Some More News - SMN: Peter Thiel And His Dorky Little Goons

Episode Date: November 2, 2022

Hi. Peter Thiel is a tech billionaire who is spending a lot of money trying to get right-wing goons elected, either to try and create a weird libertarian pseudo-feudal quasi-fascist fantasy dystopia, or just to keep himself very rich. Maybe both. Please fill out our SURVEY: https://kastmedia.com/survey/ Support us on our PATREON: http://patreon.com/somemorenews Check out our MERCH STORE: https://www.teepublic.com/stores/somemorenews?ref_id=9949 SUBSCRIBE to SOME MORE NEWS: https://tinyurl.com/ybfx89rh   Subscribe to the Even More News and SMN audio podcasts here: Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/some-more-news/id1364825229 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6ebqegozpFt9hY2WJ7TDiA?si=5keGjCe5SxejFN1XkQlZ3w&dl_branch=1 Stitcher: https://www.stitcher.com/show/even-more-news  Follow us on social media: Twitter: https://twitter.com/SomeMoreNews Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/SomeMoreNews/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SomeMoreNews/ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@somemorenews  Get a better night's rest and a better day tomorrow with products from NextEvo Naturals. For up to 25% off subscription orders of $40 or more, use promo code MORENEWS at https://NextEvo.com. Get 20% off and Free Shipping with the code MORENEWS at Manscaped.com. Be thankful this holiday season for the best gift of all from MANSCAPED™. Sources: https://docs.google.com/document/d/19...Support the show!: http://patreon.com.com/somemorenewsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Oh yeah! Screw Halloween! It's Votevember! What's up, Democracy Stands? Are you ready for the midterms? Voting is cool and horny and dangerous. It's like Ana de Armas in that movie where Ben Affleck plays Murder Cuck. Be like Ben Affleck and Cuck the vote! If you think this will be the only reference to a vengeful bro watching someone nail his wife, you will be wrong, because this is an episode about Peter Thiel, bank roller of the Ben Affleck from the movie I mentions of the world. If that statement doesn't make sense right now, that's okay.

I said it weird, and it'll barely make sense when I explain it. But rest assured, it is classic Peter Thiel stuff. Speaking of classic Peter Thiel stuff, you probably don't know what classic Peter Thiel stuff is. You might not even know who Peter Thiel is. And yet, this seemingly nonsense grouping of concepts, the midterms, vengeful cuck bros, and Peter Thiel,

are all interwoven. So here's some news. Peter Thiel is all interwoven. So here's some news. Peter Thiel is a name you maybe should know before the midterms happen and after they happen as well. During, I guess you should also know who he is during the midterms because he is and will be a quiet but key figure in American politics. Someone who really needs to be a household name,

if only because he probably doesn't want to be. So here's an episode about him. Blast it at full volume in your household. What's the deal with Teal? Let us start at the beginning of all things, the Big Bang. Then skip a bunch of stuff to, according to wikipedia.com, quote, Peter Andreas Thiel is a German-American billionaire, entrepreneur, venture capitalist, and political activist.

Hey, that doesn't sound so bad, except for the billionaire and venture capitalist and political activist parts. Also, the German part is iffy, depending on the era. Little Nazi ref for you, get used to them. Thiel co-founded PayPal with some guy, became the first major outside investor for a college stalking app called Facebook,

and supported the 2016 underdog candidate, in that he looks like the underside of a dog, Donald Trump. Admit it, if you turned over a bull doodle and saw his face, you would not be surprised. Teal now, among other things, lurks in the background and handpicks political candidates to fund, including Blake Masters and JD Vance. We will be getting to those last two names in a bit,

but you gotta keep watching. A little Vance tease for you Hillbilly Elegy fans. Some advance notice for all you Hillbillion fellow Gs out there. Anyway, Teal got his start at Stanford, which he attended both for undergrad and law school. While there, he launched the Stanford Review, a conservative student newspaper

currently covering such hot topics as sex positivity's war on young women, and Woke Watch, in which they monitor school activity for wokeness. Also, this adorable opinion piece, A Call to Revitalize Fun, in which the author complains that there are no cool parties on campus, which I'm sure is the problem. That's, you nailed it, guy. It's the parties aren't fun. So after school, Teal raised $1 million redos from quote, friends and family,

which kind of just seems like one of those headlines, how I built nine companies by eating one meal a week. And you read it and it's like, oh, you're Brian Nintendo's son or whatever. He then used that money to launch Teal Capital Management. After a few early setbacks, Teal teamed up with Max Levchin to found Confinity, a software company that would go on

to launch its flagship product, PayPal, in 1999. Truly blessed how all of society's great minds found their initial success by inventing banks, but online. In fact, PayPal launched the careers of enough rich people that they even have a nickname for themselves, the PayPal Mafia. So spooky and tough, honestly. Kudos to Musk for not being in that photo.

Now, while Musk and Teal are probably the most well-known members of this, no better way to say it, nerd group for rich losers, other members include David Sachs, who was once the corporate vice president of Microsoft's Office Division, Keith Raboy, who held senior positions at LinkedIn and Square before being ousted by sexual harassment claims, and Jodh Kareem,

who co-founded a little known website called YouTube. Home of the best darn talk show this side of the internet. Thanks for trying guys, and folks at home, make sure to stick around after the break for celebrity butt poker and maybe some heroin karaoke with Warmbo and the New Zets. Isn't that right, Warmbo? See any good movies lately, Warmbo?

