictators should be shunned by all. Or am I being naive?
A majority of American voters would (sadly) appear to disagree with you.
Not sure about majority of American voters but the majority of the electoral college does, or did.
My 92 YO mother has expressed a fair amount of regret for her past voting behavior. Maybe you can teach an old dog a new trick.
“The conflict in Iran will end, eventually, I’m sure.”
…it will, but a new Middle East conflict will appear in its place, and a new Middle East conflict will appear in that one’s place once it ends, for as long as the United States exists. Born too early to deploy to the Middle East, born too late to deploy to the Middle East, born just in time deploy to the Middle East.
Unfortunately the powers that be demand it. They all have inordinate sums of money tied up in the military industrial complex, which is basically our entire economy outside of weird speculative tech bubbles at this stage. Capitalism went completely off the rails decades ago.
If the US isn’t liquefying people in that region the economy is in trouble, so we just never stop doing it…and on top of that there’s oil there, and everyone wants to be able to fill up their F250 Boss Hog editions on the cheap, so we’re just going to go ahead and take some of that while we’re there too.
This is all very dumb and very tragic, but this comment has gone on enough at this point. Cheeto Mussolini just said yesterday that he “loves the inflation” too, so everything is just going to keep getting worse. The annihilation of the middle class will continue until morale improves…and by morale I mean the bank accounts of the robber barons.
*Looks at wealth inequality*
Okay, they have enough money now, so we can stop screwing the middle class, right? Right? Right?!
It’s all gravy at some point, right? Like…once you have a BILLION dollars your entire lineage after you will never have to work again. I can’t imagine that anyone could convince themselves they need more than that.
*checks notes*.
Oh. OH. Nevermind then….
A billion dollars doesn’t make your dick look bigger, but a billion dollars more than anyone else does.
Sure made J Howard Marshall II sexy though.
A lot of the current issues in the Middle East date back to the redrawing of the maps after WW1 by the British. Got to love someone just putting lines on a map to break up the Ottoman Empire for reasons that are hard to fathom.
F all the ethic groups over there and where you live. This is now your country and this is your new “Dear Leader.”
As for Cheeto Jesus (my current favorite nickname) time will solve this problem.
In a few years we will have a new boss that is way different than the old boss.
Right? I am sure that is how this works. /s
The construction and agricultural markets should probably remind POTUS where softwood lumber and potash primarily come from.
I dunno if Lucid can stick the landing, but I sure hope they do. Or at least that their tech lives on under another brand.
Yeah, saying we don’t need what Canada and Mexico have is just stupid. We’re all stronger together.
Something about tides and ships…
Has he ever said anything that wasn’t “just stupid”?
I’ll wait; I’m sure someone can cite something, but I sure can’t
He seemed to think the lobbying against Right to Repair was stupid, but I’m sure after a few more
bribesmeetings he’ll change his tune.right, and come to think, there was that brief moment when he was all “we need to have Kei cars available here in the US!” but I’m sure his handlers made sure he was never incentivized to support such production ever again.
“The construction and agricultural markets should probably remind POTUS where softwood lumber and potash primarily come from.”
I’m sure they’ve told Crooked Trump many times. But it’s clear he’s too stupid to listen.
I am not familiar with Lucid, but they sound like the classic era of Citroën (just at a higher price point). I would love to have / drive one of their cars, but I assume they are out of reach.
Citroën failed and now is just a joke. Things not boding terribly well for Lucid then.
Easier to assume that T-Dump is lying every time he speaks or posts until verified. I’m not doing that work, and the data speak for themselves regarding his truthiness.
How do we know Trump is lying?
Until they get their UI/UX software functional, absolutely not. Everything I read from long term tests or owners of the Air has told me the engineering and hardware is absolutely incredible, but some design decisions were very strange, build quality is 2014 Tesla bad, and the software is genuinely buggy, unreliable and incomprehensible trash. I get that it’s difficult, but cmon, if you want to be a tech forward EV, make your tech work, or people will avoid you like the plague.
If they’re lucky, they’ll be like the Knicks at the half last night, and we all know how that ended.
Do we? I don’t get the impression there is much basketball enthusiasm here, although I watched every second of that game and am glad I did.
I don’t have many thoughts on Lucid, but that was one hell of a fourth quarter last night. I have been rooting for San Antonio (mostly because I think Wemby is a truly legendary player), but I can’t help but root for New York after that. I’m not sure the Knicks did anything special in the second half, but continuing to play with intensity despite getting absolutely smoked in the first half is impressive in itself.
I’m curious how many people watched that game until the end. I know a few people that turned it off at halftime or early in the fourth. I’m fortunate I had nothing better to do but watch all of it – that was one of the more fun endings I have seen in a long time.
