[ExI] Trump Is Doubling Down on His Disastrous A.I. Chip Policy

[John Clark]

On Fri, Dec 19, 2025 at 7:49 AM <spike at rainier66.com> wrote:



> *> The capability of manufacturing advanced chips is easier than designing
> the chips.*
>

*I'm not at all certain that's true. I tried to get a more detailed
understanding of how ASML's new $400 million High Numerical Aperture EUV
Lithography Machine works but the damn thing is so complicated it makes my
head hurt thinking about it. And lithography is just one step out of about
20 steps that TSMC needs to worry about if they want to manufacture cutting
edge AI chips that they can sell at a price that is economically viable.
And neither ASML nor TSMC are American companies, although I own stock in
both. *

*>> … I'm pretty sure if China where to invade Taiwan the huge but delicate
>> chip fabrication plants on that island would no longer be functional, and
>> even if they were there would be very few people still around who knew how
>> to operate them.** If that were to happen it would hurt both the USA and
>> China and the entire world, but it would hurt the US more than it hurt
>> China, so they might figure it would still be a worthwhile endeavor because
>> it would give China time to catch up in the AI race…*
>
>
>
> *> That depends on how many Taiwanese processor designers get out of
> Taiwan ahead of the attack.  It feels like we have a lot of them already.
> More are arriving constantly.  They get fast-tracked to citizenship.*
>

*Today that could happen only if the immigrant had a "Trump Gold Card", and
that costs one million dollars. If that had been the policy in 1973 then
Jensen Huang would never have been able to move to the USA, and today
Nvidia would be a Chinese company. And we would be screwed.  *

* > I am a free-trade guy,*
>

*I am too, but He Who Must Not Be Named is the most anti-free trade
President in American history so (I'm not sure but I may have mentioned
this before) I am not that man's biggest fan. *

*John K Clark *





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