China Rising

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As the world leader in manufacturing and high technology the US used to dominate the mining and production of rare earth metals. Everything that was developed in the 20th century requires one or more rare earth metals and most of what we take for granted in the 21st requires them in large quantities. Things like computers, green energy equipment and high tech weapons use large quantities of these metals that China controls completely.

How could we have put ourselves in such an dire position from a national security stand point? Does the phrase “A guy you’d like to have a beer with” come to mind? In 2003, at the height of the “national security” frenzy when FOX News was running the color code alert at the bottom of the screen 24/7 is when it happened. At a time when the Bush Administration said they made every decision as a matter of NATIONAL SECURITY but they didn‘t even blink when China not only bought all our rare earth metal capacity but crated it up and moved it to China.

But hey, the earth is flat, it’s a free market and the markets decide everything, we just need to have faith in the markets. Of course the godless Communists don’t act on faith, they act on smart planning and hard numbers. They don’t believe in free markets either and they are eating our lunch.

It boils down to this, China can do as it pleases and we have to do what pleases China. This could go on indefinitely as China can use its leverage to keep us from doing anything about it. Your lesson today: "nǐ è le ma", are you hungry? And your response is, "shì de". You can guess if that means yes or no.

http://www.prairie2.com/2010/10/yes-yes-i-am.html