Despite his attempts to label himself a libertarian, it should be clear that Thiel is anything but. His ideology seems neoconservative or worse if you trace some of his other "philanthropy."

For instance, he donated $75,000 to the far-right Institute on Religion and Public Life, gave $25,900 to Meg Whitman's failed gubernatorial campaign, and provided the funding to the smear group that attacked ACORN.

I wish that were all. He has a long history of this sort of thing. What kind of libertarian would fund anti-immigrant groups? All the real libertarians I know are so pro-immigration that they can even make lefties uncomfortable.

But what you may not know about Thiel is that he was a founder of Palantir Technologies, a company that provides analysis and informatics tools to governments and large corporations. Palantir was in the news this week for its role in waging cyber warfare against WikiLeaks and its supporters at the behest of Bank of America.

Also, through different sources, it has been learned that Palantir and other firms were hired by the US Chamber of Commerce to "develop tactics for damaging progressive groups and labor unions, in particular ThinkProgress, the labor coalition called Change to Win, the SEIU, US Chamber Watch, and StopTheChamber.com."

Libertarianism as a philosophy can be a very noble thing, and fighting for market freedom can also be a noble thing. But these actions of Palantir Technologies were neither noble nor in support of free markets.

The Chamber of Commerce lives for only one thing: corporatism. The last thing they would want is to have to compete on a free market without the aid of subsidies, economic rent, barriers to entry, regulatory capture, patents, limited liability, corporate personhood, and the many other market interventions on behalf of centralized wealth.

[UPDATE: After being exposed, Palantir says they are now very sorry for what they have done to WikiLeaks. No word on how they feel about supporting the Chamber.]

Disturbingly, the latest post on Palantir's Twitter account was to advertise a company event with Silicon Valley Robotics, makers of military robotics. The event appeared to promise an up close and personal look at the "killer robots" of the future. Not surprisingly, Palantir's other big investor was In-Q-Tel, the investment arm of the CIA.

People of conscience, consider this your warning before undertaking any relationship with Mr. Thiel.