Peter Thiel is the quintessential CL: a tech billionaire who thinks the fate of mankind revolves around geniuses like himself, and who consequently thinks he should be completely free of any annoying government meddling in his business. And yet, Thiel is aggressively supporting two candidates–Vance and Masters–who are running as reactionary, business-skeptical populists. On its face, it makes no sense. What is going on here?
My best guess is that Thiel sees the reactionaries (including Trump, of course) as a force that will destroy the constraints of liberal democracy and the rule of law and leave unfettered freedom and power to people like him. In other words, instead of a Marxist dictatorship of the proletariat, he is looking forward to the dictatorship of the tech billionaire.
As the saying goes, Marx turned Hegel on his head. Thiel wants to turn Marx on his head.