The Elonator: Rise Of The Machines

Richest guy in the universe Elon Musk continues his slew of successful tax write-off projects that will not only fail spectacularly, but set yet another field back decades as it crashes and burns.

Tesla revealed on Friday a prototype of a humanoid robot that it says could be a future product for the automaker.

The robot, dubbed Optimus by Tesla, walked stiffly on stage at Tesla’s AI Day, slowly waved at the crowed and gestured with its hands for roughly one minute. Tesla CEO Elon Musk said that the robot was operating without a tether for the first time. Robotics developers often use tethers to support robots because they aren’t capable enough to walk without falling and damaging themselves.

The Optimus’ abilities appear to significantly trail what robots from competitors like Hyundai-owned Boston Dynamics are capable of. Boston Dynamics robots have been seen doing back flips and performing sophisticated dance routines without a tether.

“The robot can actually do a lot more than we just showed you,” Musk said at the event. “We just didn’t want it to fall on its face.”

Tesla also showed videos of its robot performing simple tasks like carrying boxes and watering plants with a watering can.

Musk claimed that if the robot was produced in mass volumes it would “probably” cost less than $20,000. Tesla maintains that Optimus’ advantage over competitors will be its ability to navigate independently using technology developed from Tesla’s driver-assistance system “Full Self Driving,” as well as cost savings from what it has learned about manufacturing from its automotive division. (Tesla’s “Full Self Driving” requires a human that is alert and attentive, ready to take over at any time, as it is not yet capable of fully driving itself.)

Tesla has a history of aggressive price targets that it doesn’t ultimately reach. The Tesla Model 3 was long promised as a $35,000 vehicle, but could only very briefly be purchased for that price, and not directly on its website. The most affordable Tesla Model 3 now costs $46,990. When Tesla revealed the Cybertruck in 2019, its pick-up truck that remains unavailable for purchase today, it was said to cost $39,990, but the price has since been removed from Tesla’s website.

Tesla AI Day is intended largely as a recruiting event to attract talented people to join the company.

 

Let's keep in mind that Musk's Hyperloop nonsense was designed from the ground up to destroy mass transit and in particular high-speed rail, so that people would buy more cars. Tesla cars, you see. Now we have Tesla robots as the company goes after competitors like Boston Dynamics, Samsung, and Honda.

The M.O. is the same: overpromise, destroy the stock prices of the competition, then present a flop making the entire sector barren.  Tesla is finally making a profit, but that's because it stomped all over the EV market, one that Ford, GM, and Stellantis Chrysler are coming on like gangbusters now.

Elon's just a greedy ass.

Our Little White Supremacist Domestic Terrorist Problem, Con't

MAGA terrorists continue to try to assassinate government officials in order to stop January 6th prosecutions of MAGA terrorists.

Shortly before midnight on July 21, police arrived at the home of a federal judge set to preside the next day over a plea hearing in Washington in a high-profile Jan. 6 prosecution.

In what law enforcement later described as a “swatting” incident, an unknown person had placed a call to an emergency services line pretending to be US District Judge Emmet Sullivan. The caller claimed a violent situation was unfolding at the judge’s home. Local police responded to the scene.

The officers found no threat and no one was injured. They determined the call was a hoax, albeit a dangerous one -- when armed police respond to an emergency call on high alert, it escalates the risk of someone getting hurt or killed. The following day, the US Marshals Service sent an email to all of the judges who serve in the federal courthouse in the nation’s capital describing the incident, offering tips to judges on how to stay safe, and noting a possible connection to the Jan. 6 case before Sullivan, according to a copy viewed by Bloomberg News.

The previously unreported incident illustrates the stakes of the rising threats that judges are facing in Washington as well as across the country. In the aftermath of a New Jersey federal judge’s son being killed in 2020, the federal judiciary urged lawmakers to take steps to make it harder for personal information -- such as their addresses -- to fall into malicious hands but legislation has stalled in Congress.

In Washington, federal judges are handling hundreds of cases linked to the Jan. 6 attack on the US Capitol. The prosecutions, some of which involve far-right figures with large online followings, have presented their own particular set of security challenges.

Acting Marshal Lamont Ruffin wrote judges in the July 22 email that his office believed whoever called in the swatting hoax may have been trying to “intimidate” Sullivan into postponing a plea hearing that day. Ruffin didn’t name the defendant, but court records show the only plea on Sullivan’s calendar at that time involved Anthime “Tim” Gionet, a far-right internet personality also known as “Baked Alaska.” Gionet, who live-streamed his entry into the US Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor offense and is scheduled to be sentenced in January.

Ruffin noted the defendant had a “significant social media following” and had used his online platforms to call “attention” to his case. While stressing there was no evidence the defendant who appeared before Sullivan was responsible for the call, Ruffin wrote that there had been other security incidents when that person had a previous court date.

 

So a January 6th terrorist with a huge social media following identified the judge in his case and brought attention to it, and his followers did the rest. Classic stochastic terrorism. 

And remember, in Texas, the 5th Circuit has all but guaranteed that there can be no efforts whatsoever to regulate these kinds of social media terrorism attacks because of "free speech".

 

If Judge Sullivan was Black, for instance, would he have been "mistaken for a suspect" and killed by police?

Understand that there's a concerted effort by the right to kill people on the left, stoking anger to destroy, and the victims will be the most marginalized among us.

We live in dangerous times, and they are only getting more dangerous.