February 18, 2025 - 8:30pm
Palantir CEO Alex Karp has warned that the Democratic Party is “committing suicide” over its refusal to engage with “real-world concerns”.
In a recent interview with CNBC, the outspoken CEO argued that the party’s unwillingness to acknowledge fundamental issues — such as border security and national defence — mirrors a broader crisis of legitimacy across Western institutions. “The Democratic Party is committing suicide,” Karp said. “It’s because we’re not allowed to admit the truth. We literally have to say that anything ever uttered by the opposition must be wrong, including fundamental things like national security and border control. This self-imposed blindness is leading to collapse.”
Karp, a self-described political progressive, has frequently criticised both sides of the political spectrum but insists that the Left’s focus on trivial issues has made it increasingly irrelevant. Referring to DOGE’s efforts to cut fraud, waste and abuse from the federal government, Karp claimed that the Left’s criticisms of Elon Musk were “yet another example of the progressive Left boxing themselves into a suicide dance”. Karp went on to describe Musk as “the most important builder in the world” and called on the Left to let “the most qualified person in the world” perform his duties.
The Palantir CEO also weighed in on the X owner’s growing involvement in global politics, particularly Musk’s engagement with Right-wing movements in Europe. While he refrained from endorsing Musk’s positions, Karp suggested that the real issue is the failure of traditional institutions to adapt to rapid technological change. “We are in a software-defined world,” he said. “And the nation that leads in software is the USA. If you don’t get on board with this reality, you are going to be washed away.”
According to Karp, political and institutional leaders who ignore these shifts are losing relevance. “The pendulum isn’t going to swing back,” he said. “People think things will return to ‘normal,’ but they don’t understand that the train is leaving the station. If you’re not on board, you’re getting left behind.”
These comments reflect his broader belief that Western societies must embrace a results-driven approach rather than one dominated by ideological purity. He cited Germany, where federal elections are taking place on 23 February, as one example. “In Germany, if you even bring up migration, you’re labelled a bigot,” the billionaire businessman said. “This means that policy is dictated by a tiny faction that refuses to engage with reality. The result? Crime rates spike, terror attacks happen weekly, and yet the political class focuses all of its energy on condemning the far-Right rather than addressing the underlying issues.”
Karp suggested that this dynamic is driving ordinary Germans toward the Right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, despite its controversial reputation. “I know so many Germans who never would have considered voting for AfD four weeks ago,” he said. “Now they’re saying, ‘Screw it, I’m voting for them.’”
He emphasised that this shift is not due to ideological alignment but rather frustration with a political system that suppresses debate. “You’re not allowed to say, ‘This isn’t working,’” Karp explained. “And when people aren’t allowed to speak, they turn to whoever will listen.”
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SubscribeGermany perhaps, but he’s very much describing the UK.
I suspect this week’s meeting between the commissars of Europe, post-Vance speech and with the Ukraine talks starting in Saudi will just be a re-inforcing of their diminishing world view, and no lessons being learnt. Today’s Unherd article suggests as much. Have we ever had such dim-witted ‘leadership’?
All eyes next on the German elections, and their aftermath.
In the US (the main focus of this essay) the Dems are completely dumbfounded. They really don’t seem to be able to ‘get it’, hence their silence but at least Karp is trying to wake them up. If you consider yourself Woke though, how can you possibly awaken?
All the Left and Establishment Parties bought into the comprehensive UN Sustainability Agenda. Sunk cost. Pretty hard to back out now even if they wanted to.
Germany is lucky to have the AfD, just as the UK will be lucky to have Reform, because otherwise the concerns of the electorate will not be heard and discussed.
A democracy where some debates are ‘forbidden’ is not a true democracy.
The political cost of the ‘Conservative’ parties paralysis and avoidance of truth and reality will be the same as it was in Weimar Germany – the coming to power of a violent and malevolent leader offering ‘renewal’.
In practical terms. Germans, vote AFD or you will soon get far worse.
