埃隆·马斯克究竟有多大权力？请看：据《华盛顿邮报》和 CNN 等媒体报道，在今年中期选举前，马斯克向共和党事业捐款超过 4 亿美元 —— 远超迈克尔·布隆伯格和乔治·索罗斯向民主党捐款的总和。
How powerful is Elon Musk? Consider: Musk has donated more $400 million dollars to Republican causes ahead of this year's midterm elections — far more than mega-donors Michael Bloomberg and George Soros have given to Democrats combined, according to media outlets including The Washington Post and CNN.
本月，马斯克旗下公司 SpaceX 暂时限制了乌克兰对“星链”卫星系统的使用，导致一些乌克兰无人机从天空坠落。
This month, Musk's company SpaceX temporarily restricted Ukraine's use of the Starlink satellite system, causing some Ukrainian drones to fall from the sky.
资深科技记者、马斯克批评者卡拉·斯威舍近日在《早间新闻》节目中表示，不应由任何私人公民 —— 此案中是世界首富 —— 来做战时决策。纽约城市大学荣休历史学教授大卫·纳索同意这一观点。
Kara Swisher, the longtime tech journalist and a Musk critic, recently told Morning Edition that no private citizen — and in this case the world's richest person — should be making wartime decisions. David Nasaw, an emeritus professor of history at City University of New York, agrees.
“百万富翁、亿万富翁，如今的万亿富翁，一直对政治体系施加过度影响，”撰写过 19 世纪末钢铁大亨安德鲁·卡内基传记的纳索说。“但从未出现过像马斯克这样的人。”纳索指出，马斯克是首位跨入万亿富翁门槛的人。他还主导了“政府效率部”（DOGE），拆解了美国国际开发署 —— 一个由国会设立的大规模对外援助机构。多年来，马斯克旗下包括 SpaceX 和特斯拉在内的公司，已获得超过 300 亿美元的联邦合同、补贴、贷款和税收抵免。
"The millionaires, billionaires and now trillionaires have always exercised undue power over the political system," says Nasaw, who has written a biography of Andrew Carnegie, the late 19th century steel magnate. "But there's never been anyone like Musk." Nasaw notes that Musk was the first person to cross the trillionaire threshold. He also oversaw DOGE, which dismantled the U.S. Agency for International Development, a massive, congressionally created foreign aid operation. Over the years, Musk's companies, including SpaceX and Tesla, have received more than $30 billion in federal contracts, subsidies, loans and tax credits.
“我称之为不洁联盟，”纳索说。“他赚钱，然后把钱回馈给那些对他友好的人，让他们继续掌权。”美国国家公共广播电台曾联系马斯克置评，但未获回复。
"I call it an unholy alliance," says Nasaw. "He makes money and then he returns that money to keep those who are friendly to him in power." NPR reached out to Musk for comment, but received no reply.
纳萨夫表示，现行的民主制度无法制衡马斯克这样的人，并主张国会应通过法律，提高对亿万富翁的税收并限制竞选开支。否则，纳萨夫说：“民主正处于通往寡头政治的死亡螺旋之中。”但斯坦福大学荣休历史学教授理查德·怀特表示，马斯克的权力在历史上并非独一无二。事实上，与镀金时代（涵盖19世纪最后几十年）的主导银行家J.P.摩根相比，马斯克的权力甚至相形见绌。1895年，摩根曾援助美国摆脱金融危机。
Nasaw says the current democratic system can't check someone like Musk, and argues that Congress should pass laws raising taxes on billionaires and limiting campaign spending. Otherwise, Nasaw says: "Democracy is in a death spiral towards oligarchy." But Richard White, an emeritus history professor at Stanford, says Musk's power isn't unique, historically. In fact, it pales in comparison to J.P. Morgan, the dominant banker of the Gilded Age, which encompassed the final decades of the 19th century. In 1895, Morgan bailed the U.S. out of a financial crisis. "J.P.
怀特说：“J.P.摩根认为自己是政府的合伙人。一旦你救了美国，使其不必在承诺以黄金偿还债务上违约，你就会意识到自己拥有巨大的影响力。”这种影响力并未持久。摩根将三大横贯大陆的铁路合并为一个名为北方证券公司的庞然大物。以“托拉斯粉碎机”著称的西奥多·罗斯福总统一眼就认出了这是垄断，并将其拆分。
Morgan thought that he was a co-partner with government," says White. "Once you've saved the United States from having to default on its promise to pay its debts in gold, you realize you have a great deal of influence." It didn't last. Morgan merged three major continental railroads into a behemoth known as the Northern Securities Company. President Teddy Roosevelt, the trust-buster, knew a monopoly when he saw one and broke it up.
