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AI prophet with $900 million in government contracts explains to the Vatican where it all went wrong
He tells the Vatican surveillance is dangerous. His company does $900M of it.
The tech prophet has arrived on schedule. Bags carried, NDAs signed, audience seated a stoneβs throw from the tomb of St. Peter. Peter Thiel, co-founder of PayPal and Palantir: wealthy, self-assured, $900 million in government contracts. Welcome.
The story always works, because it always has. The most dangerous force in the world, he says, is a government that uses existential fear to justify control. The room nods. Nobody asks what his company does with the Medicaid records of 80 million Americans, because nobody in that room has anything to worry about. The system handles that on its own.
Palantirβs ELITE tool generated daily arrest quotas. Eight people per team per day. A federal judge ruled the operations unconstitutional. The families being torn apart were not in the room, because they never signed an NDA. Nobody asked their consent for anything at all. Not an oversight. By design.
The Catholic universities distanced themselves the moment the press called. One press release. The popeβs AI advisor published an essay titled: βShould Peter Thiel be burned at the stake?β He meant it philosophically. Safer that way.
The system holds together on every side at once, and thatβs exactly what makes it beautiful. Thiel is right that centralized surveillance is dangerous. His surveillance company grows accordingly. His friends are in the White House. His tools run across four federal agencies. The prophet and the factory are the same body, and the body is doing just fine.
No contradiction here. A man who warns about the dangers of unchecked power while building and selling its infrastructure doesnβt have an inconsistent vision. He has a business model with a theological wrapper. The wrapper attracts academics and journalists. The model attracts government contracts. Both keep growing.
Tourists walk past St. Peterβs Square in Rome. In a database in Denver, someoneβs address is being calculated from their Medicaid number. Confidence score high enough. Alert sent. The ICE agent is on his way.