[Peter] Thiel did touch on the private sector, touting his native Silicon Valley as an example of a properly functioning community:

“Where I work in Silicon Valley, it’s hard to see where America has gone wrong…

“We don’t accept… incompetence in Silicon Valley, and we must not accept it from our government.”

Of course, even the briefest survey of Silicon Valley reveals a culture that is rife with incompetence, where the basic rules you’d follow running a lemonade stand — taking in more than you spend, for example, or adhering to basic quality standards — are discarded in favor of explosive growth and runaway valuations…

Thiel neglected to mention that Silicon Valley is also in the midst of a serious slowdown, where the bubble inflated by venture capital firms like his own Founders Fund — not Wall Street — shows sign of popping, or at least deflating.

—Sam Biddle
Peter Thiel: I Miss the Days of Strong, Daring Federal Spending