Politically, I generally put my chips down on the liberal side of things - and this ain’t it. This is the kind of stuff that makes you go “maybe Ayn Rand had a point”.

Arguably, the only reason Musk has decided to wade into politics is exactly this kind of shit - how can one build a business in an arbitrarily regulated environment, where it’s one rule for me, and one for thee? The regulatory environment is supposed to be impartial, and to act for the greater good - not to be a political weapon to wield against your enemies.

Things which spring to mind:

- the FCC excluding starlink from rural broadband subsidies

- never ending DFEH investigations in California

- disproportionate NHTSA scrutiny compared to other automakers and self-drive systems

- federal EV tax credit exclusion

- FAA foot-dragging over starship

I’m not saying that these are universally regulatory harassment, but one can readily see from how his perspective this paints a pretty damning overall picture, and I can’t say that in his shoes I wouldn’t be going the same way.

Starlink not getting rural broadband subsidies is an example of the regulatory environment being impartial and applying the same rules to everyone. There were minimum performance requirements attached the subsidies and Starlink fell short.

The FAA has processed Starship matters about as fast as the process similar things for other companies.

Tesla hasn't faced any more scrutiny from NHTSA than anyone other carmaker who has put a beta purported full self driving system in production cars sold to the public.