Peter Thiel Is Joining Donald Trump's Transition Team (theverge.com)

Peter Thiel's time spent campaigning for Donald Trump during the election season has paid off. According to a statement released today, Donald Trump has named Thiel to the executive committee of his presidential transition team. The Verge reports: Thiel, who donated $1.25 million to Trump's campaign late in the election cycle, mostly stood alone among colleagues in his support for Trump, who was publicly disdained in the Valley. Thiel's support came at a cost to businesses like startup accelerator Y Combinator, which soon attracted negative publicity for having Thiel as a part-time adviser. Thiel also brought criticism to Facebook, where he is a board member, although Mark Zuckerberg defended his place at the company. Thiel further angered First Amendment supporters by bankrolling the Hulk Hogan lawsuit that brought down Gawker. Thiel said before the election that he would find some way of working with the Trump administration, and although his final role is unclear, his appointment to Trump's executive committee signals the relationship will indeed continue.

Comments

he bet on the winner

[turkeydance]

he reaps the rewards.

Re:he bet on the winner

[ATMAvatar]

like his idea to start an independent libertarian utopia on an ocean platform.

Would you kindly vote Trump?

Re: he bet on the winner

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh noes! He's going to allow pipes to carry oil instead of those so much more environmental methods such as trucks and trains!

Get your head screwed on, pipelines beat the alternatives, and saying no to them doesn't do what you think it does (because I'm betting you think it means people won't be able to buy oil).

Re:he bet on the winner

[FlyHelicopters]

if Peter lands a spot in Trump's administration, it certainly won't be business as usual.

When is the last time a Republican Administration had an openly gay man in a senior role?

Peter would make a decent tech adviser to Trump. For all the people bitching that Trump is a raciest, homophobic, bigot... well, you're not paying attention...

Re: he bet on the winner

[ShanghaiBill]

He's already planning to bring coal burning back

Coal isn't dying because of politics. It is dying because of cheap shale gas. Coal is not coming back.

Re:he bet on the winner

[jandersen]

Remind me who were the ones screaming people down with accusations of "racist, misogynist, nazi, hitler",

True - as one of the people who feared the election of Trump as a very bad thing indeed, I have to admit that people on my side did tend to do that, and that was wrong.

The marxists that make up today's left-wing movement absolutely despise the American system and the constitution. They detest free speech and free elections and would just prefer to use government force to cram their ideals down everyone else's throats. They are always demanding more and more power be given to the federal government, not caring about the abuses of power it results in, because they believe it will be THEIR power to use against their opponents. With their loss of this election, they are are slowly realising why such power is not to be granted. Their opponents now wield this power, and they are terrified of it being used against themselves.

- but as this illustrates, your side engage in exactly the same tactics. And that is why American politics is broken: there is no honest and open-minded debate to be found, at least not in public. It is tempting to point the finger at lack of education or blinkered religion, both of which probably contribute, in some way, but I have met people who were both illiterate and deeply religious, but still managed to teach me a thing or two about open-mindedness and being willing to listen.

I don't know the solution - I don't think any of you guys do either - but I think it is very likely that the way to the future, from where we are now, can go two ways: either towards ever deeper conflict between two almost exact halves of the population, perhaps ending in civil war, or people can decide that they have to start reaching out to their "enemies" and seek compromise and understanding. There is still time to make the better choice, but the longer you continue down the path of division, the harder will it be to heal the wounds.

So, why don't we start the process here and now? It isn't really all that hard - it is of course necessary to state your viewpoints and your grievances, but it is also your duty to be willing to listen to the other side and try to take on board some of it. Let me give you an example: I think the Trump is an absolutely appalling twit - based on the way he appears to insult without thinking, and apparently lies without shame and so on. This is my subjective view of him, and I may be wrong. I absolutely understand and accept the anger that is felt by his supporters; they happen to be mostly male, white and working class, but the gross indecency of the ever growing inequality in the US is unversal and hurts all except the few that richer - one of whom happens to be Trump, by the way. So, there you have it - it may only be a small, symbolic gesture by one individual, but that is all any of us have to give, and it is genuine; I really do want the situation to improve, and I really am willing to give Trump the chance to prove himself, but it won't matter unless everybody else is willing to do the same.

Re: Crony Capitalism

[prefec2]

Why? Corruption is the standard in Washington. I wait for the day when Trump voters find out that Trump is also part of a rich elite. That they will stay poor and have no jobs. Lower taxes is BTW only good for people who earn that.much that they have to pay them.

Peter Thiel and Hulk Hogan

[tlambert]

"Thiel further angered First Amendment supporters by bankrolling the Hulk Hogan lawsuit that brought down Gawker"

I'm pretty sure the only people who felt angered at this as a first amendment issue were the folks at Gawker.

Everyone else was pretty happy to see the Silicon Valley Version of TMZ (Thirty Mile Zone) go away, and quit outing the sexual orientation of businessmen whose only possible reason for being considered "public persons" was having been promoted as such by Gawker in the first place.

