This is naked corruption. It's way worse than just stealing the contract, it essentially means Starlink will get a free antenna on every airplane in the country (at taxpayer expense?) and will then have the airlines as captive customers. Musk is going to make way more than $2bn out of this.
I'm gonna say this every time this comes up: These people should be in PRISON. They are criminals. If we care about law and order, we must remove them immediately from office. End of story. I am sick and tired of apologists for these people, if you believe they are conducting themselves legally, you do not believe in our Republic, you are complicit, you are a traitor to our country and to the American project. We will find you with our pitchforks, it is only a matter of time.
Don't forget the 44 billion USD he paid to control one of the world's largest vehicles for dissemination of information, transforming it into a superspreader of disinformation and propaganda.
Does it strike anyone else as sadly funny that the country which has meddled in other countries for so long, has finally had a foreign puppet + stooge installed in itself?
Obligation to have a starlink terminal on the plane to enable communication with the radio tower. This comes with the added bonus of enabling Elon to sell Starlink internet in-flight.
Prescribed users will get access to net and non-users will get forked as per-usual. But with an Elon branded fork instead.
I also expect he's eager to make it proprietary. That way it would then force all other airlines that route through the USA to have a Starlink terminals too.
I use a mini in-flight. I welcome anything to bring the price down (currently $250/mo for 50 GB)
However, this "fix" not being put out for bid is ridiculous. That's not how competition and the market works. This feels like African-style "whatchu gonna do about it" big man corruption.
You'll forgive a significantly large body of people for not being willing to trust a man who has "also claimed" a ton of things that have turned out to not be true.
Let's not pretend like every president and congressperson has the same track record for corruption and hypocrisy. I don't need to "suddenly give a shit about integrity, capability, or neutrality" to wonder why a particular president lets a billionare give unhired people access to treasury data, lie about "read-only access", redirect earmarked contracts to the billionaire's companies, and pretend that Elon Musk does not have anything to do with DOGE or firing decisions, or to question why certain legislators are telling citizens that "nobody should bellyache" about the unconstitutional actions committed by DOGE and Elon Musk with Trump's permission.
