The only issue is that Musk vastly overpaid for Twitter, but if he plans to keep it and use it for his political ambitions, that might not matter. Also remember that while many agree that $44B was a bit much, most did still put Twitter at 10s of billions, not the $500M I think you could justify.
The firings, which was going to tank Twitter also turned out reasonably well. Turns out they didn't need all those people.
Twitter/X is the reason DJT became President. It happened accidentally (ie against the wishes of Twitter management) in 2016, they successfully suppressed him in 2020, and then Elon gave MAGA that platform in 2024, leading to DJT's successful election.
As long as X is seen a kingmaker, someone will find it profitable to own/maintain, even if it doesn't convert Ads like Meta/Google.
I really don't think so, at least not in isolation. It probably contributed a small part but the right wing media machine is multi-faceted. There were a lot of podcasters (i.e. Joe Rogan), comedians and youtubers all publicly in support of a second DJT presidency and I think that had a much bigger factor overall than Twitter.
I also doubt hispanics and other minorities voted for Trump because they were obsessively on twitter. Not being able to make ends meet, a weekend at Bernie's president, and the over-the-top blank check given to Israel played more of a role than Elon buying twitter.
In Israel the debate was "should we be rooting for Trump because of how much of a blank check he will give our government, or against him because of the damage he will do to the free world that we are part of and also the blank check that he will give our government?"
Since this prediction turned out basically correct, I wonder if across the seas people had different expectations?