Hacker News Reader

Comment by 3pt14159 | Hacker News Reader

Or maybe its because Thiel is a useful person to associate with and enough money is on the line that pg's claim that he'd be the "first to bring about the resistance" doesn't apply because Thiel, like Andreessen, is too important to be stood up to.

I've lot so much respect for YC wrt Thiel. Trump is such an obvious villain that if you're not against him you're an enabler. I don't care that he's become normalized in the American and Russian press the rest of the world is laughing at the USA and crying inside. We're slowly finding out which people are actually committed to their ideals and which are just interested in being more powerful, even if it comes at the cost of allowing a total maniac to the nuclear throne.

View on HN

Roughly half the country voted Trump so it's a bit excessive to shun all of them.

About 23%, actually. Roughly half the country didn't vote, or they did but their votes weren't counted because of voter suppression laws largely passed by Republicans.

I respect the 28% of voting age America that voted for HRC. I also have respect for the people that voted Stein or Johnson in non-battleground states. Call it 30%. But as a Canadian who's been to America dozens of times over the years I've slowly lost respect for the GOP and Trump was the final nail in the coffin. 90% of the GOP is evil or brainwashed. The other 10% that I still have a small modicum of respect for includes people like Kasich.

So I respect about a third of American electorate. The third that didn't vote I don't respect. The third that voted for Trump I don't respect.

As for America the country, I respect most of the intelligent people working at the State Department and the CIA that I truly believe are working towards a peaceful more prosperous world, though I admit that their history is much more checkered (waterboarding, etc) than their counterparts in Germany, but they've done good work basically everywhere outside of the Middle East. Tough area to play right though, lobbyists, Israel, Turkey, multiple religious factions, critical market for the economy / national security.

But all their work is jeopardized by this horrible demagogue and enough of America either stayed home or voted for him. A man that bragged about sexual assault and swindled the poor for their student loan money and chanted "lock her up" to crowds of tens of thousands. We're laughing at America in the morning, but we're crying at night.

He's a villain to you because you have different ideals. To many, he is a figurative Bruce Wayne in the Gotham City of corruption that is D.C. Any man who "is with her" either has a confused sense of allegiance to the USA or needs a shot of testosterone.

If what you say is true then pg's essay is deliberately deceptive, and pg is deliberately holding Thiel to a different standard. Although possible, I think it's much more likely that pg is sincere in his convictions. Regardless, I find Thiel's vision for America as reprehensible as you do.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com