All right, so the point is PayPal and its mafia have launched the careers of incredibly affluent, incredibly powerful people. So it should come as no surprise that along with Musk and Sax and Kareem and all the rest, Thiel has had no problem turning his initial success into something more long-term and frankly, more insidious. In 2002, PayPal was acquired by eBay for $1.5 billion.

Once again, that is the concept of banks, but online. After that, Thiel immediately used his 3.7% of the profits, or $55 million, to angel invest $500,000 on the ground floor of Facebook. After 9-11, Thiel became more and more afraid of the threat of Islamic terrorism, which was pretty in vogue during that time. The fear, not the actual terrorism.

And in response to that fear, not the terrorism, he did what any red-blooded American would do and founded a terrifying spy company that collects and analyzes government data. It's called Palantir, the data analytics company literally named after the omniscient spying orbs from the Lord of the Rings that are secretly

being controlled by an evil puppet master. Honestly, a pretty apt name. Good job naming things Peter Thiel. Since then, he's continued to invest in various tech companies to become richer than God, assuming God is worth less than $7 billion. I have no information about God's net worth. It seems worth pointing out that like the Muskster,

all of Thiel's wealth has come from lucky smart investments and being in the right place at the right time. Not actually like inventing anything. Thiel is credited as being co-founder and CEO of PayPal, but that doesn't really mean anything. There's no indication that he actually contributed to the development of the app or website or whatever. And even if he did, the app or website in question is,

if you're following along, banks, but online. There's since been a bunch of better or different versions of PayPal because it's not a unique concept. It's not even the first. Also, did you catch that one of the founders is named Sax? Which sounds like ball sacks, not important, but as a little news gumshoe,

I wanted to leave no stone unturned, you see? And when I say stone, I mean testicle. We put the private in private dick. Also the dick in private dick, both the dick and privates. And speaking of Private Dicks, what most people probably know Teal for, if they've heard of him at all, is his years long feud with Gawker Media.

A feud that ended when Gawker was being sued into the ground by Hulk Hogan, the famous movie star best known for his nuanced portrayal of Rip from No Holds Barred. See, what happened was that in 2007, Gawker's tech blog, Valleywag, published a post under the headline, "'Peter Thiel is totally gay, people!"

Which, while true, was probably not the most sensitive or respectful way to tell the general public about someone's sexuality for the first time. It was, in fact, nobody's business, until he might have chosen to make it people's business. Gawker and its media family, while it existed in this form, was pretty sleazy like that

and did this kind of stuff not irregularly. This wasn't the only person they outed as they were once even knowingly part of an extortion scheme. It's good that this version of them is no longer around. However, the means of their demise are very debatable. Specifically, their article about him pissed Teal the hell off and he spent the next several years plotting his revenge.

The opportunity came in 2012 when Gawker published a leaked sex tape of Hollywood Hulk Hogan having sex with the wife of his good friend Bubba the Love Sponge. If you're wondering, Bubba is the Ben Affleck I mentioned before. He actually gave the Hulkster the go ahead for the banging sesh, but didn't tell Hogan that he was secretly recording the whole affair.

He betrayed Hulk, much like how Lenny the Elf betrayed Blake Thorne at the beginning of Santa with Muscles. But I'm not here to explain classic holiday movies. Point is that Gawker published the video under the headline "'Even for a minute, watching Hulk Hogan have sex "'in a canopy bed is not safe for work, "'but watch it anyway.'"

Because Gawker, once again, icky. After this, Hogan tells reporters he plans to sue for violation of privacy. Peter Thiel jumps on the opportunity, contacts Hogan's legal team, and bankrolls a lawsuit seeking damages of $100 million from Gawker Media. Now, normally, lawsuits concerning a celebrity sex tape don't go to trial.

This can be for a number of reasons, including the fact that a sex tape related trial is very embarrassing and expensive for the plaintiff. Gawker knew this and tried to make the suit as drawn out as possible for Hogan and force him to settle. Of course, that strategy only works if the person suing you isn't being financially backed by someone with unlimited money.

So instead of a long painful lawsuit for Hogan, it became a long painful lawsuit for Gawker, culminating in 2016 when a jury sided with Hogan, awarding him $140 million in damages and dealing a massive blow to Gawker Media in the process. The lesson here, besides that Gawker sucks and Hogan fucks, is that Peter Thiel will fire hose money if he really wants to win something bad enough.

Also, Hulk Hogan is pretty racist. And so sometimes there's just no heroes in any given story. It's like the film Gremlins 2, where you're not sure who to root for, but can't stop watching the spectacle. That's of course, featuring movie star, Hulk Hogan. Best known for his films and racism and nothing else. But despite his litigation against free speech

and someone's right to be a real piece of shit, it turns out that Peter Thiel is a libertarian, or at least as libertarian as a rich guy funding major politicians gets. In a 2009 essay titled, TheThe Education of a Libertarian," Thiel identifies human freedom as his primary political goal and as a precondition to the highest good. And it's ostensibly for these reasons

that he's consistently supported right wing and anti-tax political candidates and groups over the years. Also, you know, because he's a very rich person and wants to stay that way, or if anything, get richer. The scary part though, is when in that same essay, he goes on to write that he no longer believes that freedom and democracy are compatible, since in his words,

the vast increase in welfare beneficiaries and the extension of the franchise to women have rendered the notion of capitalist democracy into an oxymoron. He goes on to say that the great task for libertarians is to find an escape from politics in all its forms and ends with the sentence, "'The fate of our world may depend on the effort

"'of a single person who builds or propagates "'the machinery of freedom "'that makes the world safe for capitalism. Overall, the piece is pretty libertarian in that a lot of it is kind of muddled and vague and doesn't offer many practical solutions. He seems to want an escape from politics, whatever that means,

I assume an escape from government or perhaps big government. Thiel lays out three remaining frontiers that he considers still viable for individual choice to have meaning and impact. Cyberspace, outer space, and the ocean space. Because libertarians fucking love ocean cities. Thiel himself even bankrolled one in 2008 before later announcing the project was not quite feasible.

