> They can only micromanage your policies if you specifically allow it beforehand.

A formerly sovereign state can choose to give up its sovereignty to join a larger union, as the U.S. states did and as EU member countries have done.

> your home state is not sovereign, because its administration ordered some paper clips from a supplier and is now bound to pay for them, without the senators being asked if they really want to pay

They're not obligated to pay for the paperclips. E.g. if the U.S. government fails to pay for paperclips you sell it, you can file a claim in the Court of Federal Claims, but only because the government has chosen to waive its sovereign immunity as to such claims.

Which brings it back to square one: Ireland complies with the EU micro-managing (like the the US on the paperclip contract) because it has chosen to waive sovereign immunity from other countries' intervention into its tax policy.