You Can Take China's Assurances And @%#&*

So China just assured America that it will always be willing to ship "rare earth minerals" to the world. Really? What good is that assurance? The next time they get officially mad at us and decide to slow or stop shipments like they recently did to Japan, what good will this assurance be? Is this something we can take to any corner convenience mart and get a loaf of bread? China controls 97% of rare earth minerals and almost 100% of production. Rare Earths are needed for hybred cars, most electronics and things like guided missiles and the so on. How good of an idea is it to have China be the only country in the world able to produce these minerals? We used to produce them but like so many other industries, we allowed that one to slip away too. Now if we want to build a robotic plane to stay in the air for long periods searching for terrorists and then pinpoint bomb them, we have to ask China for the rare earths necessary to build the thing. Is that a good idea? Next thing you know, we'll have to say pretty please. Letting our industry disappear from our shores, in fact rewarding companies for packing them up and shipping them to other countries, doesn't seem to me to be a wise decision. Of course there are the apologists who favor industry and tell us it'll be OK, that we still have the edge in technology even though our educational edge is fast disappearing. But will it really be OK? We had a technological edge because we had the best educational institutions both public and private in the world, from K-12 right on through doctorates. But we've fallen dangerously behind. As our educational foundation goes, so goes all of our edges. In Technology, research and industry. Oh, we'll always have a need for burger flippers and we'll always need cleanup in isle six, but the products in isle six won't be "Made in the USA". Of course by then we won't be able to afford them anyway.