Musk’s DOGE is an investor problem, make the anti-DEI movement measure merit, and nanoplastic teaspoons

Introduction

LIVE from my own private snow squall, it’s a Business Pants Friday Show here at February 7th Studios, featuring AnalystHole Matt Moscardi. On today’s weekly wrap up: The Super Bowl of Confusion, CEOs are being paid to be good bosses, spinelessness, and TikTok ate my lipstick

Our show today is being sponsored by Free Float Analytics, the only platform measuring board power, connections, and performance for FREE.

Story of the Week (DR):

1. The shameless Google flip-floppers:

1. Google axes its promise not to use AI for weapons or surveillance just weeks into the Trump presidency

2. Google ends diversity hiring goals as it reviews DEI programs

2. VC Giant Andreessen Horowitz Hires Man Acquitted In NYC Subway Killing

3. The Musk/DOGE shitshow MM

1. Giving Elon Musk’s DOGE access to the Treasury payment system risks a U.S. debt default and global financial crisis, senator warns

2. Elon Musk Just Pulled Something Unbelievably Sketchy at the US Treasury

3. Elon Musk’s DOGE gains access to sensitive Treasury data, including Social Security and Medicare payment systems

4. Elon Musk Says DOGE Will Now Shut Down Government Payments He Doesn't Like

5. Elon Musk’s Pet U.S. Attorney Threatens Anyone Reporting on DOGE

6. Elon Musk Says It’s Time to Get Rid of All Regulations

7. Official Warns That Elon Musk Is Poised to Kill "Thousands, If Not Hundreds of Thousands" of People

8. Elon Musk Says Naming Specific Government Workers Is Illegal, After Doing Exactly That Himself

9. Some members of Elon Musk's DOGE squad aren't sharing their last names as they attempt to remake the federal workforce

10. The person ruling on Elon Musk’s DOGE conflicts of interest is…Elon Musk

11. Elon Musk's Assault on the Government Has Canceled a Human Trial for a Promising HIV Vaccine

12. Elon Musk's Henchmen Feeding Sensitive Government Data Into AI

13. Elon Musk said DOGE would provide 'maximum transparency.' It may be years before its records are public.

14. Musk’s DOGE is trying to access your data. You’re right to be paranoid.

15. 25-year-old employed by Elon Musk’s DOGE who posted he was ‘racist before it was cool’ resigns after being linked to deleted social-media account

4. NFL to remove ‘End Racism’ messaging in end zone ahead of Super Bowl

1. On the one hand, commissioner Roger Goodell reaffirmed the league’s diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts aimed at goals such as increasing the number of non-white coaches, despite the recent wave of DEI pullbacks announced by businesses from Target to McDonald’s to Meta, not to mention the Trump administration’s noisy demonization of such policies.

Goodliest of the Week (MM/DR):

1. DR: Female-focused search engine Diem sees 40% growth amid Trump, TikTok’s troubles, and Meta’s ‘masculinity’ moment

2. DR: A million cars have disappeared: What NYC is like after one month of congestion pricing DR

1. Congestion pricing began on January 5. One month in, traffic is down, public buses are faster, and transit ridership is up

3. DR: DEI-related bonuses

1. Costco awarded executives hundreds of thousands in DEI-related bonuses

1. CEO Ron Vachris receved [sic] a $93,333 bonus for hitting metrics around DEI and environmental goals

1. Fox Business writer: David Spector

2. Novo Nordisk missed its diversity targets last year, and its CEO paid a financial price

1. The group’s diversity targets include achieving a gender balance across management, in addition to a minimum of 45% women and a minimum of 45% men in senior leadership positions by the end of 2025.

2. A spokesperson for Novo Nordisk said the group increased its share of women in leadership positions by 0.7 percentage points to 42%. 

3. As a result of missing out, Jorgensen surrendered around $108,000 in pay in 2024 that he would have gained otherwise, according to Fortune calculations. 

