Peter Thiel's New Man in the Defense Department
&gt; Thiel has made a variety of enemies in the tech world and beyond; for example, he has slammed Google as being too accommodating to China.<p>You can tell the smart guys from the smart-sounding ones by looking closely at how good of an understanding of the real world they have, measured by how many true non-obvious predictions they make.<p>Paul Graham, Nassim Nicholas Taleb and Peter Thiel score high. To grow ones understanding of the world one must be open, look closely, <i>read</i> those interviews and books, form your own opinion, without prejudice or partisan filters.