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How the Tech Billionaires Bought Radical Journalists

On this episode of The Time of Monsters, I talk to Eoin Higgins about how rich tech weirdos co-opted huge chunks of the media.

Jeet Heer

July 21, 2025

Peter Thiel(Nordin Catic / Getty Images for The Cambridge Union)

The Time of Monsters with Jeet Heer

The Time of Monsters podcast features Nation national-affairs correspondent Jeet Heer’s signature blend of political culture and cultural politics. Each week, he’ll host in-depth conversations with urgent voices on the most pressing issues of our time.

How the Tech Billionaires Bought Radical Journalists w/ Eoin Higgins
byThe Nation Company LLC

Tech lords such as Peter Thiel and Elon Musk are among the richest humans who have ever

lived and have an enormous sway over the American political system but even that isn’t enough

for them. They also want a compliant media, one that echoes their ideas, doesn’t investigate

their business practices, and goes after their enemy. This is the subject of a new book by Eoin

Higgins: Owned: How Tech Billionaires on the Right Bought the Loudest Voices on the Left. I

talked to Eoin about two of the major figures in this story, Peter Thiel, a plutocrat who is eager

to abandon the human species and Matt Taibbi, a onetime anti-establishment voice who now

has become a standard reactionary.

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Tech lords such as Peter Thiel and Elon Musk are among the richest humans who have ever lived and have an enormous sway over the American political system, but even that isn’t enough for them. They also want a compliant media, one that echoes their ideas, doesn’t investigate their business practices, and goes after their enemy.

This is the subject of a new book by Eoin Higgins: Owned: How Tech Billionaires on the Right Bought the Loudest Voices on the Left. I talked to Eoin about two of the major figures in this story: Peter Thiel, a plutocrat who is eager to abandon the human species, and Matt Taibbi, a onetime anti-establishment voice who has now become a standard reactionary.

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Europe is Gutting Its Tech Regulations w/ Aline Blankertz | Tech Won’t Save Us
byThe Nation Magazine

Paris Marx is joined by Aline Blankertz to discuss how right-wing governments and international corporations in the European Union are pushing to gut tech regulations with the goal of boosting AI development in hope of improving economic growth and geopolitical standing.

Aline Blankertz is a cofounder of Structural Integrity.

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Jeet HeerTwitterJeet Heer is a national affairs correspondent for The Nation and host of the weekly Nation podcast, The Time of Monsters. He also pens the monthly column “Morbid Symptoms.” The author of In Love with Art: Francoise Mouly’s Adventures in Comics with Art Spiegelman (2013) and Sweet Lechery: Reviews, Essays and Profiles (2014), Heer has written for numerous publications, including The New Yorker, The Paris Review, Virginia Quarterly Review, The American Prospect, The GuardianThe New Republic, and The Boston Globe.


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