 |
|
Elon Musk at Trump Tower last year
|
Tesla co-founder Elon Musk, a
constant source of intrigue (to me at least), is busy positioning
himself as the “voice of reason” that lies between Silicon Valley and
the White House.
I’ve written at length about President Trump’s relationship with the technology heartland. On
the one side, you have the likes of Paypal founder and major investor
Peter Thiel, who is now very much part of Trump’s inner circle.
 |
|
Tesla is creating jobs in US manufacturing - though robots do plenty of the work too
|
On
the other , you have tech bigwigs like Apple’s Tim Cook and Alphabet’s
Larry Page, who were cooperative but mostly quiet when honouring the
then President-Elect’s invite to meet him at Trump Tower last year.
 |
|
Mr Musk (L) met President Trump again earlier this week
|
Little
has been said about that meeting since. The silence from most of
Silicon Valley has been deafening to the frustration of many here
but you get the sense that could all change if the companies are called
upon to implement any policy decisions they consider unethical.
For instance,
there’s a growing list of employees at tech firms who have noted they will refuse to work on a “database” of minorities, if asked. All hypothetical, of course.
Until such a thing happens it seems much of the tech elite are just keeping their heads down.