I’m not a Knicks fan, but at this point, go Knicks!
The problem with sports references is it can be niche. I didn’t see the Knicks game, but from what I’ve read it was epic. On the other hand, I am planning to see the ‘Canes / Knights game tonight and expect game 5 to be as epic as the first 4. What happened in Game 3 is easily as big as last night in Basketball, but the NHL doesn’t have the fan base as the NBA.
(If you missed it, in a defensive struggle, a Knight player scored 4 goals in a row in the 4th period. Then in the 3rd period, the Canes scored 3 goals in under a minute and scored a goal that was reviewed where it seems like both teams had all their players stuffed in the goal at once. Then in the 2nd OT, on a simple dump in, the puck bounced off the end boards, hit the back of the Canes goalie and into the net in a very fluke goal. The other 3 games have been that level of chaotic too.)
The problem with sports references is it can be niche.
I know that very well. I am a basketball fan but not a hockey fan, so I genuinely don’t know what is going on in the Stanley Cup finals.
I hope you are enjoying the Stanley Cup finals as much as I am enjoying the NBA finals.
(I’m sure there are also non-sports fans on this site who have no idea what either of us are talking about)
Are people still playing hockey in June?
Las Vegas vs Carolina? That’s exactly what I expected when I went to see who was in the finals.
Really? I wouldn’t expect anyone to play hockey in Vegas or the Carolinas. How do they keep the ponds frozen? /s
I barely understand the basics of that slidey-on-ice-with-sticks game, although we do have a minor league team local to me that’s fun to watch now and then.
Since we’re down to Game Five, maybe it’s time to give it a watch.
I think if I were still working and not retired, and needing to be up at 6am again, I’d probably have packed it in around halftime and not stuck around. They sure looked like they were cooked.
But this is the year I’ve been following sportsball not of the major-league base*- variety, so for a change I’ve become invested in the NBA finals, and in the WNBA regular season just now starting up. And in the women’s pro softball league just now getting under way.
So, sure, in for a penny, I watched the crazy thing and I’m glad I did. I miss living in the NYC metro area, but I can live vicariously through their fans’ celebrations.
________
* This was the year I told MLB I was not going to give them another $160 to stream the Flushing Metropolitans, nor $60 for their audio, as I’ve been doing for way too many years. And I picked a good year for that because boy do the Mets ever epically suck.
As a Pirates fan I paid for the package for the first time in about 8 years. Still have some hope?
As a Met’s fan you should know better. As a Pirates fan I should also know better.
Good luck with their blackout scheduling. I found it infuriating in the past few years.
I’ve been eyeing lightly used Air’s and they are getting to the price point of consideration. But, I’m pretty sure they’re going to be gone in five years, so what’s the point?
Seems they’re still having significant software issues, too.
From Engineering Explained:
Lucid Is Buying My Car Back – More Problems!
Surprise! Software is hard too.
I don’t think the human brain handles having $billions at the whim of the few, or the one. Astonishingly, usually a questionable brain before gets the shot.
I’m a bit confused what you’re saying here? Particularly “before gets the shot”.
“Power corrupts, absolute power, Absolutely.”
Lately, maybe always, those wielding massive wealth and power started with a F’d up head.
Not everyone watches sportsball, Matt…
That’s well and good. I sportsball watch Baseball and a bit of American Football.
My biggest issue is (insert dirty word here) New York City teams.
“Hopefully, this is just going to be a negotiating tactic.”
If you’ve payed any attention to this person for the past 40 years, you’d know that Pedo-Felon 45/47 is lazy, stupid, and a lousy negotiator.
Meanwhile this:
“I have a suspicion that engineers won most of the arguments with designers, and I have always been firmly in the camp that thinks designers should tell engineers what to do, thereby compelling them to come up with interesting technical solutions.”
Years ago I took architecture classes with a young-ish practicing architect. At one point he had us meet him at a house he had designed for a client and was winding up construction on.
I took a look at a few structural details – such as a wall coming down onto an arch but off center – and asked him how he kept the thing standing.
He said he called in an engineer and they just shoved in a few steel beams.
I found that, and the resulting unnecessary expense for what would have been very simple to arrange such that the load would come down thru bearing walls, to be the stupidest answer ever.
Form over function is how we ended up with buttonless car interiors and electronic door handles.
The Shart of the Deal!
COTD!
Its pretty short sighted, because a stronger canada and mexico is better for the united states than to give up everything to China.
(Europe, plus other countries, raises its hand to speak)
I dunno, but used Lucid prices are getting pretty interesting!
