You are conflating democracy and classical liberalism. Democracy is a decision making mechanism that can produce any decisions - democratic cannibals might vote

You are conflating democracy and classical liberalism. Democracy is a decision making mechanism that can produce any decisions - democratic cannibals might vote on who to eat. Most people think, and I tentatively agree, that democracy was the best way to achieve liberal outcomes. However, overall they are in tension. You can see it in the endless 1st amendment cases over the centuries - people really, really want to limit all kinds of speech by the power of the majority, but there's an absolutist undemocratic rule usually preventing them from doing so. I think on the net classical liberalism (esp. free speech and markets) are more important than democracy. I don't think there's enough tension between them to ditch democracy completely, I guess thiel disagrees. But he's not a coward or a hypocrite, he said so explicitly and openly.