There might be some psychological stuff happening with ‘The Left’, I’ve begun to think…….
You are literally in a cult, fella. The psychological stuff is all going on in your head!
Pot kettle me thinks
You are literally, in a literal cult, fella. Try drinking less Prosecco – you might think a bit more clearly.
Be quiet cypher.
The urge to control is a psychological and emotional flaw in many humans. The rest is just madness.
Sunk costs, someone else mentioned
As a wise man from round my way once put : “We all want progress, but if you’re on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the right road; in that case, the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive.” C. S. Lewis
The Left believes in Utopia writ large and fabricates whatever ideology it needs to get there. However, nothing that they propose is practical or constructive or addresses fundamental needs of the population. They are in effect fantasy-makers…even formulating their own religion (Wokeism) an language (pronouns etc). Which is why they expect everyone to goose-step to their vision, otherwise their utopian bubble pops, which is why they can be observed nowadays ranting and raving about all the Trumpian changes taking place. They are literally losing it.
Just another creepy tech bro with a god complex- of course you guys love him!
Obviously everything he says is utter garbage. For example, Biden took really strong measures on border security last year – he seems to have missed that, as did the drooling Fox News viewers.
No-one is labelled a bigot for bringing up migration. We call you bigots when you say bigoted things about migrants. There’s always a conversation to be had, just try not to be blatantly racist.
But we are in a post-truth age, for now anyway, so the people with the loudest voices are able to convince the simple minded that up is down and white is black and that the likes of Trump and Musk actually care about anything other than themselves. Sad.
If I didn’t know better I would take this as irony.
You don’t know better, chum. I mean, you people think Donald Trump is smart! How dumb is that?!?!
All you achieve on here is to further push people to those you appear to hate. You are a loser running a losing strategy. Are you really a false-flag troll? Surely nobody can actually be as horrible, irrelevant, frequently wrong and contradicted deliberately could they? Are you the actual village idiot in real life?
Surely LW ”progressives” loved tech bros up until about 5 minutes ago
”bigoted things about migrants” = it’s possible for immigration levels to be too high, and illegal immigrants have no automatic right to be in the country
“Surely LW ”progressives” loved tech bros up until about 5 minutes ago”
Um, surely not. Peter Thiel, the super creepy Blake Masters, this weirdo Karp, Musk obviously. All creeps. Looks like Zuckerberg and the Amazon guy have gone from just being oddballs to part of the Trump fan club so, no, the left does not love the tech bros, bro.
And of course they all think that Trump is a complete buffoon but they know they can easily manipulate him for their plans for world domination or whatever it is that they want. They are the modern equivalent of press barons and hopefully will go away very soon, although I fear not…
Oh, no, here we go again, CS …..
What’s up Sammy? You having another one of your episodes?
TDS is a brutal disease.
No doubt RFK jnr, Joe Rogan and Aaron Rodgers will have a cure for it in no time. Something usually used for treating pig bladder infections or the like no doubt!
Wow. Well said, sir. And I definitely agree with the far-seeing Palantir CEO Alex Karp. Sunlight is the best disinfectant, and people must be allowed to speak their thoughts aloud. We can have no ideological purity tests. Wounds hidden from the fresh air and sun fester.
Wow. Well said, sir. And I definitely agree with the far-seeing Palantir CEO Alex Karp. Sunlight is the best disinfectant, and people must be allowed to speak their thoughts aloud. We can have no ideological purity tests. Wounds hidden from the fresh air and sun fester.
The political left’s focus on issues like identity politics over fundamentals like security is both trivial and not trivial. Don’t lose sight of the fact that the end game of all this ridiculousness is control and money.
What DOGE has exposed is what many of us who worked in the public sector have seen with our own eyes, its a grift for votes and cash. Money is funnelled to ideologically aligned causes through organisations which heavily reward their leadership and as a quid pro quo support the people sending them the money.
