1000 years from now the last man will be dying on Earth and will have the bitter regret: "We could have gotten to Mars but Elon Musk just had to post that stupid tweet."
It is Elon Musk's brilliance that makes his stupidity so poignant. Electric cars will survive him and will survive Tesla but what he's doing in space travel is so important that he shouldn't undermine it.
He doesn't undermine it at all, on the contrary. He answers attempts for consolidation raw ideas with raw responses. Something that maybe someone should have done sooner.
It is Elon Musk's brilliance that makes his stupidity so poignant. Electric cars will survive him and will survive Tesla but what he's doing in space travel is so important that he shouldn't undermine it.