I don't understand how a gay man can support a political party who's platform wants to reverse marriage equality.
Just because he's gay doesn't mean he supports marriage equality. Given Thiel's political views I would guess that he thinks that the government shouldn't care about _anyone's_ marriage, gay or straight. So rather than fight for marriage equality for gay couples he'd fight for marriage deregulation for everyone, including straight couples (e.g. no special tax treatment, no special legal protections for spouses).
Peter Thiel To Join Trump Transition Team
611–620 of 1001 posts
Re: Peter Thiel To Join Trump Transition Team
#612Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why exactly am I meant to be comforted by the fact that the craven opportunists --- the lowest of the low of the Republican party, discredited outsiders like Newt Gingrich and John Bolton --- are getting the most important positions in the United States government for kowtowing to Trump? There are important thinkers in the Republican Party. People with ideas and a moral core, people who have given years of service to…
> Why exactly am I meant to be comforted by the fact that the craven opportunists --- the lowest of the low of the Republican party [...] are getting the most important positions in the United States government for kowtowing to Trump? Twenty-three days ago you and Marco sought to get Peter Thiel removed from YC for his support of Trump[1]. This is to say you were explicitly working to ensure that respectable people w…
The respectable Republicans distanced themselves from Trump
But that shouldn't really matter, as both sides know it was all about posturing and publicity. Just like Trump is (hopefully?) going to be a much more reasonable president than his campaign antics would lead you to believe, so he can work with the respectable Republicans in a much better way than their campaign behaviour would you lead to believe. Twenty-three days ago [..]
And one year ago Trump suggested the plurality vote should determine the presidency, in which case he would have lost.Neither he nor his supporters will agree to that now, nor will he acknowledge he was wrong. And there will be no consequences.
Most people only have eye for short term problems, don't have a good memory or good associative capabilities and don't think beyond the outcome they hope for.
Even if you are aware of longer term problems, consequences and have a good memory, you may still choose to pursue short term goals in your opinion-making, because those listening to you want you to address their immediate concerns. You don't need to worry about contradicting yourself or causing new problems: they won't notice.
So congratulations on remembering that an action/proposal/opinion of 23 days ago opposes one now. Did you also realize back then what the consequences in face of an adverse outcome would be? That would be an extreme ability of foresight. And unfortunately it doesn't make a lick of difference.
Re: Peter Thiel To Join Trump Transition Team
#613A huge issue today is the lack of calm, reasoned debate. As a Trump supporter I have never been able to properly explain the rationale to a liberal. I believe there is a worthy debate beneath all the political smear, but it is never reached. I believe the reason for this is the liberal media and the incredibly effective Democratic party election machine. The argument stays at the high level of "how could you vote for…
Would you be willing to articulate your argument for Trump here? I promise not to argue against you, and certainly not to slur you. Can't speak for anyone else, though. We now HAVE Trump coming in as US president, so frankly I'd welcome a bit of hope that he might be good. I can't promise to agree with you, but I'm very willing to listen to arguments from those who hold opposing positions to mine.
Please argue! And thank you for not slurring :)
> Would you be willing to articulate your argument for Trump here?
I supported Obama. I always considered myself a liberal. I support gay marriage, I support gun control. I support universal health care. I support decent welfare and a safety net.
As a programmer, the formative moment for my Trump support came when a prolific open-source developer was forced to leave the community because he would not accept a trivial change to the documentation to change gendered pro-nouns to non-gendered pro-nouns. His reason was he didn't want to mess up the revision history with a trivial change like that. And he was from South America where nouns are all gendered anyway. But one of the big companies came out and said that "they would have fired him". http://www.dailydot.com/news/github-gendered-pronoun-debate/
This was non-sensical to me, and was bullying. But I soon realised that this overly sensitive behaviour had pervaded all walks of life and all aspects of society and I soon discovered the cliched political correctness run wild with third-wave feminist bloggers, social justice, Black Lives Matter protesting of clearly non-racially motivated attacks, and that was it.
Its ironic that my biggest reason for voting Trump is to stop the bullying from the left - who are protesting against...bullying (sexism, misogyny, racism).
One side is for freedom of speech, the other side is for controlling what you can say.
One side thinks controlling what you can say will be abused and unfairly target people, the other side thinks that freedom of speech is a means of control by the entitled.
There's a calm, complex, and nuanced debate to be had here to find a middle ground.
But unfortunately there is no Liberal ready to accept that this is the debate that needs to be had.
The alt-right, the new right, the Trump supporters - we are ready and waiting to have this debate...
Re: Peter Thiel To Join Trump Transition Team
#614A huge issue today is the lack of calm, reasoned debate. As a Trump supporter I have never been able to properly explain the rationale to a liberal. I believe there is a worthy debate beneath all the political smear, but it is never reached. I believe the reason for this is the liberal media and the incredibly effective Democratic party election machine. The argument stays at the high level of "how could you vote for…
I'm curious: > I have never been able to properly explain the rationale to a liberal Have you ever had explained the liberal rationale to you and did you understand it? I'm wondering if it works one way, or everyone struggles to understand the other. Thanks.
My Medium daily update newsletter is full of feminist, progressive, black lives matter articles. I read all of them. I read all the comments on Reddit, and on HN.
Everything is labelled as racism and misogynistic and full of vitriol. There is no priority on sound and valid argument. Its all about feelings.
