Amy Hamm: Here’s how to properly love Elon Musk, the world’s greatest entrepreneur

Protesters leave messages in chalk as they gather outside of JP Morgan's New York Headquarters on June 12, 2026 in New York City. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

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Elon Musk has made himself the world’s first trillionaire and, in doing so, cemented his supervillain status among his green-with-envy hordes of critics, who are embarrassing themselves.

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Last week, The Globe and Mail issued a distinctly non-apologetic mea culpa over their op-ed headline, “SpaceX IPO makes Elon Musk the first trillionaire. Here’s how to properly hate him.”

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The paper subsequently announced on social media and in an editor’s note that “(t)he previous headline on this article did not meet The Globe’s editorial standard. It has been replaced.” Their new headline asks if Musk’s achievement is a “bad look for capitalism.” The first paragraph, by columnist Chris Gay, asks if it is “okay to despise him just for being one” before concluding, in its final paragraph, that Musk, with his allegedly “often-malignant influence… make(s) it a whole lot easier” to “excite class warfare.”

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(Do attempts to provoke class warfare fall within The Globe’s editorial standards? Questions abound.)

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Gay’s thesis, laid bare, is that we must shift focus from any argument over the “fairness” of Musk’s wealth accumulation onto Musk’s politics. “Most importantly, concentrated wealth means concentrated political power that tends, in a self-reinforcing cycle, to exacerbate economic inequality,” wrote Gay, who clearly views Musk as a nefarious plutocrat with all the wrong ideas.

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Musk engages in “gratuitous political provocations,” wrote Gay. He “shamelessly bend(s) public policy toward private advantage.” The examples cited: Musk was critical of a congressional budget that President Trump, while elected but not yet in office, also opposed; and Musk spent four months heading Trump’s now disbanded Department of Government Efficiency last year (which Musk has since described as only “a little bit successful” and not something he has any interest in doing again).

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That’s not much of a resume, as far as plutocrats go. Would Gay be making the same argument if Musk was the richest man on earth but was keen on making orthodox, leftist political provocations? I suspect not. In fact, I suspect that Gay would be the type to slap an “I bought this before we knew Elon was crazy” bumper sticker onto a Tesla, should he have one.

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The Globe’s and similar attacks on Musk are motivated by divergent views, envy, and tall poppy syndrome — nothing more.

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On that note, may I suggest ways that we can properly love Elon Musk for being the world’s greatest entrepreneur?

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Musk has built important things and stood up for important principles. We generally cannot predict who will enter the annals of history, but not a truthful soul can deny that Musk’s name will never be forgotten.

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SpaceX has revolutionized satellite and rocket technology in ways that no government space programs arguably could have done in such a short length of time. Reusable rockets? Not without Musk. Commercial space travel? Again, not without Musk. Or, at the very least, not for decades and without enormous political will and taxpayer funding. (Take a moment to imagine what “Air Canada — Space” might look like. Abysmal, right?) Starlink, Musk’s satellite internet service, has made connectivity in war and disaster zones a reality.