He also frames his creation of PayPal as a quote, "'New World Currency, "'free from all government control and dilution.'" And seems to be imagining a utopian free market society where capitalism can thrive, which is pretty fucking convenient when you're one of the richest people alive. And finally, he wants a single person to make this happen,

which kind of sounds like, like Anakin Skywalker that time he floated the idea of fascism on his waterfall date where he hid Padme from assassins by sticking her on her home planet in an open field with lots of high vantage points. Overall, it's libertarianism from a rich guy. So it's focused mainly on wanting a magical land of free market deregulation.

But again, it's muddled. In fact, biographer Max Chafkin has argued that Thiel's most consistent philosophy is contrarianism, even going so far as to title his biography of the man, The Contrarian. In an interview with Time, Chafkin says that one of the things that makes Thiel so scary is that he thinks companies are better run

than governments because they have a single decision maker. In other words, a dictator. That's taken from Thiel's book, Zero to One, in which he romanticizes and praises tech founders' ability to make authoritative decisions while comparing them to feudal leaders. At first glance, this seems pretty contradictory to the group of people Peter Thiel

has been associating with. Libertarians are, in theory, not rock hard for the concept of a dictator or a monarchy. For that reason, there's a strong argument that Peter Thiel isn't toying with libertarianism at all, but rather Thiel and Thiel fans are more closely associated with something called the new right, a much larger tent of political ideals that,

while dabbles with the big L, often don't agree on everything. And so that's something we will get into in just one second or a few seconds. Because we need to cut to some ads, okay? Because unlike Peter Teal, we are not rich. And in fact, we'll do a lot of things for money. For example, do you want me to snort something weird?

Give me five bucks then. For $10, you can record me doing it. And for $20, I will punch anyone you tell me to. I don't care how old or young they are. I am so hungry for punching and food. Greetings, citizen. The evenings are traditionally a time to relax with some music and a nice bottle of corn juice. But these days, I'm finding it harder and harder to get to sleep. What with all those big squirrels and raccoons running around. Did you notice that squirrels and raccoons running around.

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So give it a try, why don't ya? Honestly, seriously, I gotta tell you that I love this stuff. I'm sleeping great despite the raccoons, I mean it. This is sincere. So get a better night's rest and a better day tomorrow with products from NextEvo Naturals. For up to 25% off subscription orders of $40 or more, use promo code MORENEWS at NextEvo.com. That's N-E-X-T-E-V-O.com. Promo code MORENEWS. Eh? We're back and we're talking about Peter Thiel, or rather for legal purposes,

talking about articles and books about Peter Thiel and simply relaying that information. Also, legally speaking, I won't actually punch anyone for $20. Legally speaking. Anyway, the new right. It's the thing I mentioned before the break. A real somehow Palpatine returned, re-re-rebranding loop that conservatives seem to be stuck in these days.

Hey, remember the Tea Party? They still around? Making Herman Cain NFTs or some shit? I am not going to look them up. Anywho, in a piece for Vanity Fair, journalist James Pogue details the inner workings of the new right, the latest evolution of the alt-right post-left neo-reactionary movement

that seeks to distinguish itself from both the Reaganism of the 80s and Bush-era conservatism. As I alluded to before, the new right is not a unified ideology. As Pogue explains, members come from a wildly diverse set of political backgrounds, from monarchists to Marxists to the literal Unabomber,

who some new rightists call Uncle Ted. But the idea at its center, the core tenant that makes the new right a movement at all, is the underlying belief that individualist liberal ideology, increasingly bureaucratic governments, and big tech are all combining into a world that is at once tyrannical, chaotic, and devoid of the systems of value and morality

that give human life richness and meaning. Pogue points to Curtis Yarvin, friend of Peter Thiel, and an ex-programmer and blogger who goes by the online name Mencius Molebug. Many people in the new right will ironically call him Lord Yarvin because apparently this guy cannot get enough Star Wars names. Menstrual Mold Grub is credited as a co-founder

and or prominent voice for the Neo-Reactionary or Dark Enlightenment movement. It's basically a bunch of alt-right Silicon Valley bros that like Teal, believe that democracy is not compatible with freedom and want to replace it with a vague techno monarchy. Sounds kind of familiar, right? Yarvin once put out a blog post called the case against democracy

with a listing of red pills that he considered to be truths because, and this can't be understated, these guys are dorks. They're also pretty fucking fashy and border on white nationalist. Yarvin himself has blogged that although he doesn't consider himself a white nationalist,

he recognizes that many of his readers are and said he would also read and link to white nationalist content, which sure sounds like something a white nationalist would say. By one account, Yarvin once gave a speech where he defended Hitler's decision

to invade other countries, calling it self-defense. Here's another blog where he doesn't seem to understand why people hate the Nazis the most, which includes the quote, "'We are taught that the Nazis were bad "'because they committed mass murder, to wit, the Holocaust.'" On the other hand, and then there's more, and like, do I need to finish that quote?

