Instances of crazed leftists (but I repeat myself) protesting Elon Musk’s Tesla by flipping off drivers, keying cars, spray-painting dealerships and charging stations, and even lighting vehicles on fire have become more widespread since Musk committed Thoughtcrime by running Donald Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency. Attorney General Pam Bondi announced yesterday that the Justice Department has charged three individuals with “domestic terrorism.”

“The days of committing crimes without consequence have ended,” Bondi said in a statement.

Leftists cheered — not Bondi but the criminals.

Always vying for the title of most obnoxious late-night host, Jimmy Kimmel played to such an audience. “Tesla stock is way down, almost disastrously so,” he said to wild cheers from the crowd. He added with dripping sarcasm, “People have been vandalizing Tesla vehicles. … Please don’t vandalize. Don’t ever vandalize Tesla vehicles.” [Dramatic pause, knowing glance around the room, audience laughter.]

On Comedy Central, “The Daily Show’s” Jordan Klepper showed a news montage about such vandalism and destruction. The crowd cheered each burning Tesla and mention of Molotov cocktails. It’s possible that Klepper expected or even wanted that reaction, but he marveled, “Wow. You guys like petty acts of domestic terrorism, huh?” They laughed and cheered again.

With mock solemnity, he added, “Nobody should be breaking the law and blowing up Teslas.” Then came the punchline: “Because if you just wait a few minutes, they’ll probably just do it by themselves.”

No one would accuse Rick Wilson of being a comedian, though the Lincoln Project he runs is certainly a joke. He just got suspended from X (which Musk owns) for posting his Substack article, “Kill Tesla, Save the Country.” I guess he thought he was being humorous with his first sentence: “Tesla is no longer just a car company; it’s a bank for fascists, a goose-stepping hedge fund bankrolling the political fever dreams of Elon Musk and his DOGE dreams of controlling the ruins of the American government as he becomes Earth’s first trillionaire and then the Emperor of Mars.”

He argues that his ilk must ruin Tesla to destroy Musk’s wealth and power. Given that Tesla stock is down roughly 50% in the last three months, Wilson and the boycotters might succeed — illustrating not leftist righteousness but Musk’s patriotic selflessness.

I don’t highlight these clowns out of indignant outrage. Musk is fair game for mockery, and boycotts are perfectly illegitimate. The difference in the latter case is that when conservatives boycott Target or Bud Light, we don’t commit crimes while doing so.

Schadenfreude is a feature of all political ideologies, and we all sometimes laugh about serious things. That’s often the best way to cope with life’s problems. Here, however, the issue is that these “comedic” incidents display an increasingly sick mindset on the Left.

“In my view,” said Hot Air’s John Sexton, “there’s a straight line between ‘free Luigi,’ to ‘free Palestine’ to ‘kill Tesla.’ Lots of people on the left support terrorism, they just can’t say it openly. What they can do is give a wink and a nod so you know what they mean without them quite saying it.”

The Luigi Mangione reference is something I was already thinking about. In fact, I wrote about the Left’s reaction to his (alleged!) murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson twice. Mangione still has a dedicated following of people who don’t bother trying to pretend he’s innocent or that what he (allegedly!) did was wrong, but who instead argue that it was necessary to rectify the injustice in the healthcare system.

(Note that the healthcare system is heavily regulated by the very government leftists cherish and advocate. Note also that Tesla succeeded with a lot of help from Democrat tax favors.)

Similarly, when left-wingers celebrate Hamas, chanting its genocidal slogan “from the river to the sea” and violently taking over college campuses, they are supporting Hamas terrorists over the “oppressor” Israel.

When you live by the oppressor/oppressed Marxist ethic, virtually any and all resistance is valid — whether violent and wanton destruction of private property or hostage-taking and murder.

Kimmel and crew think that’s funny and endorse it with a wink and nod. While they scream about Thoughtcrime, they and their audiences gleefully cheer actual crime. That hypocrisy isn’t just contemptible but dangerous.

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