I like the ideas...
...Behind encrypted RAM and all that. I will admit that I am skeptical (and maybe even more cynical, if possible) about Intel's claims. It's not just Intel either. I think I am developing a full blown case of hardware vulnerability paranoia.
This is due to the fact that as time goes by it is inevitable that more of what we used to do in software will be done in hardware. I spent decades watching people roll their eyes when I told them that reducing their software footprint was the fastest and cheapest way to reduce the attack surface of their organization. Maybe, just maybe, had they actually been paying me for advice instead of just "Making IT Work" they would have listened. After I have been gone from those companies for decades I look back and in my minds eye I can those eyes rolling again when some PFY says "You are going to ransom? You know that will only make things worse, right?"
My point is that I want to be able to choose which features I get in my CPU now. For 25 years I have able to apt-get my way to a (mostly?) stable and secure system. Now it's time for some new commands, like "Intel-put --cores=32 --L2=2M --L3=128M --AVX=128 --hidden-backdoors=-1" and have them spit out my desired hardware. It would not be cheap but it would go a long way towards rebuilding the trust that was lost.
Maybe, just maybe, in the future everyone will be able to design a custom CPU in fifteen minutes.