This trend actually reflects the post-economic identity of the Left that we see in today’s Labour government as they go about enthusiastically wrecking the British economy. They don’t have ideas, just the usual patrons – the unions, the public sector – entailing that they can be just a much if not more loyal to identity groups upon which they focus in their overwhelming if not predominant focus on cultural politics. The social takes massive emphasis over the economic then, and as modern day Maoists they actually view the cultural as the path to socialism, with new figures of the revolutionary proletariat, such as the non-binary transperson and the intersectional post-colonial subject.
It’s remarkable to watch Democrats argue for things they vociferously hated 15-20 years ago, all the while being completely oblivious to the fact that their heads have been turned 180 degrees.
“You’re not allowed to say, ‘This isn’t working,’” Karp explained. “And when people aren’t allowed to speak, they turn to whoever will listen.”
Read and heed. When liberalism enforces conformity, it is no longer liberal.
Left? What is this ‘left’ today? Just corporate and ngo globalism underwritten by taxpayers with dragqueens and double mastectomies for confused teenage girls added. The working class do not obtain.
Which is basically what Vance said at the Munich conference.
He’s right. But hush… don’t interrupt the enemy when it’s making a mistake.
Labour was in part established to enhance the position of blue-collar industrial workers, at the time organized by strong manual and craft trade unions…with a light top-dressing of idealistic upper class Fabians. In consequence it represented a very large proportion of the people as a whole, cared about all of them and greatly enhanced their material and social well-being.
However, those industries and unions are long gone…so it’s union paymasters are now solely the idle, greedy and feather-bedded payroll vote of overwhelmingly taxpayer funded bureaucrats…and the only “welfare” the state now offers is to it’s own employees…from the train-drivers to the endless roster of civil-service, local government and NHS employees. Mostly (not actually) “working from home” or signed-off with “work-related stress”…as in, being expected to do some.
As anyone honest who ever worked in one of those organizations knows perfectly well. Even if they tried to earn their money…which some of us did.
The Dems, in their present form, can only govern and exist if they have a sizeable majority. And then they suck, look at the blue states, especially California. They are masters of ruling through threats, graft, and propaganda. They have the Propaganda sites, er Media, the Federal, State, and local bureaucrats bending the knee for goodies and advancements, and the Uni’s popping out indoctrinated zealots ready to work for these governments, their NGO’s or in politics.
They still have the propaganda sites, whose credibility is being torn down brick by brick by self-inflicted zealotry by educated idiots. The Uni’s are still popping out, at least through this year, uber progressive automatons who will have NO federal jobs to infect, and maybe the same story at the NGO’s. Fed Bureaucrats, the great majority, are toast and no NGO’s to go too to pay their salary.
I don’t like one party rule, and I believe this is a good thing for the Dems to come back to reality and actually try to do what is right for their constituents, not for “Globalization Elites” and the politicians/Bureaucrats/Media/NGO folks they bought to do their bidding. How do to think Samantha Power is worth a cool 30 million? It is the tip of the iceberg.
We will see, the Elites stand to lose a LOT of money and it might take time. If they don’t, we are going to have a Repub party that certainly could be in power for the next 12 years. They have a great shot at being totally in charge for the next 8 years. It all depends on the Dems recruiting younger, more pragmatic leaders who know how to compromise. We will see.
I thought that JD Vance’s presentations in last week’s meetings was excellent. I think he’s a good, and clear speaker, and would make a good president. He’d bet my vote.
The fact that the German and larger EU governing classes refuse to counter AfD with argument says they do not think they have the better argument. Resort to force is what people do when they are not confident of their arguments but think they are stronger.
They know the public would reject them if told both sides, so they seek to ensure that only their side is heard. That will work, until it doesn’t.
UnHerd. Last year you had about £300 off me. This year nothing. Why? It’s good to get both sides but there are a few trolls on here that are complete poison. I hope you survive but I am done with you. Sorry, but this isn’t good enough.