Peter Thiel and Hulk Hogan: I personally cheered for the verdict in this case, and am glad Thiel backed it.

Re:It's the transition team, people.

[PopeRatzo]

You very, very rarely go from "transition team" to "cabinet position".

Trump chose his vice-president to lead his transition team.

This is a guy who, as governor of Indiana, when facing a breakout of AIDS in the rural community due to drug use, chose "prayer" as his only solution.

This is a guy who signed a bill with a government mandate that families hold funerals for miscarried or aborted fetuses.

This is a guy who as governor, instructed law enforcement to investigate women who miscarried to make sure they weren't aborting their fetuses.

Re:It's the transition team, people.

[physicsphairy]

mandate that families hold funerals for miscarried or aborted fetuses

This was so crazy that I had to look it up. Turns out "hold a funeral" is "dispose of remains properly" -- the bill required that fetal remains be either interred or incinerated. Generally speaking that would be the responsibility of the healthcare facility in custody of the remains.

Tell me straight, is "require families to hold a funeral" truly the most accurate and reasonable way you could come up with to indicate the nature of the bill, or is it a purposeful deception?

Re:It's the transition team, people.

[lucm]

The hiring of the *homophobic bigot* Peter Thiel just goes to show how awful they are.

He's also sexist, since he won't have sex with women.

Cleaning the swamp?

[Kwyj1b0]

I've been hearing a lot of talk about "Give Trump a chance", and "let's judge him when he gets to office" by people who voted against him, but are practical enough to want a good leader.

However, this seems to be a pattern with Trump - using donors or people who already agree with him in key positions and advisors. His economic team consists of big donors, and discredited hacks like Stephen Moore and Larry Kudlow (this is non-partisan; even economic advisors of previous republicans presidents don't agree with Moore). He takes an climate-change skeptic (Myron Ebell) to lead the EPA transition.

Yet, I haven't heard a peep from most people who supported Trump about this. The "blue collar" crowd who supported him was about people sick of "Establishment politics", and instead wanted someone "looking out for the working class". Trump's isolationist and trade-war leaning policies, and embrace of supply-side economics have a proven record of hurting workers. Together with clear cronyism (to be fair, this was obvious before the election), I'm surprised that the "blue collar" crowd isn't even slightly upset.

Trump's supporters seem to still be in the post-game high - "Our team won!"; are they going to hold him to his (crazy) campaign promises? Are they going to expect him to loosen libel laws, build a wall, bring back sweatshop factory jobs? A co-worker remarked "Trump's victory speech was a step towards healing", instead of realizing that the stirred up crazy is still out there; he doesn't get credit for not being as crazy enough to follow through on his campaign promises.

Oh boy, not this shit again

[rsilvergun]

Keystone was shut down because it was primarily a way for Canada to ship oil to China. It's of very, very limited use to the United States while presenting significant risks (oil pipelines break all the time because it's cheaper to let 'em break than to maintain them since the tax payer cleans up the spills).

Coal burning isn't a big deal because we regulated the fuck out of it. It's not profitable when they coal burners can't externalize their costs by dumping crap into the air and water. That's what shut down coal burning.

He won't gas jews, but I am worried about my daughter's access to reproductive services. She's got some fairly serious congenital health issues that might someday require an abortion of a non-viable fetus to save her life. This is a surprisingly common occurrence that Mike Pence believes his God forbid's. If you think I'm speaking hyperbole then you don't know the horror of child birth left in God's hands. Educate yourself.

Re:Oh boy, not this shit again

[AaronW]

My sister similarly has major health issues and relies on a number of provisions of Obamacare in order to stay alive. Losing insurance for her would be a death sentence. Several provisions of Obamacare are helping to keep her alive and a productive member of society:
- Nobody can be turned away due to pre-existing conditions.
- All medications must be covered (minus deductible) though some may require petitioning.
- No lifetime limits on care

As it is, my family has to help subsidize her care since the monthly deductible on one of her medications is $500/month and she's on a teacher's salary that doesn't pay a lot. Without insurance her medication jumps to $5000/month.

My mother also at one time had to have a procedure similar to an abortion when the fetus died and had to be extracted. If they're so anti-abortion, why not work on ways to make it much less needed by offering more birth control and pre-natal healthcare to women? To me it just seems that they want to make women second-class citizens by legislating their bodies rather than help make it so the procedure is needed far less. People like Pence also seem to go out of their way to make it harder for wanted children by fighting against programs like CHIP.

Re:pay to play

[Imazalil]

You're willfully missing the point.

Clinton is questionable as hell, and that is why she wasn't elected.

Trump promised (or technically implied so, maybe there is a literal swamp he'll be draining somewhere) to clean things up. Now, he is putting people into government that were throwing money at him. Sure, they're a transition team and all that, but so much for a clean break. Screaming Clinton this, Clinton that doesn't make Trumps hypocrisy any better.