A Stefon Story

 Bill Hader had a recurring character on SNL called Stefon who touted night clubs with the line "This club has it all.." before rattling off a list of impossibly bizarre features. I think we need to start looking at stories about Trump's administration that "have it all" and this one qualifies. 

The contours are this: The United Arab Emirates is looking to diversify its economy by getting into AI. America leads the world (for the moment) in AI chip technology. The UAE is also pretty friendly to China, so the Biden Administration and even national security officials in the first few months of the Trump Restoration were very, very reluctant to give UAE access to the Nvidia AI chips. 

Enter Steve Witkoff, Trump's new consigliere who has no relevant experience to the multitude of jobs that he has been given. He comes out of New York real estate, the same moral sewer that produced Jabba the President. Witkoff, working with techbro oligarch David Sacks, tried to make an end run around the national security concerns and got a huge assist from extreme MAGA gargoyle, Laura Loomer. Basically, they overrode security concerns to export 500,000 of the advanced chips, and then the UAE invested over a billion dollars into Trump aligned crypto.

This story has everything: corruption and personal enrichment by Trump and tech bros, selling out national security interests, Laura Loomer, incompetent people ignoring expert advice and the growing international web of rich people who exist beyond the interest and control of governments.

It also has implausible denials from "White House spokespeople" who say ridiculous things that often don't deny anything. "The Trump administration is the most honest in history" North Korea media type shit.

Crypto doesn't need to exist. It performs no real useful function that money can't perform, except money laundering, drug and human trafficking and fraud, all of which is removed from banking oversight. Crypto has no intrinsic value, but as we see in this story, it's really good for bribing people under the guise of "investing." Meanwhile, China is almost certain to get their hands on these chips and we will lose that advantage, whatever that's worth in our coming AI dystopia. However, for the international tech bro club, who cares if it's the US, the UAE, China or whoever, as long as you get yours. The startling amorality of tech libertarians is almost its own pathology at this point. 

Does this "make America great again"? Of course not. Anymore than the criminal treatment of South Korean engineers by ICE makes sense. However, the swirling chaos, corruption and incompetence of Trump-world means that as long as someone gets what they want - Witkoff's millions; Loomer's vendettas; Sack's techno-stateless utopia - it can proceed, even if it reduces efforts in another area.

Like I said, this story has everything.