Our alien overlords have arrived and their name is “Elon” [Starbase, TX]

Amy Gamerman, Elon Musk Is Colonizing Earth, NYTimes, June 12, 2026

In this town, almost every communal space is private property. A company controlled by the world’s richest man owns nearly all of it. He shapes its future.

This is Starbase, Texas, the city that Elon Musk built on America’s ragged hem at the southern border as the home for SpaceX, his aerospace and artificial intelligence company. Locals describe a highly secretive environment overseen by a company-affiliated city commission that rubber-stamps Mr. Musk’s vision, a place where even kindergartners are guided by his philosophies. Starbase is the newest manifestation of Mr. Musk’s political power. It is a beta test for a rising oligarchy that seems intent on transforming America from the inside out. [...]

On May 12, Mr. Musk announced on social media that “SpaceX is considering several locations domestically and internationally to build the world’s most advanced spaceports!” His announcement came on the heels of reports that a large parcel of land in coastal Louisiana may have been acquired by an anonymous aerospace company, widely rumored to be SpaceX.

These spaceports will allow Mr. Musk to create his own reality for other people to live in. He doesn’t need Mars. Mr. Musk has already built a colony of his own.

Mr. Musk often cites “Star Trek” as inspiration for founding SpaceX. “We want to make ‘Star Trek’ real, OK?” he said in January. But Starbase bears less similarity to the enlightened wonderland depicted in that 1960s television show than it does to the autocratic company towns of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Like Mr. Musk, the industrial titans of that era built their own private fiefs, not only to cement control over workers, but to realize their vision of an ideal society.

Perhaps the most grandiose company town of them all was Fordlandia, the sprawling city that Henry Ford built in the Brazilian rainforest to grow rubber trees. Fordlandia was Ford’s personal Utopia, an expression of his social views, his personal predilections and even his vegetarianism. Workers were forced to subsist on a diet heavy on brown rice, oatmeal and canned peaches, as detailed in Greg Grandin’s “Fordlandia: The Rise and Fall of Henry Ford’s Forgotten Jungle City.” For amusement, there was square dancing — Ford loved square dancing — and poetry readings.

Fordlandia’s ghost haunts Mr. Musk’s colony. Corporate control is so all-encompassing at Starbase that a warning on the menu at its Astropub restaurant alerts diners to the “confidentiality and proprietary nature” of the fare. Students at its private Ad Astra school are guided on “hands-on experiential missions.” The interplanetary mission is even written into the job description for a facilities supervisor overseeing waste management and janitorial needs.

There's much more at the link. It's not pretty reading.