4 ms·

Peter Thiel Sours on Donald Trump

30 points by cmurf 9y ago

Nokinside 9y ago
He saw opportunistic possibility to get ahead and it backfired. The problem with Trump government is that dysfunction shadows opportunistic cynicism by wide margin. Nobody can question his authoritarian tendencies. He just lacks the executive skills.
- cmurf 9y ago
  I'm not quite so forgiving of "opportunistic possibility" that just isn't working out to Thiel's advantage. First a person had to cross the birtherism rubicon, it wasn't something you could just skip over claiming you didn't know about it. Either you went with "YES! MORE GIVE ME MORE OF THAT!" or "Yeah that's pretty derp, but I'm going to overlook it as irrelevant to a proper assessment of one's character: someone who's making a personal and racist attack, attacking the office of the presidency, and also really attacking everyone who is willing to believe such an obvious lie - yeah that's who I still want as a president, someone who thinks I'm a moron." And just tick that box. And then there are the Stern interviews. The bankruptcies. The widespread pooping on all the furniture approach to business. And the 1999 Russert interview where he said we must preemptively bomb North Korea, we have to do it. And last year out loud asked why we hadn't used nukes yet. The data points for a kakistocracy are all there plain to see. But there was and still is a deep attachment to tribalism and denialism that resulted in where we're at.
evgen 9y ago
And now we reach the point where opportunistic douchebags who used Trump/alt-right crowds for their own benefit and those who felt that it gave them license to say and post things that they previously would have kept to themselves or to 4chan start to see the writing on the wall and begin looking for the exits. Unfortunately for them, the internet never forgets and the stink of this will cling to them for the rest of their days. I never had a high opinion of Peter Thiel, but for the past year or so my policy has been to avoid any company or organization that took money from him starting in 2016. This policy is not going to change. Ever.
- guelo 9y ago
  Where can I get that list of companies?
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
ufmace 9y ago
Maybe, maybe not. Honestly, I don't put much faith these days in what Left-leaning publications report on personal dealings within the Trump administration. Particularly when it is sourced to multiple anonymous sources.
- guelo 9y ago
  This is probably planted in the media by Thiel himself.
ChuckMcM 9y ago
" But the disruption that Trump has brought to Washington doesn’t appear to be the kind that Thiel was betting on." Whoops? The thing about chaos is that it doesn't have a discernible vector. When you throw chaos into a situation to shake things up, all directions it could go are equally probable. And no matter how bad you think things are currently, there is a large surface area of possible directions that makes things worse.
- cmurf 9y ago
  The whole "shake things up" meme was among the dumbest. It made me think of: "Honey, the toilet isn't working again! Those dammed plumbers don't know WTF they're doing. I'm calling an electrician to shake the f'n toilette! We'll just see how that works!" Seriously, this is kakistocracy levels of thinking, but that's what happens when people are a.) legitimately frustrated and b.) have no idea how to vent it. So they basically just role the dice and go with the stink bomb approach. All I can think of is we're just going to have to collectively suffer, and hopefully learn from the mistake but at this point the pain level isn't high enough for a proper feedback loop to kick in. Everyone is still really attached to the idea their tribe is just inherently obviously vastly superior and the others are either stupid or traitors. Politics by emotion. And embrace of denialism.
  - ChuckMcM 9y ago
    I have observed that engineers (myself included) are especially bad at evaluating the challenges faced by a politician in the course of doing their job. That lack of understanding makes it difficult to evaluate which 'change solution' might be the most effective.
  - imminentviolet 9y ago
    In what way is it dumb if the alternatives looked even worse?
    - cmurf 9y ago
      If you follow the metaphor, the idea of shaking a toilette to fix it is stupid as is hiring an electrician. Rationally, you'd find another plumber, maybe choosing a different selection metric. Extending the metaphor, the electrician has a long record of saying demonstrably untrue things about both water, electricity, and plumbing. And the idea that alternatives look worse is just more stupid denialism, the idea that literally all alternatives are worse than someone who poops on all the furniture is just non-credible nonsense and begs for ridicule because it is that ridiculous. It's not rational.
Upvoter33 9y ago
"sources say" ... sometimes I trust sources like this, sometimes not. Really hard to get much out of this article. However, it does push all the buttons for those of us on the left, and hence, it exists. If it's true, it's hard to imagine that people like Peter Thiel honestly thought Trump would be any different than he is right now.
neo4sure 9y ago
"Reed Hastings" (Netflix ceo) was spot on when he said he will lose points on evaluation. Frankly, he should be fired from the FaceBook board.

