At the high point of the White House state dinner, the hierarchy of the world’s two great powers was laid bare. Around the head table at the centre of the room sat two of the most powerful leaders, Xi Jinping and Donald Trump, alongside some of the most influential figures in American technology: Elon Musk, Tim Cook and Taiwanese-born leaders of two of the world's most important chipmakers, Jensen Huang and Lisa Su.It was an extraordinary encounter between two very different political systems.On one side was Beijing's political apparatus: Xi's closest diplomats, political architects and economic executors who help consolidate his…