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Having told the Venice Carnival of his latest technological venture to save the world, a media tycoon in his 50s embarrasses the British and Italian Governments, while escaping their attempt to arrest him for illegally trading fuel for nuclear weapons.
He celebrates his victory by telling a guest, “A piece of advice, Mr. Bond. Don’t screw with a man who buys ink by the ton. It’s deadlier than uranium.”
Fast forward 27 years and replace “ink by the ton” with “X”, and Jonathan Pryce’s theatrical villain in Tomorrow Never Dies with Elon Musk, and you have a good picture of where we now are.
Of course Carver’s quest for global domination rested on starting a simple war between the UK and China.
Musk’s on the other hand is far harder to believe, beginning with his attempts to undermine and topple a whole series of Western governments, while feeding racial, ethnic, and class tensions across the globe.
No lie appears too big to achieve his aim. No political party is too deviant to be supported and, if it does not momentarily follow Musk’s agenda, jettisoned. And no misogynist, hard-right, or even neo-Nazi actor, from Germany’s AfD to the UK’s Tommy Robinson and Andrew Tate, appears beyond his embrace.
Toppling the UK Government
Not content with his role as the unelected co-President-elect of the most powerful nation in the world, Musk has also sought pretexts to assail other governments, from Canada to Germany to the UK.
On New Year’s Day, Musk noticed a tweet by Jonatan Pallesen, an advocate of “less mass immigration, more births”, about “Pakistani child-rape gangs”. The tycoon replied, “Who in the government and judiciary allowed this to happen and which of the legacy media covered it up?”
Mario Nawfal, the host of “The Largest Show on X” and boasting 1.8 million followers, jumped in with a declaration by then-UK Home Secretary Suella Braverman from April 2023:
“Some of these gangs have been overwhelmingly British-Pakistani males. Some areas absolutely failed to take action because of cultural sensitivities — not wanting to come across as racist.”
Braverman’s statement was deceptive. A 2020 Home Office report found that group-based sex offenders are “most commonly white”.
Perhaps more importantly, Braverman was trying to divert pressure on the Conservative Government to take action over sexual abuse of juvenile girls. While there had been historic police failures in investigation of the “grooming gangs”, there had been a series of steps – including by Keir Starmer, then Director of Public Prosecutions at the Crown Prosecution Service – and national and local inquiries to rectify the failure to listen to and protect victims.
This culminated in the 2022 Jay Inquiry, a national examination which produced 20 recommendations, such as mandatory reporting of child sexual abuse, financial compensation for victims, creation of a Child Protection Authority, a single set of core data, and extension of the list of people barred from working with children.
Up to its departure in May 2024, the Sunak Government took no significant action. As Professor Alexis Jay, the head of the inquiry, said on Monday, “Our mission is not to call for new inquiries but to advocate for the full implementation of IICSA’s recommendations.”
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But Musk was either ignorant of this, or did not care, as he reposted and commented on scores of tweets – many of them filled with disinformation – throughout the day. Now he had a pretext for his mission to take down the UK Government.
Responding to X user ‘Basil the Great’, he posted, “Vote Reform, it’s the only hope.” He added that Labour MP Naz Shah “should be in prison”. He said of the supposed officials involved in a “cover-up”, “Hang them for treason”.
Then he turned his gaze to Jess Phillips, the Labour minister for safeguarding women, insisting that “she deserves to be in prison.”
The alleged “crime” of Phillips’, a staunch defender of the rights of women and girls throughout her career, was her response in October to members of Oldham council, who had asked for another national inquiry.
Phillips noted that the findings and recommendations of the Jay Inquiry was still prevalent. However, if the council members wanted another inquiry, they could do so at the local level.
GB News, the primary outlet of the Musk-backed Reform Party, distorted her response, stating that “Labour REJECTS Oldham’s call for Government inquiry into grooming gangs scandal”, alongside a photo of Phillips. Its post was seen by Musk via a share by the disgraced former UK Prime Minister, Liz Truss, who added the false claim that Phillips was “the same Home Office Minister who excused masked Islamist thugs”.
Eighteen minutes later, commenting on a post by “Inevitable West”, Musk repeated, “Prison for Phillips now!”
The following day, the tycoon expanded his mission, misspelling the name of the Prime Minister.
“Who is the boss of Jess Phillips right now? Keir Stamer.”
“The real reason she’s refusing to investigate the rape gangs is that it would obviously lead to the blaming of Keir Stamer (head of the CPS at the time).”
Once again, the attack was based on disinformation. Starmer became head of the CPS after the police failures over the grooming gangs, and initiated a series of measures to correct the malpractice. Prosecution and conviction rates of rapists sharply increased during his four years as Director of Public Prosecutions.
