Sarah Palin slammed car manufacturer Tesla Motors on her Facebook page, calling it one of the "losers" of the automobile industry.
Elon Musk, founder of Tesla, a company that was founded in 2003 by a group of "intrepid Silicon Valley engineers who set out to prove that electric vehicles could be awesome," according to its web site, responded through his Twitter account.
Musk said he is "deeply wounded" by Palin's words and that many of her assertions about the company are wrong.
The disagreement began when Palin posted a commentary on her Facebook page disparaging Tesla, and specifically calling the Model S a "brick."
"This is really just the latest manifestation of the administration's crony capitalism as their green energy buddies benefit from this atrocious waste of taxpayer money," she said, referring to a statement that the company would be laying off three quarters of its employees. "Americans really need to get outraged by these wasteful ventures."
"As we've seen time and time again, We the People are always stuck subsidizing the left's 'losers'" she said.
This is where the conversation begins to veer off a bit. Palin was referring to the hybrid vehicle manufacturer Fisker Automotive, not Tesla. She previously noted on April 5 that Fisker, which has been the recipient of approximately $200 million in U.S. government loans, is laying off three-fourths of its workforce.
Palin's criticisms of green energy cars may be over reaching. She talks about the Telsa and Volt as unsuccessful, calling them losing venture. Volts, the electric car manufactured by General Motors, was subsidized by the U.S. government to spur sales, but Chevy is a still functioning business and Volt sales are doing well. Palin's criticism is clearly addressing Fiskar, and not Tesla or other successful green energy vehicles, leaving her argument disjointed.
Tesla vehicles have a starting price tag of $62,400, making them a luxury class vehicle, and not in the same vehicle class as the Chevy Volt, with a starting price of $39,145.
This article is copyrighted by Travelers Today, the travel news leader