But, okay, to be fair and balanced, his other hand is pointing out that the Soviet Union also did mass murders. Okay, yes, both things can be bad. Cody's showdy has a strict no genocide policy. Of course, this isn't a video on Lord Yarnish dildo bug, the totally not racist who uses liberal democratic hypocrisy to get you to sign up for fashion adjacent neo-feudalism,

but it's important to talk about him because he's a man deep in Peter Thiel's circle. Thiel has funded Yarvin's startup and they will correspond to discuss the politicians that Thiel backs. Yarvin and the new right, like many far right groups, believe in a fundamental conspiracy where the people at the top hold so much power,

it strips agency and freedom away from everyday people. He calls it the cathedral because nerd. And part of his belief is that there's no single entity running the show. In fact, he believes hardly anyone who participates in it believes that it's an organized system at all. Instead, it self-perpetuates by rewarding media that goes after threats against the established order,

like nationalists, libertarians, and anti-vaxxers. Social media, according to Yarvin, only accelerates this cycle, since the best way to get clicks from someone is generally to reaffirm their worldview, which in Yarvin's eyes, reaffirms the cathedral. In other words, he's describing like capitalism and the status quo or social norms,

something that has existed for as long as society exists. But since he's a tech bro at heart, he's decided that this is a brand new thing he's invented and is now giving it a silly name. The solution in the eyes of Yarvin and the new right is for a big strong boy to take power back from the cathedral and replace the whole system

with a regime structured topdown, like a startup. But it's like, super not a dictatorship, you guys. That's not how it's gonna turn out. In that aforementioned speech where he defended Hitler or whatever, Yarvin also gave his solution to reboot the government. As a first step towards the goal, Yarvin advocates for retiring all government employees,

or RAGE, a super chill and not at all scary acronym, and replacing them with what he calls a national CEO. These days, Yarvin is super duper careful not to use the word dictator, but not because he doesn't think we need one, but rather the optics around that word are a tad bit bad. To quote Yarvin, if you're going to have a monarchy, it has to be a monarchy of everyone.

Which when you think about the definition of monarchy for more than a second is a completely nonsense statement. That's like saying you want to have water, but only if it's a dry water. And that's how we get back around to Teal, who as we have mentioned, also seems to think a country should be structured like a corporation,

autocratically from the top down, under a single ruling figure. Whether Yarvin and the new right have influenced Thiel away from his purely libertarian roots, or Thiel has come to these positions on his own, it doesn't really matter. Because either way, both Thiel and Yarvin believe this stuff and Thiel is willing to pour his money

into supporting people and causes that further these beliefs. Like a weird fascist Ouroboros. I don't know what that word means. One of those snakes eating its own tail. Oh, you mean Mr. Gobblebottom. I got one of those on my ankle. So speaking of Teal pouring his money into things,

let's talk about Teal as a political donor. Before 2016, Teiel had dipped his toe into conservative politics, donating around $3 million to Ron Paul's campaign in 2012, and another 2 million to Ted Cruz the same year. But as we've already discussed, Thiel's politics, which mirror much more closely to Yarvin and the new right's beliefs,

were never all that in line with mainstream Republican values. So when everyone's favorite loud boy, Donald J. Trump, came along in 2016, saying and doing things that had previously been considered unsayable and undoable, Thiel saw a chance to finally get out of the stasis of the status quo. And so he jumped on it, donating $1.25 million

to Trump's 2016 campaign and speaking in support of Trump at the Republican National Convention. I'm not a politician, but neither is Donald Trump. He is a builder and it's time to rebuild America. Oh, he's just like a regular guy. I was honestly expecting some kind of like dark mist or something, a guy hooked up to a bunch of tubes maybe. After Trump won,

Thiel was appointed to the president-elect's transition team and Trump reportedly told Thiel he was a very special guy, which is like kind of a weird thing to say to a grown adult, but whatever, it's Trump. That's how he talks. Despite this early strong start to their friendship, things didn't stay quite smooth for long. In 2018, the New York Times quotes Thiel as saying,

"'There are all these ways that things have fallen short,' pointing to his hopes that Trump would, "'End the era of stupid wars, rebuild the country, "'and move us past the culture wars.'" In this sense, Thiel is completely correct in that Trump did not do any of those things. Though why Thiel thought he would do those things in the first place is beyond me.

In 2020, Teal notably and intentionally stayed on the sidelines, avoiding endorsing Trump or making any major political donations at all. Whether he did this because he still had major issues with the way Trump had handled his first term or simply because he thought Trump wasn't going to win is anybody's guess. But regardless, Thiel stayed out

of the 2020 presidential election and thereby avoided having any personal stake in the ensuing debate about whether or not the election was rigged. You know, that debate that's somehow still going on almost two years later. But now, as we approach that two-year mark, Thiel is stepping out of the shadows once more

like the spooky venture capitalist that he is to financially back 16 conservative candidates for the House and Senate in the 2022 midterm elections. Many of these candidates who include J.D. Vance, Blake Masters, Eric Schmidt, Kevin McCarthy, and Ted Internet internet creep Cruz himself have embraced the pervasive lie that Donald J. Trump won the 2020 election.