30 points by cmurf 9y ago

He saw opportunistic possibility to get ahead and it backfired. The problem with Trump government is that dysfunction shadows opportunistic cynicism by wide margin. Nobody can question his authoritarian tendencies. He just lacks the executive skills.

cmurf 9y ago
I'm not quite so forgiving of "opportunistic possibility" that just isn't working out to Thiel's advantage. First a person had to cross the birtherism rubicon, it wasn't something you could just skip over claiming you didn't know about it. Either you went with "YES! MORE GIVE ME MORE OF THAT!" or "Yeah that's pretty derp, but I'm going to overlook it as irrelevant to a proper assessment of one's character: someone who's making a personal and racist attack, attacking the office of the presidency, and also really attacking everyone who is willing to believe such an obvious lie - yeah that's who I still want as a president, someone who thinks I'm a moron." And just tick that box. And then there are the Stern interviews. The bankruptcies. The widespread pooping on all the furniture approach to business. And the 1999 Russert interview where he said we must preemptively bomb North Korea, we have to do it. And last year out loud asked why we hadn't used nukes yet. The data points for a kakistocracy are all there plain to see. But there was and still is a deep attachment to tribalism and denialism that resulted in where we're at.

evgen 9y ago

And now we reach the point where opportunistic douchebags who used Trump/alt-right crowds for their own benefit and those who felt that it gave them license to say and post things that they previously would have kept to themselves or to 4chan start to see the writing on the wall and begin looking for the exits. Unfortunately for them, the internet never forgets and the stink of this will cling to them for the rest of their days. I never had a high opinion of Peter Thiel, but for the past year or so my policy has been to avoid any company or organization that took money from him starting in 2016. This policy is not going to change. Ever.

guelo 9y ago
Where can I get that list of companies?
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]

ufmace 9y ago

Maybe, maybe not. Honestly, I don't put much faith these days in what Left-leaning publications report on personal dealings within the Trump administration. Particularly when it is sourced to multiple anonymous sources.

guelo 9y ago
This is probably planted in the media by Thiel himself.

ChuckMcM 9y ago

" But the disruption that Trump has brought to Washington doesn’t appear to be the kind that Thiel was betting on." Whoops? The thing about chaos is that it doesn't have a discernible vector. When you throw chaos into a situation to shake things up, all directions it could go are equally probable. And no matter how bad you think things are currently, there is a large surface area of possible directions that makes things worse.

cmurf 9y ago
The whole "shake things up" meme was among the dumbest. It made me think of: "Honey, the toilet isn't working again! Those dammed plumbers don't know WTF they're doing. I'm calling an electrician to shake the f'n toilette! We'll just see how that works!" Seriously, this is kakistocracy levels of thinking, but that's what happens when people are a.) legitimately frustrated and b.) have no idea how to vent it. So they basically just role the dice and go with the stink bomb approach. All I can think of is we're just going to have to collectively suffer, and hopefully learn from the mistake but at this point the pain level isn't high enough for a proper feedback loop to kick in. Everyone is still really attached to the idea their tribe is just inherently obviously vastly superior and the others are either stupid or traitors. Politics by emotion. And embrace of denialism.
- ChuckMcM 9y ago
  I have observed that engineers (myself included) are especially bad at evaluating the challenges faced by a politician in the course of doing their job. That lack of understanding makes it difficult to evaluate which 'change solution' might be the most effective.
- imminentviolet 9y ago
  In what way is it dumb if the alternatives looked even worse?
  - cmurf 9y ago
    If you follow the metaphor, the idea of shaking a toilette to fix it is stupid as is hiring an electrician. Rationally, you'd find another plumber, maybe choosing a different selection metric. Extending the metaphor, the electrician has a long record of saying demonstrably untrue things about both water, electricity, and plumbing. And the idea that alternatives look worse is just more stupid denialism, the idea that literally all alternatives are worse than someone who poops on all the furniture is just non-credible nonsense and begs for ridicule because it is that ridiculous. It's not rational.

Upvoter33 9y ago

"sources say" ... sometimes I trust sources like this, sometimes not. Really hard to get much out of this article. However, it does push all the buttons for those of us on the left, and hence, it exists. If it's true, it's hard to imagine that people like Peter Thiel honestly thought Trump would be any different than he is right now.

neo4sure 9y ago

"Reed Hastings" (Netflix ceo) was spot on when he said he will lose points on evaluation. Frankly, he should be fired from the FaceBook board.