马斯克有许多批评者，但自由意志主义智库卡托研究所的高级研究员马里安·图皮表示，像马斯克这样的非随大流者往往领导创新型公司，有助于推动经济增长。他说，随大流会让社会停滞不前，一个国家需要非随大流者来推动科学和技术进步。
Musk has many critics, but Marian Tupy, a senior fellow at the libertarian Cato Institute, says non-conformists like Musk often lead innovative companies that help drive economic growth. Conformity makes societies stagnant, he says, and a nation needs non-conformists to push scientific and technological advancement.
图皮还将政治支出视为一项宪法权利，并反对竞选开支限制，他承认这一立场在涉及超级富豪时尤具争议。
Tupy also sees political spending as a constitutional right and opposes campaign spending limits, a position he acknowledges is particularly controversial when it comes to the ultra-rich.
图皮说：“富有的成功人士，作为全球经济和美国资本体系的参与者，与中位数选民相比，可能实际上对什么能让美国经济增长有更好的见解。”
"Wealthy accomplished people, having been participants in the global economy and in the American capital system, may actually have better views on what makes the American economy grow than the median voter," Tupy said.
当然，巨额竞选开支并不保证在投票箱前获胜。马斯克去年在威斯康星州最高法院大选中花费了超过2000万美元，结果其支持的候选人以10个百分点的差距落败。
Of course, massive campaign spending doesn't guarantee victory at the ballot box. Musk spent more than $20 million on the Wisconsin Supreme Court race last year, only to see his candidate lose by 10 percentage points.
在特朗普的第二个任期里，马斯克获益良多，但斯坦福大学教授怀特表示，如果民主党掌权，他可能面临更艰难的处境。
Musk has benefited during Trump's second term, but if Democrats come to power, White, the Stanford professor, says he could have a tougher time.
怀特说：“如果有一位总统和一个国会都反对马斯克，他们能在一年内搞垮他。‘没有政府资助，SpaceX 根本不存在。’事实上，他说，民主党已经在谈论，如果他们在下周的中期选举中赢得众议院控制权，将调查马斯克。”马斯克在其社交媒体平台 X 上反击。
"If you had a president and a Congress who were opposed to Musk, they could break him in a year," says White. "SpaceX doesn't exist without government funding." In fact, he says, Democrats are already talking about investigating Musk if they win the House in next week's midterms. Musk fired back on X, his social media platform.
“靠剑生，靠剑亡，”马斯克写道。“那些挑起事端来找我的人应该明白，我会查出到底是谁在背后操纵，并找上门去。”德克萨斯大学奥斯汀分校历史学家 H.W. 布兰兹表示，关于超级富豪政治影响力的争论，凸显了美国历史上民主与资本主义之间长期存在的张力。布兰兹曾撰写过关于镀金时代实业家的著作，他说，民主建立在平等理念之上——包括“一人一票”原则，而资本主义建立在不平等之上。他说，人们天生具有不同的特质和才能，并据此获得回报。
"Live by the sword, die by the sword," Musk wrote. "Those who pick fights with me should understand that I will find out who is really pulling the strings and come for them." H.W. Brands, an historian at the University of Texas at Austin, says the debate over the political influence of the super-rich highlights the long-running tensions in American history between democracy and capitalism. Brands, who has written about the industrialists of the Gilded Age, says democracy is based on the idea of equality — including the principle of "one person, one vote," while capitalism is based on inequality. He says people are born with different characteristics and talents and rewarded accordingly.
布兰兹说，19 世纪末资本主义超越了民主，造就了摩根、卡内基等巨头，并导致巨大的贫富差距。20 世纪初，进步主义者通过拆分托拉斯、禁止企业向候选人捐款来回应，以恢复民主。
Brands says capitalism surged ahead of democracy in the late 19th century, creating moguls such as Morgan and Carnegie, along with a huge wealth gap. In the early 20th century, progressives responded by breaking up trusts and banning corporate donations to candidates to restore democracy.
一些人认为，美国现在正处于第二个镀金时代，马斯克、杰夫·贝佐斯、马克·扎克伯格和拉里·埃里森等科技与基础设施巨头位居顶端。布兰兹认为，在特朗普的两个任期之后，美国正走向另一个民主改革时代。“我觉得它已在地平线上浮现，”他说。
Some people see America now in a second Gilded Age with tech and infrastructure titans such as Musk, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg and Larry Ellison at the top of the heap. After Trump's two terms, Brands thinks the U.S. is headed for another era of democratic reform. "I think it's coming over the horizon," he says.