https://www.cremieux.xyz/p/chinas-upside-down-meritocracy

The chain of reasoning, stripped of rhetorical devices:

1. Nations like Europe fail to innovate, which explains why they have fallen behind
2. European talent is good at starting companies, except they can only start successful, big ones in the United States
3. Successful startups are the biggest source of innovation
4. China may be having trouble starting successful startups
5. China has a massive and highly capable government
6. This implies China is misallocating its top talent towards government rather than entrepreneurship
7. Therefore, China has less innovative startups than it would otherwise have
8. Therefore, China is less innovative than it otherwise would be
9. Therefore, China is weaker economically and innovatively than it otherwise would be if it allocated more of its top talent towards entrepreneurship
10. America doesn’t siphon off its talent into useless enterprises like China does
11. America doesn’t impede its talent from being realized the way Europe does
12. America is singularly capable of dragging the world into the future
13. To achieve a better future where more parts of the world are capable of creating a better future, we ought to remove the barriers and bad incentives from those other parts of the world (China and Europe) and let talented people build (America)

With implicit premises:

1. Nations like Europe fail to innovate, which explains why they’ve fallen behind.
2. European talent is good at starting companies, except they can only start successful, big ones in the United States.