But for GB News and the Reform Party, Musk’s falsehoods were a god-send. Ignoring facts and the Jay Inquiry, the outlet featured diatribes about “multi-culturalism”, race and ethnicity, and the Labour Party. Elon Musk’s father Errol was brought in to proclaim that Starmer would be “gone” by February.
Fearing a surge in support for Reform, the Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch and Shadow Home Minister Chris Philp – not mentioning that the Sunak Government had also turned down the Oldham request for a national enquiry – now said that this was a necessity in order “to get to the truth”.
Talk TV, which is another channel supportive of Reform, echoed Musk’s proclamations. The Telegraph stripped out all context from its coverage, insisting “Labour Blocks Grooming Gangs Inquiry.”
Musk pressed his advantage, claiming that “Jess Philips is a rape genocide apologist….What an evil human.” He called on King Charles III to prorogue Parliament and force elections: “Starmer must go and he must face charges for his complicity in the worst mass crime in the history of Britain.”
Embracing Tommy Robinson, Breaking Up With Nigel Farage
Musk had another quest on this New Year’s Day: exalt Tommy Robinson, the far-right activist accused of inciting racial and religious hatred and given an 18-month prison sentence over his libel of a 15-year-old Syrian refugee.
Told by “Inevitable West” that “Tommy Robinson was smeared as a ‘far-right racist’ for exposing the mass betrayal of English girls by the state”, Musk posted:
“Why is Tommy Robinson in a solitary confinement prison for telling the truth?”
“He should be freed and those who covered up this travesty should take his place in that cell.”
Musk circulated further disinformation from Robinson’s X account about Labour and Jess Phillips with the comment, “This is unconscionable”.
He promoted Robinson’s “documentary” – the video in which the far-right activist repeated his defamation of the Syrian teenager – with a “Worth Watching”.
On January 2, he posted at least twice more, “Free Tommy Robinson!”, retweeting others who called Robinson a “political prisoner”.
The Reform Party suddenly had a problem. While it had been easy politics to ride Musk’s wave on grooming gangs, it was far more difficult to support Robinson, with his long criminal record and extremism.
On January 3, Reform MP Lee Anderson told GB News, “I would not welcome Tommy Robinson into Reform UK.” Farage followed up, “We are a political party aiming to win the next general election, Tommy Robinson is not what we need.”
Musk’s father Errol had fired a warning shot earlier in the day, telling GB News, “I look at Nigel Farage, he doesn’t particularly look like a strong man to me.”
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But on January 4, Farage said in a GB News interview that he would “at the [Trump] inauguration, explain to [Musk] that perhaps things aren’t quite as they look” as Robinson was in prison for contempt of court rather than exposing grooming gangs.
Musk responded, “I know he’s in prison for contempt of court ffs, but there is NO justification for such a long prison sentence or for solitary confinement!”
The next day, he dropped the hammer: “The Reform Party needs a new leader. Farage doesn’t have what it takes.”
Two hours later, he was asked by “God Save Great Britain” if Reform MP Rupert Lowe should be the party leader.
Lowe had proclaimed, “If the Government won’t hold a proper inquiry, we will do it ourselves.” He said, “Elon Musk has done more for these abused British girls in a few days than almost any British politician has in decades.”
Musk responded, “I have not met Rupert Lowe, but his statements online that I have read so far make a lot of sense.”
Farewell, Mr. Bond
As Farage stuck to his line that “Tommy Robinson is not right for Reform”, Musk continued to jab at him, circulating a post that declared Farage “probably has Stockholm Syndrome” about Islam.
GB News scrambled, with most of its hosts and talking heads backing their colleague Farage, but they also featured Ben Habib, who was removed from the Reform Party leadership by Farage, who backed Musk’s portrayal of Tommy Robinson as a “political prisoner”.
There were soon signs of a wobble from Farage, who told his GB News viewers that “I do question why is in prison and in solitary confinement.”
Meanwhile, Musk’s broader mission continued.
“Starmer is complicit in the crimes,” he posted, agreeing “100%” with the statement that “Keir Starmer belongs in prison along with all the child rapists he let off the hook”. He proclaimed that former Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown “sold those little girls for votes”.
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He posted a “poll” over his quest: “America should liberate the people of Britain from their tyrannical government.” He wins the vote by 58% to 42%.
And responding to a declaration by “Rob2628” that “Germany is next!”, he replied, “Definitiv!”
In 1997, Elliot Carver told James Bond, “You see, you and I are both men of action. But your era is passing. Words are the new weapons; satellites the new artillery.”
Of course, Carver is vanquished in the final scene. However, Tomorrow Never Dies, does it?
In 2025, words are the weapons of the man whose satellites are his artillery. And this time, the personal quest to topple governments and upend societies is not a Hollywood script.