i would advise you do not let your rat use the phone. >> can we go back to peter theil? s that was a not so veiled threat. >> if you do not agree to this debate, we are going to take you back to court and find details about you and publish them, as well. >> they have nothing to lose. >> they are going to dig up dirt. denton is saying i will do this in court and publish this on gawker. this is a great move by denton to say let's talk about free speech but free speech is not the issue. >> pay no attention to what i have in this hand over here. >> absolutely. >> thank you so much. >>> happening right now, severe thunderstorms tearing across the lone star state this morning. the national weather service says a possible tornado touched down northwest of houston yesterday. the funnel was seen moving at about 25 miles per hour right through the town of bryant. dozens of homes and roofs were blown off and several trees were uprooted from the ground. heavy rainfall caused widespread flooding in that area. despite how bad that looks, no injuries have been reported. >> that is good

the lawsuit is funded by pay pal founder peter theil. some raise the concern of free speech and first amendment. can someone with money destroy a news organization because he doesn't like the content which is where we get to this morning's challenge over free speech debate. keep in mind, the courts themselves said what gawker did wasn't protected by free speech. gawker lost its free speech case. denton in his challenge does threaten theil if he doesn't agree to this debate saying, "you too will be subject to a dose of transparency, however philanthropic your intention, details of your involvement will be gruesome." another consideration in all this is theil is a board member at facebook. facebook is trying to attack media and arguably has become a news media outlet itself. jeff bezos owns "the washington post" says he is ready to launch another rocket. bezos' fund blue origin had successful origins and landings. they are going to make things gç wrong intentionally, including messing with the capsule's parachute so that it will crash land

billionaire peter theil who made his fortune creating paypal, one of the first investors in facebook out sharing details about why he spent millions of dollars financing hulk hogan's winning case against gawker media. silicon valley billionaire peter theil revealing to "the new york times" overnight why he shelled out about $10 million for the courtroom takedown of gawker by hogan whose real name is terry bollea, after gawker published the 2007 article outing theil as gay he said i saw gawker pioneer a unique and incredibly damaging way of getting attention by bullying people even when there was no connection with the public interest. he put a plan in place of secretly funding cases in hopes of crippling the website. the paypal founder saying it's less about revenge and more about specific deterrence. explaining why he decided to help, they usually attack less prominent, far less wealthy people that simply can't defend themselves, even someone like terry bollea who is a millionaire and famous and a successful person didn't quite have the resources to do this alone. >> well, they pick

story, and nick denton on "squawk box" this morning the talk about the fight against billionaire peter theil that silicon valley needs to watch out, and they need to watch out in silicon valley, because they have more money and power than god and some of them want to actually be gods. >> and kara you got embroiled in a discussion on twitter yesterday with nick we don't need to be taught lessons or. far less ethics and more click chasing in press today. and then khosla said we don't need to be taught lessons. and then it was also if he was so proud of his efforts why skulk around. >> and so it is a troublesome situation where somebody could do this in secret, and that is the secret part of what is it to get to me. if he is proud of what he is doing, and doing the philanthropy or god's work or whatever, why not say it and say what you are doing, and probably, because it would have opened him up to criticism in the process, and now that he has won, he can take the criticism and say, see what i have done for you shgs, you other potentates, i have knocked down someone unpopular, and gawker is unp

coming up in this half hour, paypal co-founder peter theil says he did help hulk hogan sue gawker, accusing them of bullying people. we have more and will ask if theil could change silicon valley's image. >>> olympic athletes say they're ready for rio even with the talk of crime, corruption, pollution, and the zika virus. we'll visit the training center where team usa is warming up for the summer games. that's ahead. >>> time to show some of the headlines. "the new york times" looks at a new theory about the cause of alzheimer's disease. some harvard researchers think it starts when the brain reacts to infections. they believe that reaction forms the plaque that clogs the brains of alzheimer's patients. dr. david agus says this is a great new idea, but it is too early to draw any conclusions. >> i thought that was a fascinating article. >>> "usa today" says some lawmakers called -- pay dues, saying it improves a lawmaker's chance of being assigned to a powerful campaign committee. campaign committees for both parties declined to report details of the dues. >>> in europe's ongoing refugee cr

