I Admit It: I Was Suckered

I believed the UNOCAL grab for precious metals story myself. I might have been wrong:

While hysteria surrounding the possible acquisition of Unocal by the Chinese has abated since Unocal’s board vote against the bid, it’s unclear whether Unocal’s owners will follow management’s advice. If not, they face a gauntlet of politically charged nonsense about the “strategic value” of the company they own, including the contention that Unocal owns super-rare mineral deposits crucial for military applications.

According to Rep. Duncan Hunter, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Unocal owns a mine where, as he said on CNN’s Lou Dobbs show, "the precious metals chromium tantalum and titanium” are produced, and that those metals and others “are vital to the nation's weapons systems." Dobbs agreed: "Those rare earths come from only one mine in California. It should not be sold to China as part of some. . . libertarian free-market program."

But chromium and titanium are not precious, the earths in question are not rare, and that mine is one of many. Unfortunately, “strategic metals” are among those perennially misunderstood policy issues with strange lives of their own. The myth of shortage simply refuses to die.

I certainly hope I'm wrong on this. Of course, even if China cornered the oxygen market, America would find a way to breathe beer in short order.

We're that good.