While Thiel hasn't said publicly what he personally believes about those election results, it doesn't really matter. It should be clear by this point that Trump was just a sweaty tool in the Thiel toolbox, Thiel box, Thiel box, to achieve his own political ends. And these new candidates are more of the same. At a dinner for the Federalist Society last October,

Teal spoke about the deranged society that a completely deranged government had created, alluding to the same themes he references in his 2009 essay. To quote this Teal speech, "'My somewhat apocalyptic, somewhat hopeful thought "'is that we are finally at a point "'where things are breaking.'" Sure, a better writer might have said breaking point

instead of the point at which the breaking begins to be of starting or whatever, doesn't matter. I want to stop on that quote and go all the way back to that Hulk Hogan lawsuit against Gawker. Because if you recall, Peter Thiel wasn't like pals with the Hulkster, famous star of Suburban Commando. I doubt he even cared about this specific case. The sex tape lawsuit could have been brought on

by any cast member from Muppets from Space. Fozzie comes to mind. Also, Fozzie comes. No, what I'm saying is that Peter Thiel's goal there was seemingly to destabilize and ultimately destroy Gawker Media. He probably didn't care how, and it appears that this wouldn't be the only time

Thiel would bankroll a clown-haired orange meat slab for the purposes of collapsing a thing, is it? I have no way of knowing this, but judging from his apocalyptic hopeful thought that things are breaking, it's likely that he supported Donald Trump because he was the candidate most likely to destabilize the current government,

perhaps become the national CEO that would give Thiel an opportunity to implement his rich guy quasi-liarian, neo-feudal goals. Again, just a guess. Legally speaking, I'm not accusing Peter Thiel of subconsciously rooting for the collapse of democracy, nor can I confirm or deny that Fawzi comes, but I'm working on finding that out.

I've heard he calls it his wada wada. There's also a take-whatever-you-can-get element to Thiel's current political strategy. As he himself said, he's not a take whatever you can get element to Thiel's current political strategy. As he himself said, he's not a politician. He also doesn't seem to like politics or big government. He ideally wants to have no democracy, it appears. And so he's bankrolling the people closest to that goal, whether those people are in on the goal or not.

Specifically, he's funding the GOP. Although I have a question about Peter Thiel and the GOP for you to rattle around in your big old noggin. Would Peter Thiel still support a quasi-libertarian, free market society run by a single tech company CEO type if he himself wasn't a very rich tech company CEO type? I'm not saying that Peter Thiel wants to personally be a dictator, but it's pretty funny whenever a super rich tech company CEO type. I'm not saying that Peter Thiel wants to personally be a dictator,

but it's pretty funny whenever a super rich guy comes out in support of a political party that just so happens to be against taxing super rich guys and giving them lots of freedom and prioritizing the free market and capitalism. I have voted overwhelmingly for Democrats historically, overwhelmingly. Like I'm not sure.

I might never have voted for a Republican, just to be clear. Right. Now, this election, I will. The Democrat Party is overly, overly controlled by the unions and by the trial lawyers, particularly the class action lawyers. And generally, if you'll see something that is not in the interest of the people, on the Democrat side, it's going to come because of the unions, which is just another form of monopoly. And the the trial lawyers on the Republican side, if you say like where is something like not not ideal happening, it's because of corporate evil and religious zealotry. That's generally where the bad things will be coming from on the Republican side.

Yeah, you must have known we'd be referencing this dip at some point. As we pointed out in a previous video, Elon Musk was willing to brush off, quote, corporate evil and religious zealotry and vote Republican because the Democrats have unions and class action lawyers, which he hilariously considered the worst option, which probably has to do with the fact

that he's an evil corporate guy, literally fighting against unions and class action lawyers. People like Elon and Teal like to think of themselves as politically or ideologically complex, and yet their leanings always side with the people who will help them make and maintain the most money. They are, in reality, very simple people with bad haircuts who think they are very smart and important

with cool haircuts. But this is also what makes them very dangerous because as Musk is demonstrating, they are willing to overlook acts of evil if the people committing or supporting those acts also support the things that keep them rich. But Peter Thiel isn't just verbally supporting candidates. He's not even just kicking them a few bucks.

What makes Thiel particularly dangerous, at least more so than Mr. Twitter over there, is something we are going to talk about right after these final ads. Cliffhanger, you something we are going to talk about right after these final ads. Cliffhanger, you gotta watch the ads to learn things. We trapped you. Bum, bum, bum. Listen, the testicles are like the dungeon of the body,

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for the best gift of all from Manscaped. Your balls will thank you, because your balls can absolutely speak. You need to listen to them. Listen to your balls. That was your balls. Add over, you're free, but don't go anywhere. So as I mentioned before,

