Sam Freedman

Freedman highlights a stark asymmetry: the US can force compliance from its tech giants in extremis, but allies like the UK are left exposed to American corporate power with no recourse. Better come to this realisation late than never: Tech sovereignty isn't just about China.

Sure the rich are fine in any system. Grammars save them some money while harming mid and low income kids by pushing them into secondary moderns.

Whereas the rich will mostly get their kids into grammars and if they don't can fall back on private. So they're better off.

Yes a small number benefit and most are worse off. And this is done via a low reliability test that defines peoples' life course at age 10. Plenty of kids that turn out to be "bright" failed the 11+.

I've never said anything about internships. The bigger point is that you're fundmanetally wrong about the impact of grammars on mid-income families. It harms them whereas it entrenches the privilege of people like me *much more* than house price selection which is a weak mechanism.

It is such a specious argument though because someone like me wants lots more ladders not just one that most can't climb. That's why I worked for Gove!

This is pretty disgraceful.

And I wanted it to be automatic! Also my kids would have got into grammar schools but we'd have all absolutely hated the misery that would have created in years 5 and 6.

House prices are more important at primary and ofc grammars would make that much worse because of a high stakes exama at 11.

Grammar schools lock it in vastly more. We know this because it happened and still happens in countries that select at 11.

The top few deciles nearly all benefit from selective systems whereas most of our secondaries are genuinely comprehensive.

Indeed. My daughter did further maths gcse a year early at her comp.

Um yes Scotland. Defence isn't devolved. And Scotland is still dependent on US tech companies.

It disadvantages more mid-income families than it helps by definition because the top deciles nearly all get in. Just argue for elitism and accept it's socially segregating. More honest.

Lower ataining pupils also make less progress om average.

Which is why the system was so unpopular in the 1960s and councils of all stripes got rid. Voters hated them.

As for the ad hom against people who disagree with you... polling repeatedly shows that those with selective educations are most likely to support grammars and those that didn't go to one the least. Same for income distribution.

House price selection is far less powerful than this implies. Most secondaries in cities are genuinely comprehensive. No grammar schools come remotely close to it.

Sovereignty for sale Tech monopolies and the future of the nation state

New post just out:

"Sovereignty for sale"

The UK is uniquely exposed to the power of US tech monopolies - from Palantir to AI and cloud services.

Why is it so dangerous? What are other countries doing? And what should we do?

(£/free trial)

open.substack.com/pub/samf/p/s...

I'd be surprised if more than a handful or two went from a deprived background to grammar school. Apart from anything else you have to be in you 60s now to have gone in most parts of the country.

Not any of the leadership of Reform. True for a few like David Davis but doesn't change the fact they were raritites.

Just shows how much contempt Reform has for their own supporters. This is a policy that helps the kids of the wealthy educated liberal elites they claim to despise. And would harm the types of constituency they do well in.

(I think this because they are treating it as if its axiomatic rather than trying to make a case it is necessary to a sceptical public like Cameron tried with Syria.)

I think they really believe but I think that's partly because there in a epistemic bubble treating it as if it's obvious and don't realise the vast majority disagree.

It's possible this is a very clever marketing strategy but I think it's above board - his senior team are basically all people who left OpenAI because they thought Altman had gone rogue.

He's going to try and make Marco Rubio President of Iran isn't he?

(As if he'd heard of Mojtaba Khamenei before this week).

"Safety theater" is exactly what I'm worried about if we're completely dependent on these companies. Sellable to ministers but doesn't mitigate the risks.

(Full memo is here but paywalled - www.theinformation.com/articles/rea...)

If you think I'm overstating concerns about the loyalties of US tech companies - check out this memo from Anthropic CEO to staff on their battle with the Trump administration.

It's quite impressive...

One of the big global policy debates to come - national sovereignty in the age of global markets. An issue that has been bubbling around for many years (see e.g. Newman Farrell Underground Empire) but Trump is bringing to the surface inadvertently.

That it's a bad idea to get involved in a Middle East war with open-ended objectives is pretty hard coded in the public mind at this point.