Is This the Beginning of the Civil War?
Reports of angry targeting against the Tesla electric automobile have been coming in from various parts of the US. Peaceful protests have inspired acts of vandalism.
Already, there have been 50 rowdy demonstrations at Tesla showrooms, which included calls for a boycott and enraged shouting at passing Teslas.
The most troubling incidents have been at a Tesla sales office and repair center in Salem, Oregon. In this sedate state capitol, a lone saboteur, Adam Lansky, crept up to the building on the night of January 20, intent on destroying it with homemade Molotov Cocktails (fire bombs). A witness spotted, presumably Lansky, walking toward the Tesla building and towing a wagon, according to The Oregonian, a Portland newspaper.
The witness watched as Lansky pulled an object from the wagon and lit it on fire. He then hurled the object, which turned out to be a Molotov Cocktail at a red Tesla SUV. The witness said that Lansky spotted him, and aimed what he identified as an AR-15 rifle in his direction. The witness made himself scarce. When police arrived, the suspect was gone.
Less than a month later, police returned after bullets were fired into the building and a car. It was Lansky, again, said police.
He was less than successful that night but returned on the evening of Jan. with more incendiary devices and an AR-15 rifle, with which he fired at several of the new Teslas. He was observed by security cameras. Police found enough evidence to track him to his home. He was arrested and has been held in jail pending further court proceedings.
The Game is Afoot
Again in Oregon, in the city of Tigard, on March 6, A Tesla dealership near Portland was damaged by gunfire, resulting in shattered windows and damage to three vehicles.
Massachusetts was the scene of several Tesla Supercharger stations being intentionally set on fire, causing significant damage. Firefights responded to the scene where multiple chargers were engulfed in flames and heavy smoke.
In Colorado, a woman was charged with malicious destruction of property after allegedly attempting to damage a Tesla dealership using explosives.
Oddly enough, the hostility has come not from mindless Trump supporters, but from law-abiding people who can’t stand Trump. Discussions in “Blue” areas in previous years have revolved around hostile Trumpists doing violence against MAGA-hating Democrats. Now, the Democrats are so incensed they are screaming invectives on street corners as a family drives by.
Will anti-Trump, anti-Musk, and anti-Tesla protesters turn violent? Since a car, the Tesla, is a target, let’s look at violence on the highways. In Los Angeles, the first verified incident was a shooting on a freeway in 1987. After that, reports continued for many years, until they stopped, not the shootings, but the reports of shootings. But in 2021, there were too many to cover up. In 2021, there were 80 freeway shootings in Southern California in one month. Another shocking number of incidents is the 3,095 road rage incidents between 2014 and 2023, with 777 deaths. The year 2023 holds the record for the largest number of shootings, perhaps because 2024 data has not yet been gathered.
With the highway shootings, the assumed killers had no cause for shooting, other than random anger. Now they have Teslas to target.
How did Teslas become the evil automobile de jour? After all, they are non-polluting when driven and they finish first in government safety tests. One would think they would be the last brand to raise anyone’s blood pressure.
The hoopla about Teslas didn’t begin until the major stockholder, innovator, and CEO at Tesla, Elon Musk began taking up with Donald Trump. As Musk continued to do Trump’s bidding, the volume rose on the Bad Tesla syndrome.
Are we to believe that no other corporate executives support Donald Trump? What about the stampede of Apple, Google, Amazon, and many more who flew in their private jets to welcome Trump to the White House? Did it never happen? Sometimes these days it is hard to distinguish reality from fantasy. But no, I’m sure I saw them cuddling up to Trump.
And later, they scrambled to implement every Executive Order Trump signed. It’s now the Gulf of America, quick change the maps. Faster still was the rush to dump DEI, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, while they abhorred quotas and affirmative action. Back in 2016, President #45, also named Donald Trump, apparently had no problem with DEI. News reports stated that DEI “exploded” under his administration. Yet, now to gain his favor, corporate execs have to bow down before 2024 President #47, and pledge no more DEI.
Some activists just seem to know that Elon Musk is the evilest CEO in the US, and his most evil invention is a non-polluting vehicle named after one of the country’s greatest inventors and visionary, Nikola Tesla. There are calls to boycott Tesla (the car, not the man), including calls to paint swastikas on Tesla vehicles. Hollywood celebs are posting photos of their Teslas being towed away on Social Media. If Tesla were driven into bankruptcy, about 120,000 auto workers would become jobless. It is ironic that those who are most injured by these attacks on Teslas, if successful, will be the Tesla workers, the SpaceX workers, and those at other Elon companies.
In addition, the loss of Tesla’s non-polluting cars, solar panels, and battery storage devices could increase CO2 in the atmosphere by 20 million metric tons per year. This is more than all other cars combined, since Tesla is the favorite EV worldwide, and internal combustion engines add CO2 to the air. If Tesla no longer existed it would be a great day for the oil industry and polluting automobiles, but not so good for people.