Why China curbing rare earth exports is a huge blow to the US
Why China curbing rare earth exports is a huge blow to the US
Summary
China has now imposed export controls on a range of critical rare earth minerals and magnets, dealing a major blow to the US.
"Rare earths" are a group of 17 chemically similar elements that are crucial to the manufacture of many high-tech products. Everything you can switch on or off likely runs on rare earths.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimates that China accounts for about 61% of rare earth production and 92% of their processing.
A US Geological report notes that between 2020 and 2023, the US relied on China for 70% of its imports of all rare earth compounds and metals.
Trump fucked around, now America gets to find out
America was never a leader, is was always a bully
Now the world had had enough and is pushing back. The facade is slipping and America is shown to be the house of cards it always was
Americans fucked around. We took our democracy for granted. We were too polite to challenge the bigots in our lives. We were too afraid of being called elitist or communist or soft, so we sat on the sidelines with furrowed brows and clutched pearls while shitty people steamrolled our freedoms to pave the road to their own successes.
We're all to blame. The Conservative shitbags, the opportunistic centrists, the ineffectual progressives, and the shiftless appliticals who never bothered to try. Trump didn't happen to America. Trump is the inexorable conclusion of America.
It was very carefully and insidiously taken from you
I agree that it was inevitable though. It was a county founded on the idea of fucking people over to get ahead
Maybe there's hope for the future. I sure hope that there is
It used to be a bully you could reason and work with, and that at least understood give and take. Now it's just a drunk bully, starting fights for whatever.
It's a toddler
Just look at the tantrums, let alone the shitting itself...
The world gets to find out. None of this affects only the USA or China. They‘re both freaking out right now.
It was stolen from the indigenous population
It only achieved independence because the French hated the English
It has interfered with the autonomy of so many countries
The US sat out of the second world war until the tail end things, because there were quite a few people who thought that Hitler was actually pretty cool (so history is repeating)
Since then there has been a series of wars waged purely to try to show other competing powers that 'Murica punches hard
I think it's hilarious that you call me "tough guy", as though I value people thinking that I'm a hard cunt or something
That's a yank thing.
I don't have to worry about my safety, because I don't live in a country where violence is ever-present due to everyone being afraid of everyone else