David Frum's Take On Elon Possibly Pulling Starlink From Ukraine Is Full-Blown Insanity

How far is the establishment willing to go to ensure control and get what they want?

We’ve seen a lot of moves in dangerous directions from the Biden Administration, from mandates during the pandemic to their executive orders that seize power that has not been accorded to them, such as with the student debt bailout. We saw the dangerous misuse by the government of “emergency” to be able to grab more power and stomp on people’s rights.

Elon Musk has been going out of his way to help countries in need with his Starlink system, including Iran and Ukraine. But he started being attacked by Ukrainians for proposing a peace deal that they didn’t like, he started balking and then suggested that maybe the U.S. should be paying him back for all the money that he’s flooding into the effort since the U.S. is pouring tons of money into Ukraine.

As we reported, this tweet summed it up with how he felt after his kind efforts were so rebuffed.

We’re just following his recommendation 🤷‍♂️

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 14, 2022

After that, Musk said he would be pulling his request back and it appeared that he might have come to an agreement with the U.S. government over the funding, although he tweeted that he was still paying for some of it.

To be precise, 25,300 terminals were sent to Ukraine, but, at present, only 10,630 are paying for service

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 17, 2022

But Musk possibly pulling back didn’t make former Bush speechwriter establishment hack and The Atlantic editor David Frum happy. What he said was alarming, to say the least.

It was always unreasonable, and is becoming unwise, to expect @elonmusk to provide Internet to Ukraine for free forever. Western allies should pay. And US should have a plan ready to nationalize Starlink fast if Musk cuts off Ukraine's connection to advance his political agenda.

— David Frum (@davidfrum) October 17, 2022

“It was always unreasonable, and is becoming unwise, to expect @elonmusk to provide Internet to Ukraine for free forever. Western allies should pay,” Frum said. But then he went over the slide. “And US should have a plan ready to nationalize Starlink fast if Musk cuts off Ukraine’s connection to advance his political agenda.”

What did he just say? Yes, you heard it, he wants the government to nationalize (translate: seize) Elon’s private business. Because of Musk’s “political agenda”? It isn’t Musk’s “political agenda” that’s the question here.

What’s Frum’s justification for this? He argues the “war/emergency” excuse, claiming there’s “abundant precedent” for doing this.

There’s abundant precedent for US government seizure of critical infrastructure during wars or national emergencies. Of course, reasonable compensation must be paid, per the Fifth Amendment to the US Constitution. https://t.co/HY0jUMzylr

— David Frum (@davidfrum) October 18, 2022

This gives you a mindset into the establishment take here: why do they think that a war in Ukraine is a “national emergency”? We are not at war (even if they act like we are) and there is no justification for this, or forever running over people’s rights. Why are they so desperate to pour all our money into Ukraine without any check and seemingly without end, despite all our issues in this country? I get the concept of Russia invading, and supporting Ukraine. But Russia invaded in 2014 and I was trying to call attention to it then and not too many Democrats gave a darn.

But now you have folks like Frum even suggesting this Communist move? What’s going on here? This is how far they would go to get what they want if people don’t comply with what they want. So if we decided that The Atlantic had something we wanted in the case of a “national emergency,” we could just grab it as the government, with such a lame excuse? Fortunately for them, The Atlantic has nothing worthwhile grabbing so no one would bother to do it. But the very idea that Frum would go in this direction shows where the real dangers are coming from to our constitutional republic.

The standard DC warmongers who have led the US into multiple military conflicts over the last 20 years — Iraq, Syria, Libya, endless drone bombing of 8 countries — are more excited than ever with Ukraine. Here's @DavidFrum demanding the nationalization of Starlink, citing WW1. pic.twitter.com/Dmy1iR8QrS

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) October 18, 2022