Teal has reportedly spent over $20 million Ad over, you're free, but don't go anywhere. So as I mentioned before, Thiel has reportedly spent over $20 million on the 16 candidates he's supporting, which ties him with Kenneth Griffin, the chief executive of the hedge fund Citadel, as the largest individual Republican donor this cycle. What seems to set Thiel apart from Griffin is that rather than focusing on winning control of Congress, Thiel has chosen to support hard right candidates who,

if they win, could potentially inject Thiel's own ultra-specific political ideology into the mainstream. The two most notable candidates are J.D. Vance, who is running for Senate in Ohio, and Blake Masters, who is running in Arizona. Both men are tech bros from elite universities who, despite those facts, have managed to present themselves as outside and against the establishment,

people for the working family. They've also both literally worked for Peter Thiel himself. Vance worked at one of Thiel's investment funds before opening Naria Capital, which happened to be funded by Peter Thiel. Masters was taught by Thiel at Stanford Law, and the two co-wrote a book together, specifically that book from before

where he praises tech CEOs as feudal lords. In point of fact, Masters was the chief operating officer of Thiel Capital, the Thiel's family office, until he resigned in March 2022 to focus on his campaign. Both Vance and Masters primary campaigns received $10 million donations from Teal followed by an encouraging pat on the rear, probably. Legally speaking, I cannot confirm that Peter Teal

gave Blake Masters a little boop on the rump. Vance, the slightly, slightly less awful of the two candidates has hitched his cart to many of the same new right horses as Thiel, just with the slightly rural, almost empathetic spin that made his book, Hillbilly Elegy, sorta, kinda, maybe interesting to read back when we all thought Trump wasn't going to be

the president of the United States. His campaign is run on the idea that both liberals and conservatives have slowly degraded our values. To quote a speech delivered to the National Conservative Convention in 2021, "'The fundamental lie of American feminism "'of the past 20 or 30 years is that it is liberating "'for women to go work for 90 hours a week

"'in a cubicle at Goldman Sachs.'" Yes, I'm sure venture capitalist J.D. Vance hates Goldman Sachs. But by no means should venture capitalist JD Vance hates Goldman Sachs but by no means should we assume that JD Vance is a centrist. He has spoken up against protecting same sex and interracial marriage rights and stands proudly on the pro forced birth side of history. He has also said the 2020 election was stolen from Trump,

dabbled with great replacement rhetoric and recently called the Charlottesville Nazi march a hoax. What's interesting about that last one, besides the racism, is that at the time, J.D. Vance was very vocally outraged about the Charlottesville march and blamed Trump for his shitty response to it. We have the transcripts of him on CNN recognizing the very not hoax events.

Here he is on video referring to it as a white nationalist terrorist attack. recognizing the very not hoax events. Here he is on video referring to it as a white nationalist terrorist attack. And what worries me about the response to this particular white nationalist terrorist attack, a lot of things worry me. Because more than a Republican, Vance is a man who desperately wants to be in power

and will change his views on a dime, or 100 million dimes, if he thinks it'll help him. I say this because around the 2016 election, Vance seemed much less tied to the GOP. He was vocally against Donald Trump, a contributor on CNN, and even wrote op-ed pieces for the failing New York Times, albeit pieces about how white people aren't religious enough. But then Trump won, and like all wormy little Republicans,

Vance quickly changed his tune on the puffy GOP leader. He also began to veer way to the right. As his best friend from Yale told the Washington Post, the quote, last straw was in 2020 when Hillbilly Elegy was adapted into a terrible film and got blasted by critics. That deserves repeating. JD Vance possibly became further radicalized toward the right because of rotten tomatoes.

Since then, he's quickly adapted the talking points of the new right. Here he is on a podcast with Jack Murphy, pretty much repeating Curtis Yarvin's plan on what to do the next time the far right is in power. I think Trump is gonna run again in 2024. I think he'll probably win again in 2024. And he'll win by a margin such that he will be the president of the United States in January of 2025. I think that what Trump should do, like if I was giving him one piece of advice,

fire every single mid-level bureaucrat, every civil servant in the administrative state, replace them with our people. And when the courts, because you will get taken to court, and then when the courts stop you, stand before the country like Andrew Jackson did and say the chief justice has made his ruling, now let him enforce it. By the way, what he's describing is essentially a coup, like a real one, not a shitty failed one

where people cosplay as Buffalo Bills fans. Vance also often points to Viktor Orban, the authoritarian leader of Hungary, as a positive example for how to deal with liberal cultural ideas. If that doesn't sound extremely bleak, you might want to check in on this Orban guy and what's happening in Hungary.

Or you could watch one of our next episodes, which happens to be about Hungary and Orban's relationship with the GOP. Oh boy, stay tuned. But what I'm getting at with Vance is that being the attention-desperate little nationalist weirdo that he is, it really feels less like he's his own force

so much as an extension of Peter Thiel, who essentially owns him, to the point that his fundraising is now in trouble since Thiel has essentially cut off his spending for Vance. The rumor now is that Papa Pete took the financial training wheels off, expecting his candidates to get through the rest of their campaign without his help.

The hilarious result being that they are struggling to find financial supporters who aren't a single massively rich person. Oh no, what happened to your bootstraps fellas? But don't celebrate just yet because he's super not hurting in the polls right now. Oh boy. The other major candidate Teal has handpicked

is somehow worse. Blake Masters is the perfect hard right ghoul in that he ticks all the silly little boxes. He is massively uncharismatic for one, a real fucking dork. He's against critical race theory, harps on about illegal immigration, wants to allow states to ban abortion contraception, although he's now trying to reverse that image a bit. And of course he is going all out against LGBTQ rights.

