Our Coming Plutocracy

Why Larry Ellison and Elon Musk threaten republican government in America.

The Ellison father-son moves are more in the mode of Silvio Berlusconi’s takeover of Mediaset or Elon Musk’s earlier purchase of Twitter. If they succeed in creating this media empire, they will control a vast array of outlets, both legacy and new media, that will allow them to directly influence American politics. Larry Ellison is a Trump supporter as Musk once was; he doesn’t appear to have political ambitions, though his son may. But that’s not the point. The real issue is the impact of concentrated wealth on American democracy, where two or three individuals control so much wealth and media power that they can help swing national elections, as Musk claims he did in 2024.