
Peter Thiel Pledges to Support Trump’s 2020 Campaign - koolba
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-11-01/peter-thiel-praises-trump-pledges-to-support-his-2020-campaign
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snakeboy
I find it a bit humorous that Peter Thiel is "bullish" on life-extension
research while fervently backing a party that is doing everything in its power
to make Earth uninhabitable in the near future.

~~~
hokumguru
A common misconception. I think the average conservative definitely believes
that we need to take measures to protect this planet. We just don't
necessarily believe that government should be the method of action.
Traditionally the market is vastly more efficient at solving these hard
problems...

~~~
unchocked
I’d appreciate hearing a conservative history of markets correcting unpriced
externalities.

~~~
mcphage
Here you go:

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simonsarris
I've talked to some people who I think are smart, in tech and finance, about
why they like Trump (two of which also love Thiel, and I myself think Peter
Thiel is underrated). If you sincerely want to understand where they are
coming from, I have some reading for you.

One of them gave me this article:
[https://www.claremont.org/crb/basicpage/the-
flight-93-electi...](https://www.claremont.org/crb/basicpage/the-
flight-93-election/)

Another penned this one recently:
[https://sovereignexceptions.wordpress.com/2018/10/22/team-
tr...](https://sovereignexceptions.wordpress.com/2018/10/22/team-trump-
trumpism-and-trump/)

None of my acquaintances in tech are public about supporting Trump. Finance is
a bit different. And this is not at all true of my blue-collar friends (also
note I live in New Hampshire, not SV). Unfortunately I find it is getting
harder to talk politics, at all, with my very liberal friends. And it is very
easy to discuss (and even disagree) with my conservative friends.

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martythemaniak
It makes sense. In 2016, the slogan was Make America Great Again. His 2020
slogan is Keep America Great.

He has delivered on his promises, America is now great again, why would you
want to go back?

~~~
ng-user
What metrics do you guys (Americans) use to measure how 'great' the country
is? From the start this has puzzled me.

Or rather is it a simple slogan one can confidently spew knowing it's
impossible to prove?

(edit: I get that this is probably sarcasm, but it seems at least _SOME_
Americans believe it to be true)

~~~
TheAdamAndChe
It really depends on who you ask. Stereotypical democrats nowadays primarily
measure racial and gender inequality primarily, with economics and wealth
inequality coming second and rural incomes and quality of life coming far
behind. Stereotypical republicans primarily measure GDP, economic freedom, and
total power of the country.

Politicans like Sanders and Trump are rising because they focus more on issues
like income inequality and declining quality of life for the lower and middle
classes. Both address globalization and labor leverage, though they address it
differently. While they are culturally diametrically opposed, they are still
remaining popular because they are addressing these issues that other
politicans don't address, seemingly because big money has caused them to
ignore those issues.

~~~
true_religion
Okay. I am a Republican, but I do not understand how our party can have
leading candidates who are hereditary billionaires or multimilillionaires, yet
trumpet that it is not corrupted by “big money”.

I do not think money corrupts, if it did, then Republicans would be the first
to suffer.

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zandl
What I’ve found interesting is that there is a formal term “histrionic
reoccurrence”, and amazingly an important writer on the subject is named G.W.
Trompf.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historic_recurrence](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historic_recurrence)

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simonebrunozzi
If history can teach us anything, Trump's chance of winning are not as low as
people think.

[https://medium.com/simone-brunozzi/donald-trump-has-
won-b0b6...](https://medium.com/simone-brunozzi/donald-trump-has-
won-b0b6d60c32ab)

~~~
fullshark
His favorability ratings are comparable to Obama's, Clinton's and Reagan's at
this point in their presidency. He could easily get re-elected if the economy
is still going strong.

[https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/trump-approval-
ratings/...](https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/trump-approval-
ratings/?ex_cid=rrpromo)

~~~
koolba
And it’s not just unemployment that’s down. Latest numbers are showing an
uptick in actual wages. Combine that with people taking a look at their pay
stubs and you’ve got a recipe for succcess in 2020.

~~~
prolikewh0a
Can you provide evidence that real inflation adjusted wages are going up? It's
my understanding that wages for the bottom 60% of the country have fallen or
stagnated since the 70's and have only gone up in terms of non-inflation
adjusted, or have actually gone down.

The wealthy/elite classes are doing absolutely fantastic under Trump though,
and are getting tax cuts and wage increases. Those don't represent America,
though.

Edit: Simple Google search shows my thoughts to be true [1]. Wages aren't
rising quicker than inflation/cost of living, so saying wages are increasing
or are "up" is a bit inaccurate.

[https://www.forbes.com/sites/patrickwwatson/2018/09/25/real-...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/patrickwwatson/2018/09/25/real-
wage-growth-is-actually-falling/#11c2a8587284)