Here he is calling Katonji Brown Jackson a pedophile apologist. Here he is simping for famous dumbass and shooter of people, Kyle Rittenhouse. He's a man of the people who wants to introduce new exciting ideas like privatizing social security. He also very clearly floats ideas reflecting the new right, specifically calling out a secret group of extreme leftists that control everything around us. Now, it's true there's a small minority of hardcore Democratic Party activists, ideologues, people who will never vote for common sense.

They exist. They're out there. And you know what? They're loud. You hear so much from these people because they're the ones who control newspapers and television and schools and universities. You better believe they control big tech too. Classic leftist stuff, being in control of anything. Much like JD Vance, he wasn't always like this. Although also much like JD Vance, he's always been an extremely embarrassing attention seeker.

I don't usually give trigger warnings on this show, but what you're about to see is extremely, extremely cringy. So Barack Obama called the waitress a sweetie today. Now the press is having a day. They're getting all mad. They're looking for a fight. I'm reading the news. I'm like, this shit ain't right.

What's going on here? He can't speak the truth. What if she was a sweetie? What if she was cute? It's a sad day in society when one plus two can't equal three. I'm no fan of his policies, but he's not a sexist. Everybody knows this. He's wanted around with Lexus, but it didn't work.

What an idiot. Why would I? I am so sorry about that. Why is he wearing Native American war paint on his face? Hey Blake, you got a terrible rhyme explaining that? How about we talk about the way I look? Everybody knows that's off the hook. I've got the war paint on, as you can see.

Who said what about cultural insensitivity? Oh my God, I didn't actually want to hear a rhyme about that. That was from 2008, long before his political ambitions. Still not great stuff. I mean, I would argue that the longer the internet exists, the more we will see videos like that from political candidates. But the striking thing there, I mean, besides the racism,

is that Blake doesn't sound like a hardcore right winger in that rap. I guess it's technically a rap, right? I can say it was a rap. He even seems to defend Obama for having his words twisted through an outrage machine, which is ironic because that's exactly what he's doing in this recent tweet.

A few years before this, and there's an even larger change in tone, here is a blog post uncovered and verified by Jewish Insider, in which Blake appears to be in favor of open borders, saying, ethically, unrestricted immigration is the only choice. It's all very libertarian in its reasoning.

And it's a very stark juxtaposition from Blake's current border policies listed on his site, which calls for us to finish the wall and triple the size of border patrol. Stark juxtaposition from when Blake posted a video about how he wants to help working families support themselves on one income. And then a YouTuber asked him how he planned to do that. And then he responded literally three months later with his answer, stop illegal immigration.

Great stuff, man of the people. Additionally, old friends describe MC Blake as being very pro-choice. He was, after all, a libertarian. For the record, I'm not saying he was a great or smart guy. Here's a blog post from 2006 about unjust wars where he ends on a quote from a literal Nazi named Hermann Goering that says,

"'The people can always be brought "'to the bidding of the leaders. "'That is easy. "'All you have to do is tell them. "'They are being attacked and denounced the pacifists "'for lack of patriotism "'and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country. You might notice that the quote itself isn't terrible,

but you know, maybe don't quote a Nazi. But also, I want you to remember that quote, specifically how you can get anyone behind a war if you quote, denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. So what happened to this young libertarian rap star? Well, in 2012, Blake Masters took a class on startups that was taught by none other than Peter Thiel. We know this because Blake actually posted his personal notes on the class online. Blake would then leave school and immediately begin to work for Thiel. And as we noted, the two ended up writing a book together and Blake eventually ran Thiel Capital.

He's clearly Thiel's golden boy and has been heavily bankrolled by him, handpicked for politics and personally groomed for the job. During Trump's campaign, Blake and Thiel were both enamored by the idea that you could cast off establishment Republicans as easily as Trump did. Blake was apparently frustrated

with Obama winning over Mitt Romney and felt that the GOP wasn't going hard enough. And I believe that somewhere around this time, Blake and Teal decided that they too could hijack the party the way Trump did, so long as they played the game. This is complete speculation, but I don't think Blake Masters actually changed a whole lot

from his libertarian roots and is simply trying to say the right things to court the right base. Remember that Nazi quote from like a minute ago, the one about denouncing the pacifists for lack of patriotism in order to sell a war, the one he posted on his own blog? Well, I have a recent quote here from Blake Masters that I want you to see with your eyeballs or any balls.

If you're not using any political power to shore up, you know, a good society that follows the rule of law and actually respects the individual liberties that you care about, you will just get, you'll get rolled. You know, it's like a pacifist and okay, you can recite an eloquent poem about pacifism right before they line you up against the wall and shoot you, right? You can recite an eloquent poem about pacifism right before they line you up against the wall and shoot you, said Blake Masters.

In other words, he's doing the thing, right? The thing the Nazis said you can do. He's denouncing pacifists for a lack of patriotism. If you're not using any political power to shore up a good society that follows the rule of law, you'll get rolled, he also says. Classic libertarian stuff, the rule of law. Seems more innocuous, of course,

but the question there is what he defines as good and who he is pretending is going to line people up and shoot them. This is a short-barreled rifle. It wasn't designed for hunting. This is designed to kill people. But if you're not a bad guy, I support your right to own one. The Second Amendment is not about duck hunting. It's about protecting your family and your country.