Maybe I live in a filter bubble, but I would love to find a good example of a liberal having a rationale debate with a Trump supporter about political correctness, black lives matter, etc, that doesn't revolve around something being inherently "racist" or simply ad-hominem attacks. I cannot find anything like this.
Re: Peter Thiel To Join Trump Transition Team
#615This was obvious from the RNC speech and further reinforced when Thiel donated $1M to Trump. A contrarian bet, sure, but $1M is a pretty small price to pay to have a 50/50 shot at CTO of the USA. I'm sure he'll see a very significant ROI on his $1M once the government starts awarding contracts very conveniently to companies of which he owns a portion. I had very negative feelings about Thiel, and those were magnified…
> I'm sure he'll see a very significant ROI on his $1M once the government starts awarding contracts very conveniently to companies of which he owns a portion. Wasn't Trump rallying against such crony corruption aka 'pay for play'?
Re: Peter Thiel To Join Trump Transition Team
#616Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Thankfully, freedom of speech is such an integral part of the US, that there is not one side trying to control what the other can say, and the other doing the same back. Sure, you and Donald Trump can say whatever you please. Nobody's restricting your freedom of speech. However, what you say betrays who you are. And what Trump said showed he's a liar, misogynist, tech illiterate, arrogant and overall a disgusting h…
> The argument stays at the high level of "how could you vote for someone who said that", "he is a monster", etc. It is "I don't want to listen". >> And what Trump said showed he's a liar, misogynist, tech illiterate, arrogant and overall a disgusting human being. And Clinton is not a liar, not a tech illiterate, not arrogant, and not disgusting human being? On misogyny - she has never attacked a woman's character be…
Re: Peter Thiel To Join Trump Transition Team
#617Earlier quoted context omitted.
My issue with Trump has never really been about his politics. I get that immigration and loss of manufacturing jobs due to globalization are serious concerns for a large swath of the American population. What I don't understand is how anyone could feel comfortable with him as commander in chief, or as the US's representative in the international community. Perhaps that's not what most people are concerned about, but…
> how anyone could feel comfortable with him as commander in chief I understand what you are saying here. He struggles to speak eloquently, and does not have a statesman-like persona. He is no traditional president. But look at the last 15 years of foreign policy from "statesmen". We had two wars, Obama missed seeing the rise of ISIS, Syria is a humanitarian nightmare, we had a huge financial crash, and terrorism is…
> But look at the last 15 years of foreign policy from "statesmen". We had two wars, Obama missed seeing the rise of ISIS, Syria is a humanitarian nightmare, we had a huge financial crash, and terrorism is on the rise.
So is your argument that "statesmen" have failed to avoid crisis, therefore someone who is not a "statesman" will be able to better avoid crisis?
Would it be fair then to say that because doctors have failed to cure patients, that we should stop having doctors treat the sick? Or that because people with drivers licenses have crashed cars, that we should allow people without them to drive cars?
Re: Peter Thiel To Join Trump Transition Team
#618Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I'm sure he'll see a very significant ROI on his $1M once the government starts awarding contracts very conveniently to companies of which he owns a portion. Wasn't Trump rallying against such crony corruption aka 'pay for play'?
If we believe all the recently headlines about who he's bringing in it appears pure "pay to play". Lots of individuals who Trump "owes" through either money or support they provided to him; pure cronyism. I'm not sure Trump realizes what worked best in business, or what he felt worked best for him in what business he has done, is not necessarily best for operating policy. I'm not sure he cares. I suspect he might tho…
I bet part of that was an emotion completely absent from Trump's public persona: shame.
Trump started his political career circa 2010 as a "birther" -- going on national TV, asking for Obama's birth certificate, saying he was born in Kenya and therefore ineligible to hold office. Really racist, bottom-of-the-barrel tabloid stuff.
--
Obama was incredibly gracious the day after the election. Here he is, talking about how he's "rooting" for Trump to do well, how Trump's success as President will be the nation's success:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wr2USTE3L98
Meeting after all that must have been at least a little bit embarrassing. Even for the Donald.
Re: Peter Thiel To Join Trump Transition Team
#619Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is some kind of creepy Randian thinking. The idea that playing developer-type leverage games make you "free" is a laughable fiction. Trump always called himself the King of Debt, and he owes many people, bigly. The banks were betting on Hillary because familiarity breeds contempt--they had already lost billions lending to him since the 80s. Just like the Trump Foundation, he hasn't put anything except his gold-p…
> We just elected President the world's poorest billionaire, so you can bet everything will be for sale. I have the feeling that Trump will be a worse copy of Berlusconi. Both have a fetish for young girls (Trump even said he 'd date his daughter, if she weren't related to him), both are extremely focused on PR, both do not really like politics based on facts, Berlusconi abused and manipulated the Italian court syste…
What's wrong with being attracted to young women (his daughter is no longer a "girl" in any sense of the word)?
Re: Peter Thiel To Join Trump Transition Team
#620Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm curious: > I have never been able to properly explain the rationale to a liberal Have you ever had explained the liberal rationale to you and did you understand it? I'm wondering if it works one way, or everyone struggles to understand the other. Thanks.
> Have you ever had explained the liberal rationale to you and did you understand it? My Medium daily update newsletter is full of feminist, progressive, black lives matter articles. I read all of them. I read all the comments on Reddit, and on HN. Everything is labelled as racism and misogynistic and full of vitriol. There is no priority on sound and valid argument. Its all about feelings. Maybe I live in a filter b…