ItsButters

Someone obviously got triggered big time by my post 👇😅 xitter.cf/UnderSecE/status/20588… And his reply, is unsurprisingly a pack of lies, some of them really funny ones. First: "we never said our goal was diplomatic immunity." Really? The WSJ piece reported this based on a source named... Jacob Helberg, which - as far as I understand - is YOU! Also when the BCDA chief said publicly "that's [the US's] request, but we did not agree," are you saying the Philippines government is lying? Second, you use TSMC as your example of why being in America's supply chain isn't subservience. Small problem: Taiwan is NOT a Pax Silica signatory due to its diplomatic status. And your own president keeps accusing Taiwan - and TSMC specifically - of "stealing" its chipmaking technology from the US (finance.yahoo.com/sectors/te…). Furthermore the U.S. has been running a years-long initiative to strong-arm TSMC into transferring some of its fabrication to the US (specifically to Arizona), using CHIPS Act subsidies and national security threats as leverage. Not because the free market demanded it, but because you believe that depending on a Taiwanese company for cutting-edge chips was a vulnerability to be eliminated Which all proves the exact contrary of what you're saying: when a "partner" has real capabilities, it's unbearable to you. You don't reward it, you call them "thieves" and try to take their industry away from them. So thanks for proving my point on that one. Lastly, and that's the really hilarious part. Calling Pax Silica a "capitalist project" is the height of irony: it's literally a government program that overrides market competition by telling sovereign countries which suppliers they're allowed to buy from and which competitors to ban - regardless of quality or price. Sorry but if Huawei offers a better AI chip at half the cost and you're contractually barred from buying it, that's not even remotely capitalism. Since you don't seem to be aware (understandable as someone, like you, who spent their entire career at the intersection of government power and corporate interests): capitalism, in its most basic form, means letting markets decide - you buy from whoever offers the best product/service at the best price. Pax Silica is the precise opposite, it's all about preventing this from happening.