What's the first thing the Taliban did when Joe Biden handed them Afghanistan? They took away people's guns. That's how it works. I'm Blake Masters. I'm running for the U.S. Senate in Arizona. And I approve this message. Really seems like Blake Masters is now selling a war. A war against liberals and women and immigrants

for the ultimate purpose of putting himself in the highest position of power and then reshaping the country in a fundamental way. I think Blake Masters and Peter Thiel, and to a lesser extent, J.D. Vance, all looked at Trump as this disruptive force capable of changing the way the government works, only to be disappointed when Trump didn't change anything. You know, because Trump was actually just a weird, lazy grifter who didn't want the job. And now, it seems like they themselves are hoping to be the change they saw in Trump. They are doing this through the Republican Party because of how incredibly weakened

and susceptible they've become, not to mention the party of supposed small government. But I don't think they see themselves as Republicans. After all, Peter Thiel is a gay man putting his weight behind a party that wants him to have less rights. I mean, to be fair, a lot of the GOP and politicians in general are just pandering to their base.

You could argue a lot of Republicans don't actually care about the moralizing they do in order to stay in power and help their rich friends. But in their rich friend Teal's case, like most tech bros, they're disruptophiliacs. And I think they likely see themselves as a true disruptive force that will bring down and rebuild democracy in a way they see fit,

or rather the way Teal sees fit, so like not a democracy. And Teal is certainly gearing up for disruption in a major way. In February, he announced that he would be stepping down from META's board where he's served since 2005, in order to focus more seriously on the upcoming November midterms. According to the New York Times,

a person with knowledge of Mr. Thiel's thinking said Thiel sees the midterms as crucial to changing the direction of the country. I know this all makes Teal seem like some kind of mastermind, so I do want to reiterate that my belief is that deep in his heart, Peter Teal is just a rich guy who wants to stay rich. After all, more than half of Palantir's revenue

comes from government clients, which gives Teal a built-in vested interest to care about what's going on in the government, even if everything else turns out to be meaningless. He also has vested interest in controlling federal tax policy. In 2021, Democrats in Congress proposed a bill that would force Thiel and other wealthy people

using Roth IRAs to pay huge tax bills if they ever withdraw their money. So that too would motivate him to care about politics. For him, it's win-win, even if the government doesn't topple and get rebuilt with some kind of tech bro fascist. He's also funding The Right Stuff, a dating app made specifically for conservatives living in major metropolitan areas,

which isn't so much relevant to anything else we were talking about, but does seem like proof that he's not a mastermind. For my ladies, you'll never have to pay because we all get premium subscriptions for simply inviting a couple friends. Gentlemen, if you want access to premium, that's on you. And by the way, those are the only two options, ladies and gentlemen. The Right Stuff is all about getting into the right dating pool with people who share the same values and beliefs as you.

You'll start off by building your perfect profile. No pronouns necessary. Oof. You know it's a good dating app when their ad complains about trans people existing twice in a 20-second period. The point is that for Teal, he definitely has political ideals

and those ideals clearly align with him being and staying rich. And I think ultimately he'll accept any situation that does that for him. Be it a libertarian space city or America the sequel, or just like Mitch McConnell giving him tax breaks, America the squeakquel. He doesn't really care, I reckon.

And yet that's also where the danger comes from. Because like Elon Musk and historically capitalists in general, I think Peter Thiel is willing to usher in straight up fascism in order to stay rich. Because rich people, at least most of them, don't care how badly they destroy the world when they can always

buy their way out of it. And in Thiel's case, he isn't just passively standing back anymore, but making a deliberate effort to change our government. And that would maybe be fine if he was like, good, I'm not against revolution when it's called for, see Iran right now. But what we're describing here isn't a push for positive change.

Not even if you're a libertarian watching this. After all, if you have to force libertarianism through the government mandating it on the people, isn't that not libertarianism? And considering how rock hard they are for the idea of a techno-monarchy, I super don't think these guys actually want a truly free country.

At best, they want 2 billion acres worth of a Facebook campus. At worst, they want a fucking fascist regime. Hopefully, neither of them are charismatic enough to get what they want. This might fizzle out even if they win the midterms, which they just might do. And just, you know, maybe they'll become boring,

weirdo Republican politicians getting into Twitter fights about pronouns. But just in case, maybe don't vote for these guys. You know, if you live in the States they're running, don't vote for them. Draw a little dick next to their name or a vulva or like the person they're running against name. So they win instead.

They need to fail is the point. And perhaps if they do, we can coax them into the sea to finally build the impractical floating city in which they truly belong. Because shoot, I'd check that out. I'd go to their half-assed sea quest world and like gamble. I'll cuck the shit out of that sea quest. Just like I'll cuck the vote.

And so should you. If not for me, do it for Ben Affleck. There's no post-credits joke in this one. Maybe I'm tired. I don't know, but. Ben Affco, I don't know. Oh, fucking. Wormbo, you got anything? Well, actually, no.

All right. Wow, Wormbo, thanks for another segment of Fast Jamming the News, where he fucks the news. Make sure to like and subscribe this video and channel, subscribe to the channel, like the video. We got merch at a merch store. We got a patreon.com slash some more news. We have a podcast called Even More News

and this show that you just watched and listened to as a podcast that you can only listen to and not watch. And there are more things out there in the world. So go get them on holiday. There's nothing like doing nothing as an Expedia member. You can save up to 30% when you add a hotel to your flight. So you can go out there with great ambition to do absolutely nothing. As an Expedia member, you can save up to 30% when you add a hotel to your flight, so you can go out there with great ambition to do absolutely nothing for less. Expedia. Made to travel.