paul ryan is very well liked by the party, and money people like peter theil endorsed him yesterday. people are starting to gravitate toward him. charles: how do you envision this meeting? >> i think this is happening because donald trump is a good businessman. why would you spend your own money when there is other people's money out there. i think this is what i think his supporters and americans realize, this is a complicated dynamic. certain adjustments will have to be made. they have to trust they note real donald trump. the republicans also know that as well. this is a dance will influence. what i want to add about west virginia. there has never been a concern about green energy. this is about getting and attacking a segment of the american population that is not protected by the left and a signaling hillary wants it to be a gender war. that's going to fail. part of what donald trump is saying i'm somebody who can work in administration and can change it. that's going to appeal to people across the board, no matter who they are. charles: what matters more at the meeting, the mon

wants to rally behind snowden is definitely real and pop yula >> and yes, that between that and peter theil and gawker, the ed a d adaptations of free speech in the valley are some that we have not seen in a long time. thank you, jessica, and mike. >> thanks for having us. >>> despite a large rally in asia overnight, a slew of economic data, and it is the last trading day in may, and we will wait for the jobs numb bergs and the dow and the s&p are both negative, and the dow is the only major average currently in positive is the nasdaq composite. and now, shares on the news from carl icahn are bringing his shares up. and the all-time high of amazon is coming down slightly, but still, carl, it is a level to watch at 237. -- at 722.04. >>> and a top v.c. is going to join with us answers. >>> and the vice chairman of cablevision, and tebow working together. we will talk about that game on. [bassist] two late nights in tucson. blew an amp.but good nights. sure,music's why we do this,but it's still our business. we spend days booking gigs, then we've gotta put in the miles to get there. but it's

and peter theil did say that he had helped hulk hogan defend himself against the times. he says it is less about revenge and more about specific deterrence. i saw gawker pioneer a unique and incredibly damaging way. and this brings up the importance of these ceos dealing with technology and media. >> in media, he is able to say in the specific case, i will take them out. interesting. >> and strategic alternative skills like an act of desperation of facing up to someone with a net wealth of $2.7 billion. >> good luck with that. and that is it for us, and up next is wapner and the "half." >> all right. guys, thank you, and welcome to the "halftime report" i'm scott wapner, and getting ahead of the fed. what janet yellin is likely to say on friday and how to profit from it. with us is joe terranova, and josh brown, and jon and pete najarian, and let's go to the countdown of janet yellin speaking tomorrow. we have new data showing that the e kconomy is not as weak as feared, and so it is some indication of where investors should be if the fed does raise

. >> a letter was just released to peter thiel saying "this .redictive decade-long campaign theil toldk times, i refuse to believe that journalism means massive privacy violations. it is because i respect journalists that i don't believe they are endangered by fighting back against gawker. >> i think the larger issue is, should billionaires be able to dictate what is sai about themd? do we want to live in a world where the subject of coverage gets approval over every single thing a journalist writes? if they don't like anything you write, are they going to find some secret lawsuit? are they going to use every tool they can to stop it is about the successes and failures of his capital hedge fund. it is about his decisions as a facebook board member very early on in his life when he was a private company. all of these things were things that he may not have wanted us to run. to get a veto on every single thing -- went hard on bill cosby before anyone else did, hillary clinton in the e-mails, tom cruise in scientology. >> good bill cosby get to determine what we write about him? that is p

peter thiel may have may have been secretly funding hulk hogan's lawsuit. he is a co-founder of paypal, he's very wealthy. and it looks like mr. theil his revenge against gawker. >> so peter thiel said what gawker is doing is equivalent to psychological terrorism. gawker are not journalists there, they lack credibility. this was basically a hit job on peter thiel, he will not reportedly get any proceeds if hulk hogan wins. they could go out of business. >> you're looking live in st. petersburg, and that lawsuit is what that appearance is about. >> it's about a sex tape that gawker published and reportedly tried to extort money from hulk hogan. stuart: are you on peter thiel's side of this. >> i think it's personal, and may diminish his idea of being objective. look, hulk hogan won the case for a reason. his privacy was invaded, so, yes, i'm on his side and i think that gawker is an organization very few people would stand up for liz: they have no credibility. >> a billionaire sundays a lawsuit against his enemy. >> and the environmentalists do it all the time. and push lawsuits, the same thing of thing. stuart: we're moments away fr