Is It Enough To Just Tax Billionaires Out Of Existence— Or Are Much Harsher Measures Called For?

How Would Louis Brandeis Have Dealt With Marc Andreessen, Peter Thiel, Elon Musk... Trump?

Louis Brandeis— “the people’s lawyer”— spent his life fighting monopolies and working for social justice. When Woodrow Wilson nominated him for a seat on the Supreme Court, conservatives— and antisemites— blew a collective gasket. He served on the Court for 23 years, where he was the strongest voice for progressivism and is still regarded as one of the great Supreme Court justices in history. He retired in 1939, two years before he died.

Constitutional Law historian Alfred Kelly wrote that “Throughout his long public career, Louis D. Brandeis consistently pursued one major ideal: that of a liberal progressive society based on democracy and social justice. Brandeis early became convinced that the gigantic trusts which by 1900 had come to dominate large segments of American business not only were hopelessly inefficient in a narrow economic sense but also menaced the very existence of political democracy itself….[H]e sought to ameliorate what he called the ‘curse of bigness’ and to establish a new industrial democracy based on a partnership between business, organized labor, and the public….He never challenged the fundamentals of capitalism itself; rather he looked back with nostalgic longing toward the vanished Jeffersonian notion of a self-regulated economic order characterized by competition among a great variety of small entrepreneurs….In his last years on the Court, Brandeis became a fairly consistent judicial protagonist of the New Deal….Before his retirement from the Court, Brandeis was rewarded by seeing the majority justices accept not only the major constitutional premises of the New Deal but also his own positions on First Amendment liberties, on labor legislation, and a judicial abuse of the due process clause. Thus Brandeis emerges finally as a lifelong champion of an open libertarian democratic society.”

One of his most-remembered statements— “We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both”— was made before he was on the bench. It expresses an anathema to the grotesque and hackish mediocrities who dominate today’s corporate Supreme Court and their views on the same topic.

If, as Brandeis believed, billionaires as a class are one of the greatest threats to democracy, we need to get to know some of the most politically aggressive of our mortal enemies. We may all know Elon Musk already— the world’s richest man with a net worth of over $220 billion— but Marc Andreessen isn’t nearly as well know and is working hard to do as much damage. A co-author of Mosaic, co-founder of Netscape and Silicon Valley venture capitalist, Andreessen has leveraged his substantial wealth to shape political discourse and promote policies aligned with his reactionary agenda. He invests in technology, media platforms and politicians that amplify far-right voices, fostering a digital ecosystem conducive to spreading misinformation and undermining democratic norms. He’s been especially vocal in his support for deregulation, reduced government intervention, and lower taxes on the wealthy, all positions that invariably lead to greater economic inequality and undermine public institutions crucial for a functioning democracy. When India decided to adopt net neutrality, his response was that India was better off as a British colony. 

His investments reflect his desire to dismantle regulatory frameworks, falsely portraying them as impediments to innovation and progress. By promoting platforms that allow the unchecked spread of misinformation, Andreessen directly and indirectly supports agendas that erode public trust in democratic institutions and processes. He’s become one of the top political contributors to the far right, amplifying the voices of neo-fascist politicians who seek to roll back progressive policies, further entrenching the influence of the wealthy elite in political decision-making. Sam Bankman Fried may be rotting in a prison cell now, but of all the crypto-criminals perverting the political system, no one is as pernicious as Andreessen, turning Bankman-Fried’s dream into reality.

Yesterday, Zeteo introduced its readers to another ultra-toxic billionaire, democracy hater, misogynist and sociopath Peter Thiel. An openly gay funder of extreme homophobes, Thiel bought JD Vance a Senate seat and then placed him on the GOP national ticket. In 2009 he wrote that “I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible, [complaining that] the vast increase in welfare beneficiaries and the extension of the franchise to women” had been difficult for the libertarian cause.

Thiel is now the eminence grise of a powerful network of investors and executives known informally as the ‘PayPal Mafia,’ many of whom support Trump’s bid for a second term. Having soured on democracy…  making him one of Silicon Valley’s most influential political operators while blazing a trail for a new crop of tech executives who have embraced the MAGA movement. Thiel was there first, investing in explicitly right-wing companies, dining with white nationalists, sponsoring far-right writers, and founding startups dedicated to supporting the surveillance state. 

One of the DWT themes over the last decade or so has been that the existence (and influence) of the billionaire class poses an existential threat to democratic societies. Pushed by greed and socially dangerous psychosis billionaires amass wealth at an unprecedented scale, leading to vast economic disparities and a concentration of wealth that undermines the foundational democratic principle of equality, creating a society where a small elite holds disproportionate power and influence over economic and political outcomes. With vast resources at their disposal, billionaires exert outsized influence on political processes, funding political campaigns, lobbying (and bribing) for favorable legislation, and funding think tanks that promote their interests, thus undermining the principle of one person, one vote, and skewing policies in favor of the wealthy, at the expense of the broader population.

It’s important to note that more than a few billionaires own or control major media outlets, shaping public discourse and influencing the political agenda. This control over information leads to biased reporting and the suppression of dissenting voices, hindering an informed electorate and stifling democratic debate.

Yesterday, Malcolm Harris wrote that Silicon Valley has gone MAGA— and not just because they love JD Vance, who’s weird like them. “In Silicon Valley,” he wrote, “private economic interest isn’t just private economic interest; for over 100 years, the community has elevated it to a political philosophy. It’s a myth that tech’s right-wing is libertarian; they believe in the state, they’ve just always thought it should work for them. And what better way to make sure the government is working for you than becoming the president? Donald Trump has taken to tech like a fish to water because it’s an industry led by right-wing warmongers and con men. And now he isn’t just like them; he is them. As much as Thiel or Musk or Altman or anyone else, Trump is the Valley’s avatar— whether or not he’s ever actually used a computer.”

