Fair point. I guess my issue was that Silicon Valley != VC-istan, the latter being just one incarnation of it out of many that have existed. VC-istan could die

Fair point. I guess my issue was that Silicon Valley != VC-istan, the latter being just one incarnation of it out of many that have existed. VC-istan could die and there'd still be something that would emerge to make use of that talent (maybe old-style R&D could come back; unlikely, but one can hope).