Former US presidential candidate Ted Cruz is angry people are making fun of his belief the US is under threat from "space pirates".
"Since the ancient Greeks first put to sea, nations have recognised the necessity of naval forces and maintaining a superior capability to protect waterborne travel and commerce from bad actors," the Texas Senator said last week at a hearing in Washington.
"Pirates threaten the open seas, and the same is possible in space."
He was defending President Donald Trump's formation of a US Space Force, to defend the country's interests in the final frontier.
But rather than rallying the troops to fight the pirate peril, instead, he attracted mockery.
Space X founder Elon Musk - who actually knows how to get ships into space - tweeted a Jolly Roger emoji.
Liberal-aligned news network MSNBC tweeted a video featuring clips from classic pirate movies like Hook and Pirates of the Caribbean, and even one with an actual space pirate - Lando Calrissian from Star Wars V: The Empire Strikes Back.
So many Twitter users took aim at Cruz, it became a 'moment' - Twitter's name for a big story sweeping social media. This made Cruz mad.
"Hey @jack," the Senator tweeted at the site's chief executive, "how come Twitter's 'moment' quotes all the snarky leftists making fun of my comments, but doesn't include my tweets in response explaining the real point that NATIONS like China have already developed & tested weapons to destroy satellites?"
MSNBC presenter Chris Hayes called it "the saddest tweet I've ever seen", and Cruz responded by saying he hoped "space pirates devour" Hayes' liver.
The Pentagon said earlier this year China and Russia were developing technology to shoot down satellites. They're the only other two countries in the world with a dedicated space force in addition to their landlubbing armies.
There is no present threat from non-governmental space pirates, at least from Earth.
Newshub.
