“Today the entire American innovation engine is slowly grinding to halt, public and private,” Kasparov said, speaking at an event on Monday night at Palantir Technologies, a company that creates analytics software for government and financial organizations. In his remarks, Kasparov called the U.S. a “culture of optimization.”

And though he singles out the Apple II, he is by no means an Apple fanboy, judging by the following: “We are surrounded by gadgets and computers like never before. They are better each time; a little faster, a little shinier, a little thinner. But it is derivative, incremental, profit margin-forced, consumer-friendly technology — not the kind that pushes the whole world forward economically.”