Or Taylor Swift versus Elon Musk, as you prefer. Soft power versus hard power. One leaned toward Kamala Harris and the other toward Donald Trump. Both preferences were front page headlines on all the front pages of the world press. As well as the open letter that George Clooney addressed to Biden from The New York Times so that he would desist from running for re-election, endangering the support of the lobby from Hollywood to the still president. It was not the cause of her resignation, she was surely influenced much more by the party itself and the Democratic donors. Money continues to be the hard power par excellence in your country. But its symbolic effect was important, although light years from Swift’s statement on Instagram. The singer’s impact is difficult to evaluate, but having it is there.
Much more opaque is the power that a character like Elon Musk may have, who increasingly resembles the stereotypical bad guy in the James Bond movies. Could it become the decisive vector that tips the balance in favor of the tycoon? It is known that apart from being the richest man in the world, he controls X, the old Twitter, and is already trying to influence from there. For now, a greater presence of accounts favorable to the extreme right and greater pro-Trump activism are detected on this social network. A couple of days ago, Guardian presented an exclusive according to which Musk could also be behind the subcontracted company for the organization of the American Political Action Committee (PAC), a group designed to act in the main swing states, the most decisive in the next elections. Their action would consist of mobilizing sectors of the rural population to register them and push them to vote early in favor of Trump. and the Financial Times surprised us this Friday with an article revealing the intention of Musk’s SpaceX to obtain new authorizations to expand its action in the transmissions of the low orbit wave spectrum; that is, the eventual possibility of interfering with satellite communications. Its military potential is, therefore, unlimited. Not to mention the economic one.
Apart from what the latter means as the accumulation of immense power by a single person, what should concern us for now is something different: the potential use he can make of his technological capabilities to favor the orange tycoon. This also has the support of plutocrats like Peter Thiel, who has already put part of his fortune into Trump’s campaign; The dangerous thing about Musk is that we do not know what technical tricks he can resort to to advance his interests. Or what may also be the compensation that he may eventually demand from Trump in his attempt to win the elections. I don’t think I’ll do it for nothing. A new Republican victory may consist of leaving the way clear for him and other plutocrats to see their enormous social and technological power consolidated. On the contrary, Taylor Swift puts all her popularity in favor of Harris in exchange for nothing in particular; Perhaps, he is limited to complying with his program.
The most interesting thing about these cases, however, is how American politics is increasingly influenced by these intermediate powers embodied in individual people and with great potential to condition votes and opinions. I don’t find popular culture to be worrying, the real threat comes from the new phenomenon of hyper-rich technological czars, who are beginning to have an increasingly greater capacity to affect politics and, therefore, the future of the world.