“We don’t need anything that Canada has, we don’t need anything that Mexico has, but they need everything that we have, and they have to treat us better.”
Yes, I’m so sick of being mistreated by Canada and Mexico, lol. Clearly, they just need to literally bribe him. I hear he likes gold.
It doesn’t even have to be much, just a gaudy trophy with his name on it.
Is Lucid boned? Yup, they’re boned
Only thing that could save Lucid is a pivot to trucks since that is the only thing Americans buy.
No, Lucid needs to be able to make less expensive cars.
Making ones that work might be a better start.
Doesn’t seem to stop Stellantis.
I don’t want to give Stellantis too much credit, but it sounds like Lucid should strive to improve to Stellantis’s level.
“Man, this deal sucks. Who signed this stupid thing in the first place?” Uh, that would be you, Trump, you complete moron.
Not so different from “Man this Fed Chair sucks! I was shocked when he as appointed who would do that?” which would ALSO be Trump.
I think we’re all at a point that anything stated publicly by the President will be different by the following week.
Since he’s already decided that he’s not going to follow international agreements (made by him, himself), what would an agreement even meat to him?
Anyway, USMCA runs until 2036 (even if “cancelled”) – that’s at least two more US Presidential elections.
More importantly, what does an agreement the United States mean to the rest of the world at this point? 🙁
For the next two years, probably nothing.
This is a permanent change in how the world sees us. They now see that there is no assurance of continuity across administrations. The smart ones are moving (too slowly) toward more self-reliance, especially for IT. I believe that if anyone can depose the dollar as the reference currency, it is the mad pumpkin. I have started to hedge with gold and maybe Swiss francs. As a retired person, I can’t rebuild my nest egg.
I really hope that Lucid sticks the landing because they have the best EV drive train in the industry. They really need a Model Y moment or they are gone. If they do begin to fade away, I hope a good company buys their IP and can leverage their motors.
I still think the way to go for most of the EV industry to go is for a couple of companies to do the R&D and build the platforms and sell them to car companies to dress them us as they wish. I.e. Most manual Swiss watches are built on ETA and Valjoux movements (i.e. platforms) and most computers use off-the-shelf CPUs.
I had read that is what Lucid wanted to do early on, really be a supplier and not a car company.
They will not stick the landing, the Saudis will eventually get bored, turn off the money tap and Lucid will fade into oblivion.
(see LIV GOLF)
To be fair, LIV golf was a terrible idea from the start.
I have no who convinced the Saudis that professional golf desperately needed shorts, music, and contrived teams with stupid names & logos, but I don’t recall many rational people thinking LIV was a good idea at any point.
I’m not sure Lucid will survive over the long term, but as Lucid has made some genuinely good (but expensive) products, I don’t see why the Saudis would pull the plug quite as suddenly as they did with LIV.
LIV golf was a good idea, with
somea lot of dumb shit thrown in.Hell of a lot easier to start your own golf series than it is something like a competitor to the NFL or Formula 1.
Even with all the dumb shit, they were able to get some big names to switch, and the PGA (for a while) was nervous. Had they simply stuck closer to the PGA formula (with more money), who knows what would have happened.
Had they simply stuck closer to the PGA formula (with more money), who knows what would have happened.
Yes, but it was clear from the start that they were banking on the gimmicks being popular with fans. The gimmicks were inexorably linked to LIV golf as a concept.
A legitimate competitor (i.e. a normal golf league where individual players won money by winning tournaments) might have been a good idea, but I’m struggling to see how LIV itself was a good idea.
they were able to get some big names to switch
Yes, but only offering sums of money no semi-rational person would turn down. It was clear the golfers who went to LIV were looking for a payday. I can’t say I blame them – I would have done the same thing in their position.
Yup, see LIV Golf as an example.
Got jinxed on that one.
Also think we can change it to DED Golf now
Also, the LUCID thing was probably a hedge for the Saudi’s. Their entire economic existence is built on oil and if the world went all in EV, they’d be out of luck. This (in the grand scheme of things) small investment was an ante worth paying for to get dealt a hand in the EV game.
The Saudis have been playing numbers games with their oil reserve estimates for decades.
They know they need to plan beyond oil – and they have plenty of money and sunlight to make their plans work.
I’m not sure I could buy a car that is Chaired by MBS and owned by the Saudi government. This coming from a Tesla owner.
Incidentally, this is how I feel about the people who are like “Elon is destroying democracy! We should be able to buy BYDs!” I guess the BYD guy is big on democracy?
It’s easier to feel animosity toward someone that has punched you in the face than it is to harbor the same resentment toward someone who seems to be generally pro-face-punching.
Well said.