4. MM: Harvard Law library is saving data that the Trump administration is removing MM

Assholiest of the Week (MM):

1. Spineless part 1: investors in middle schoolers

1. Look, Blackrock and Vanguard both voted FOR Kimbal and Elon on the board every year they’re up for election

2. When investors act like greedy middle school manflakes, the CEOs they’re supposed to oversee act like middle school manflakes

3. Now Musk has actual visibility into his own investors Treasury transactions - which is probably bad when he doesn’t like you: Elon Musk Clashes With CEO Of $1.7 Trillion Norway Wealth Fund And Tesla Shareholder Who Voted Against His $56 Billion Compensation Deal

1. You feel good that he can maybe tinker with your US Treasury redemption?

4. But investors - HE’S SUPPOSED TO BE DOING THIS:

1. Musk effect? Tesla sales slump in five European markets in January

2. Tesla car sales in China fall 11.5% as competition intensifies

3. Tesla Stock Fell. California Might Be Turning Against Elon Musk.

4. Tesla recalls more than 239,000 vehicles over rearview camera problem

5. Tesla to Recall 1.2 Million Cars in China on Safety Concerns

5. And to compensate, Musk isn’t CEOing.. He’s playing video games and constructing tariffs against Canada and Mexico, where the biggest losers would be his auto competitors

6. You are all spineless, feckless sycophants - you use basically zero data to exercise your fundamental shareholder right: to vote on your representatives in the board room.  Instead, Kimbal just exercised $27,590,647.50 of stock

7. STAND UP FOR YOURSELVES - demand an adult CEO with ONE job

2. Spineless part 2: distraction extortionists

1. NCAA bars transgender women from competing in women’s sports

1. Out of over 500,000 student-athletes attending NCAA schools, fewer than 10 are transgender, NCAA President Charlie Baker said during a congressional hearing in December (0.018%)

2. NFL to remove ‘End Racism’ messaging in end zone ahead of Super Bowl: Sources

1. 53.5% of players in 2023 were black (75.6% people of color overall), 24.4% white

1. US population is 75.3% white.. So racism MIGHT exist outside of football?!

2. My suggestion: replace End Racism with Reinstate Racism, see how it goes

3. Spineless part 3: DEI whiners DR

1. I can’t believe I’m saying this - activist investors are the only ones left doing any work

1. Starboard nominates four directors to Kenvue's board

1. Jeffrey Smith - Starboard investors rep

2. Michell Millstone-Shroff, Bed Bath & Beyond - woman!

3. Cara Robinson, Unilever - black woman!

4. Bindu Shah, Sephora - Indian woman!

2. Did you see that!  They found THREE highly qualified, meritocracy women!  It has to be merit because it’s an ACTIVIST INVESTOR, not some DEI ESG libtard!  Starboard owns 1.1% of the company -  worth nearly a half a billion dollars!  That’s like real money!

Headliniest of the Week

1. DR: Researchers found a spoon's worth of nanoplastics in human brains–the latest evidence that plastic is accumulating in our bodies

2. DR: Tragedy! Cybertruck Defaced With Large Crude Drawing DR MM

3. DR: ELF's CEO says people bought less makeup last month because they were too fixated on TikTok's turmoil

4. MM: Cows Have Been Infected With a Second Form of Bird Flu

Who Won the Week?

1. DR: People who hate the idea of ending racism while watching two black quarterbacks lead their teams during the super bowl

2. MM: Anyone not travelling in an airplane!  Elon Musk says DOGE will make 'rapid safety upgrades' to the air traffic control system following deadly plane crash, the same guy overseeing this: Tesla to Recall 1.2 Million Cars in China on Safety Concerns

Predictions

1. DR: a new Bud Light emerges after Super Bowl: Kid Rock shoots oatmeal after Quaker Oats runs an ad supporting motherhood with a biracial family

2. MM: I die of TB before we end the show