Cross your heart and confess: did you, or not, regret not spilling the beans, or tea, as Gen Z calls it, after being let down by a close friend and confidante? Did this regret pinch harder after the recent social media spat between two erstwhile chums? Have you never muttered, going through your former friend's feed, “wow, liar”? Have you never typed out a ‘truth bomb', either mentioning them by name or using only thinly veiled sobriquets, only to have second thoughts before pressing ‘SEND'? In a self-congratulatory inner voice, you tell yourself, “I'm not like them,” and feel smug in the goodness that you just attributed to yourself. Goodness, that has trumped deep hurt and petty vengeance.
$38 Billion: The Price Of Revenge
What is it worth, though? In the case of the wealthiest man on earth, only $38 billion. Elon Musk ended up losing a sum approximately equal to Bhutan's GDP from his personal net worth at the end of the day he spent trying to exact his pound of flesh from the president of the United States. Hurt and revenge are the same for the rich and mighty and the poor and hustling; only the price tags differ.
If the James Bond movies are to be trusted, your most vicious enemy happens to be a jilted lover or a close accomplice. M, the MI6 chief, can only be brought down by Raoul Silva, a former agent. Silva is deeply hurt by Mother's (M) betrayal of him in the past and eventually exacts his revenge. Thus, Skyfall. This shadowy world of espionage, intrigue, and bloodshed, however, has certain principles. Silva ends M but does not paint the media red about M's misdemeanours.
Judas And Brutus
Let's go from Bond to Bible. Even Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve apostles of Jesus Christ, did not betray his “master” openly. Kissing Christ's cheek and addressing him respectfully, Judas revealed the “Son of God” to Herod's men. Even in his perfidy, Judas maintained decorum.
A more public betrayal happened almost a century earlier when Julius Caesar was assassinated by close aide and friend Quintus Servilius Caepio Brutus and other conspirators at Largo di Torre Argentina in Rome. “Brutus is an honourable man,” seethed Mark Antony at Caesar's burial. And honourable he was, realigning his loyalty and friendship away from the man he thought was destroying the foundational principles of the Roman Republic.
Nothing Noble Here
In the Republican implosion underway in the US, however, where are the principles? Unless we agree to hold avarice, megalomania, and unquestioning allegiance as the founding precepts of the American juggernaut, this famous falling out is devoid of anything noble. No Resurrection, no advent of Octavian, not even a good 007 film.
This exchange of barbs between two men who publicly promised to change the US and the world less than six months ago has only demonstrated what the nexus of mercantilism, inept policy-making, and self-serving politicking can achieve when two equally headstrong egotists hold all the levers. Why Musk and Trump are at each other's throats now is of lesser consequence than the trickle of information from their jibes at each other.
Trump accuses Musk of being post-facto salty over the yet-to-be-presented Big Beautiful Bill, which is supposed to transform the US - whether for better or worse is subject to who you ask. Musk says that he wasn't even aware of the nitty-gritty of the bill, which he was never shown before he exited the White House. Both accuse each other of overplaying their hand. Both claim that the other is dispensable. Only time will tell.
'As Flies To Wanton Boys'
What is truly dispensable is voters' trust. Or voters themselves. As reports kept streaming in of DOGE cuts translating into lost lives, both in present and future, due to a lack of funds, the chants of ‘Make America Great Again' became louder. It's as if America got transformed into an amorphous human-less entity. Tariff wars competed with real wars. Amidst all of this, Trump and Musk began to drift apart. It will take several hundred man-hours to determine the damage caused to the American public and the rest of the world by the billionaire duo.
It takes a third billionaire, the hedge fund manager Bill Ackman, to urge Trump and Musk to make up before it's too late. Musk has responded positively to him; no word from Trump yet. The POTUS is on a different platform.
While the internet is abuzz with jokes and memes about this feud, the potentially dangerous aspects of the Trump-Elon partnership have yet to fully unfold. Musk is the personification of the tentative arbitrariness of the second Trump presidency. Or the arbitrary tentativeness. Where everything is big and beautiful one moment and a disaster the next. But it is the regular folk, the same ones madly refreshing their social feeds for the latest in this feud, who have been paying the price for such shenanigans and tantrums. When multi-billion-dollar contracts get cancelled, or trade deals spell disaster, ordinary people on the streets get swatted like flies.
Like Shakespeare once wrote: “As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods; They kill us for their sport”.
(The author is a Delhi-based author and academic)
Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author
