Big trouble from China: It's monopoly on vital rare earth minerals

Rare earth minerals are essential for numerous products and manufacturing processes. Your cell phone, your car, the jet you fly all contain some of these vital minerals.

Would it trouble you to learn that China is developing a monopoly on rare earths? They already have leverage over us because they hold so much of our debt, will they be able to hold these minerals hostage? PJ Media's Tatler thinks it's possible.

BusinessWeek reports that recently there was a significant rare earth find, niobium, in Nebraska.

But will it remain underground?

From the Washington Times:

It currently takes up to five times longer to get approval to mine for minerals here than it does in other countries, driving investment, production and jobs away from America. From the time a project request is submitted to the time a final ruling is made, a decade can slip by and paperwork as much as 6 feet high filed and reviewed - repeatedly. Not surprisingly, when investors are ready to move on a project, they turn to countries that are ready to do business, rather than tackle the Byzantine regulatory review process here in the United States.

Oddly, the United States is now viewed as "Byzantine."

How far we have fallen.

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