On Wednesday, Politico focused on the worst of them all, Musk, noting that he— not Twitter, Musk personally— is the “biggest spreader of political divisiveness” online, at least in great part responsible for the right-wing riots in Britain right now and spreading vicious, racist lies about Kamala Harris. “Musk’s latest flurry of innuendo, half-truths and lies online is making it increasingly clear that it is the tech mogul— and not just his platform— who poses the greatest challenge to governments struggling to rein in content that can incite extremist violence. ‘Elon is weaponizing this in a way it hasn’t been weaponized before,’ Democratic strategist Adam Parkhomenko said of Musk’s posts and hands-off approach to others’ content on Twitter. ‘It just is sort of questionable why he’s allowed to do what he’s doing.’”

Angry officials are trying to find levers to pull to influence the world’s richest man.

Some British MPs said Tuesday they plan to haul Musk in for questioning in front of parliament over his posts amid the U.K. riots. Michigan’s secretary of state and North Carolina’s Board of Elections said this week they are launching investigations into potential misuses of personal data by a Super PAC created by Musk after they received complaints.

And on Monday, five state election officials sent a letter to Musk urging him to fix an AI tool on X that falsely suggested last month that Harris was ineligible to appear on the 2024 presidential ballot.

Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon said he recruited other officials, including his Republican counterpart in Pennsylvania, to sign on to the letter because the company had reacted with indifference to earlier complaints.

“It’s important to speak up loudly now because a similar mistake in the future, over the next 92 days, might be a higher-stakes situation,” said Simon, a Democrat. “Today, it’s about ballot access, but if left unchecked and unpoliced, what if next month, it’s about voter registration rules?”

But a strongly worded letter is still just … a strongly worded letter.

“The fact that we have secretaries of state begging a narcissistic billionaire to behave himself suggests to me that we as a society are highly endangered and unprotected by a lack of responsibility and hard decision making that should be made at the highest levels of government,” said Sarah T. Roberts, a former staff researcher at then-Twitter, now a professor at UCLA studying platforms.

And higher-stakes situations are already unfolding in the U.K. British authorities are mobilizing some 6,000 officers as far-right groups plan to target as many as 30 spots around the country following a fatal stabbing attack by a suspect falsely identified as a Muslim immigrant.

Musk, a self-described “free speech absolutist,” has doubled down. He initially declared that “civil war is inevitable” in the U.K., comments that Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s office said had “no justification.” Musk responded by smearing Starmer as “twotierkeir”— an apparent reference to claims that British police treat violence less harshly when the perpetrators are not white. U.K. Justice Minister Heidi Alexander has urged “everyone who has a platform” to exercise “their power responsibly.”

Musk also went on a broader battle footing. On Tuesday, Twitter brought a federal antitrust lawsuit against advertisers who had paused their spending after Musk’s acquisition of the site. “We tried peace for 2 years, now it is war,” must said. “To put it simply, people are hurt when the marketplace of ideas is undermined and some viewpoints are not funded over others as part of an illegal boycott,” Twitter CEO Linda Yaccarino wrote in an open letter. 

The drama seems to have only burnished Musk’s rising star with the American right.

On Tuesday, former President Donald Trump announced that he will be doing “A MAJOR INTERVIEW WITH ELON MUSK” next week.

When Musk bought Twitter in 2022, he promised he would overhaul its approach to moderating content and make speech on the platform “as free as possible.”

One of his first moves as “Chief Twit” was to reinstate Trump’s account. Twitter had permanently suspended it to reduce “risk of further incitement of violence” after Trump tweeted support for his followers who had launched a deadly attack on the U.S. Capitol.

By 2023, Musk had rebranded the platform as X, axed half of its election integrity team, dissolved its trust and safety council, and done away with  Twitter’s old user verification system by allowing anyone to pay for “blue checks” that high-profile users had previously earned after submitting proof of their identities.

The moves provoked pushback. Companies drew down their ad spending due to concerns that campaigns would appear alongside hate speech; Musk told them to “go fuck yourself.”

The European Commission in July found X’s blue checkmark policy “deceptive” and in violation of the EU Digital Services Act, which could lead to hefty fines. Musk responded by accusing the body of offering his platform an “illegal secret deal” to pressure him to censor speech.

But Republican hardliners have heralded Musk’s changes. They say the earlier Twitter weaponized its content moderation policies to silence them, unfairly branding legitimate conservative opinions as “disinformation.”

“No one is doing more for free speech on the internet than Elon Musk and his platform is working better than ever,” said Russell Dye, a spokesperson for Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH).

As chair of the House Judiciary Committee, Jordan spearheaded investigations into “Big Yech censorship,” relying in part on internal documents Musk made public over Twitter’s decisions to remove posts linking to a story about Hunter Biden’s laptop. 

And as the right embraced Musk, he embraced the right.

Taxing billionaires out of existence is a necessary and overdue step to protect democracy— and our societies— from the corrosive influence of concentrated wealth. By redistributing wealth and curbing the power of the ultra-rich, society can restore the democratic principles of equality, fairness, and accountability. Musk’s, Thiel’s, Andreessen’s and other billionaires’ actions exemplify the broader threat posed by this small but deadly class, highlighting the urgent need for systemic reforms to ensure that democracy serves the many, not the few.

By the way, yesterday, Jake Sherman reported that Andreessen will speak at MAGA Mike’s fat-cat retreat in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, next week, having become a major player in Republican politics this year. Most recently, he gave $12.5 million and Andreessen Horowitz chipped in $25 million to Fairshake, a PAC that has disproportionately supports far right Republicans.