Musk’s investigation lifts the veil on global aid hypocrisy

Elon is doing applied political science. He had a hypothesis, and then he bet on it. And in being correct, we are learning empirically: The Professional Managerial Class has perfected a system of moral blackmail through which they convert third world suffering into personal…

— Justin Murphy (@jmrphy) February 5, 2025

Elon is doing applied political science. He had a hypothesis, and then he bet on it. And in being correct, we are learning empirically: The Professional Managerial Class has perfected a system of moral blackmail through which they convert third world suffering into personal wealth and status. They position themselves as noble humanitarian experts with PhDs who care deeply about things like global poverty, to justify their own sinecures extracted from the national purse.

These credentialed do-gooders wield the threat of African deaths as a shield against any questioning of their privileges. We’ve long understood bourgeois professional hypocrisy in theory, but never before have we had such a complete empirical revelation of the exact dollar amounts, networks, and individual names involved across the top of the PMC hierarchy. Professional political scientists are generally feigning horror at Elon right now, but that’s because they are members of the PMC, even if they are only minor and distant dependents on DC.