silicon valley investor and polarizing figure peter thiel on monday explained his support of republican presidential candidate donald trump. mr. thiel, the billionaire and co-founder of paypal and founder of venture-capital firm founders fund, two weeks ago revealed plans to donate $1.25 million to mr. trump<u+2019>s campaign. the move came after the republican candidate<u+2019>s vulgar remarks about women from 2005 emerged and caused many women to come forward with allegations of unwanted sexual advances. <u+201c>i don<u+2019>t agree with donald trump<u+2019>s comments about women,<u+201d> mr. thiel said. <u+201c>they were clearly offensive and inappropriate.<u+201d> mr. thiel<u+2019>s remarks came at a speech and conversation sit-down at the national press club, in washington. he spoke at length about how he views the u.s.<u+2019>s policies as broken. he said years of bad policy choices under previous presidential administrations led to such financial problems as the burst of the dot-com era internet bubble and the housing collapse. <u+201c>the truth is, no matter how crazy this election seems it is less crazy than the condition of our country,<u+201d> he said. mr. thiel said that u.s. debt is out of control and that the nation is involved in five wars, which he sees as problematic. most americans, he said, are financially worse off than their parents, and are saddled with student-loan debt and weak retirement savings. mr. thiel said that both leading presidential candidates are flawed but that he prefers to back the outsider less inclined to take the normal washington path. he said that america<u+2019>s free-trade policy hasn<u+2019>t worked and that the country has also lost <u+201c>tens of thousands<u+201d> of jobs in the heartland of the country <u+201c>i think it<u+2019>s because of the big things that trump gets right.<u+201d> write to scott martin at scott.martin@wsj.com
thiel: donald trump gets <u+2018>big things<u+2019> right - wsj
scott martin