The Oddity Of The Super-Rich

Understanding Peter Thiel’s Politics:

...But while it’d be easy, and not incorrect, to cast him in the role of a latter-day Charles Foster Kane —  la Frank VanderSloot, the Republican donor who’s offered to fund any lawsuits against Mother Jones — Peter Thiel is more interesting than your run-of-the-mill rich guy. Some of his eccentricities, like his plan to live forever, are to be expected from a high-powered tech entrepreneur. But he’s known for odd politics as well: He’s a big Republican donor in a Valley dominated by Democrats. Though a self-described libertarian, he’s advocated for monopoly and argued that companies should be structured like monarchies. He’s funded idiosyncratic “political” initiatives, such as the Seasteading Institute’s project to create floating libertarian city-states. Famously, in a 2009 essay for Cato Unbound, he declared that he “no longer believe[s] that capitalism and democracy are compatible.” (Thiel has since said that he was wrong to think America was a democracy, calling it instead a “state dominated by very unelected, technocratic agencies”)...