~~~
koolba
Well there is this report from yesterday:
[https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/31/wages-and-salaries-jump-
by-3...](https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/31/wages-and-salaries-jump-
by-3point1percent-highest-level-in-a-decade.html)

A 3.1% jump in wages should beat inflation at least for _this_ year.

~~~
prolikewh0a
Less than 0.5% increase then. Not too great!

Does this also take into account wage increases of the top 10%? If so, that
article would be wildly misleading.

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Codestare
It's no secret that Thiel has particular ideas about human behaviour and about
how the world should progress.

He is very clear in describing what he considers the issues, and it would
appear that Trump's ideas in some way or other align with his own.

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ppeetteerr
Peter, what are you doing? I loved your book 0 to 1 and your rogue style but
this makes it seem like you're (even more?) a jerk and out of touch with your
peers.

~~~
papito
When it comes to Trump support, look no further than the fear of Brown People.
It's just that simple. There is nothing else he is consistent on.

Generally, the more intellect, the less that sort of thing is likely, but
racism traps some people that are not quite dumb. It's what's in their heart
that matters.

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memonkey
So a rich white man born into privilege and complicit with America's domestic
racism, wealth inequalities, and staunch disregard for climate change,
supports a candidate with the same ideals?

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notfromhere
Peter Thiel is no fan of democracy, so I'm not surprised he's cozying up to
the Trump administration

~~~
selfselfself
Interesting. Any proof that he's not a fan of democracy?

~~~
village-idiot
> I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible

From the article linked below.

Honestly, reading that over, his political ideology is a hot mess of
inconsistency. I'm not exactly sure _what_ the hell Peter Thiel stands for,
other than his own pocket book.

[https://www.cato-unbound.org/2009/04/13/peter-
thiel/educatio...](https://www.cato-unbound.org/2009/04/13/peter-
thiel/education-libertarian)

~~~
rchaud
> his political ideology is a hot mess of inconsistency

That's what happens when you treat "libertarianism" as the immutable word of
God. Doesn't translate to the way human society works.

~~~
village-idiot
I think the funniest thing is this idea that you can escape to space or
wherever and enjoy a free society, as if all the problems didn’t come from
humans in the first place.

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userNamee
He's very wealthy so he can insulate himself from Trump's attacks on the LGBT
community which he is a part of. Too bad many people will suffer because of
this.

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sebringj
I really enjoy hearing the minds here on their opinion of why Peter Thiel is
backing Trump. I don't quite get the motivation and if there are any insights
to this, please fire away.

~~~
rchaud
1) He's rich and directly benefits from the tax cuts.

2) The cuts to social services don't affect people in his pay grade.

3) He lives in a gated community and wouldn't be targeted for harm by the sort
of people that are now emboldened to say the quiet part out loud.

4) He founded Palantir and wants to secure more government contracts

5) His experience with being outed by Gawker (completely unethical IMO)
probably also led to him viewing "the media" as a monolithic force out to get
him.

~~~
colpabar
Everyone who has a job directly benefits from the tax cuts.

~~~
dragonwriter
Untrue, because the tax cuts aren't unilateral cuts and inclide increases,and
even the cuts alone don't affect all people with jobs.

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chickenfries
> Questions about Trump’s name-calling and lack of civility were brushed
> aside. “I don’t think Trump’s nicknames are that nasty,” Thiel said.
> “They’re powerfully accurate.”

I wish people would stop asking about this crap and ask Trump supporters how
they feel about detaining asylum seekers, kidnapping, drugging and abusing
their children, or how they feel about Trump kowtowing to Putin, or MBS, or
about the corruption and nepotism. About the fact that we don't have a fucking
ambassador to Turkey or Saudi Arabia because JARED is supposed to be handling
it.

Stop asking people about if they think the Tweets are too mean...

Lots of downvoting going on in this thread. Care to comment?

