Jury selection was the key to Hulk Hogan's successful lawsuit that put Gawker out of business

Hulk Hogan in the courtroom, where Peter Thiel was secretly paying the legal bills, all to put Gawker out of business.

Like many here, I have conflicting feelings about the demise of the Gawker Media empire.

On the one hand, Gawker published spiteful, hurtful content, and the founder, Nick Denton, was a cockroach of a man.

On the other: Peter Thiel, the freakazoid right-wing billionaire and close buddy of Trump, was able to use a carefully selected straw man to put a media outlet out of business for daring to report things that Thiel didn’t like.

Not a good precedent to set.

So what actually happened? A new book has emerged about Thiel and his activities, and it all boils down to this: