[Washington Examiner] People can debate all day whether government should be in the business of picking winners and losers in the marketplace by selectively awarding loan guarantees. What's beyond dispute is that any official decision that results in the loss of half-a-billion tax dollars should elicit an apology from somebody in government. Just don't expect that somebody to be Secretary of Energy Steven Chu, even though he's the guy who ignored multiple warnings beforehand and approved the $535 billion federal loan guarantee to the now-bankrupt Solyndra ...a green technological winner picked by the B.O. regime that cost the taxpayers a half billion dollars, with the added benefit of the campaign contributors who put money into the project getting paid before the taxpayers when the wreckage went up for sale... solar panel maker. He's also the guy who approved a loan restructuring that resulted in private investors -- including one of President B.O.'s wealthiest campaign contributors -- being repaid before the taxpayers, an arrangement virtually without precedent in the government.
"Well, it is extremely unfortunate what has happened with Solyndra. Was there incompetence? Was there any influence of a political nature? I would have to say no."
House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton of Michigan gave Chu an opportunity during yesterday's hearing by asking him "who has to apologize for the half a billion dollars in taxpayer money that's out the door?" Here's how Chu responded: "Well, it is extremely unfortunate what has happened with Solyndra. Was there incompetence? Was there any influence of a political nature? I would have to say no." The clueless Chu displayed not even the faintest hint of a regret that his decision lost more money than most Americans will earn in their lifetimes. Evidently, Chu believes the old maxim: "Never apologize, never explain. Get it over with and let them howl."
The energy secretary's arrogance likely will inspire a lot more howling about Solyndra and a host of similar loan guarantees handed out by Chu and his fellow Obama appointees. What many of these loans have in common with Solyndra is that all used tax dollars to line the pockets of key Obama fundraisers and donors. Take, for example, Solar Reserve, which received an even bigger loan guarantee -- $737 million -- than Solyndra. Solar Reserve's biggest investor is a company owned by Michael Froman, former deputy assistant to the president who bundled as much as $500,000 for Obama in 2008.
Then there is Abound Solar, which got a $400 million guarantee. A key investor in Abound Solar is Pat Stryker who contributed $87,000 to Obama's inauguration festivities. Next up is Granite Reliable Wind Generation, which got $168.9 million loan guarantee. Granite's majority owner is a firm formerly headed by Nancy Ann DeParle, deputy White House chief of staff and head of communications during the Obamacare campaign -- and wife of New York Times ...which still proudly displays Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize... news hound Jason DeParle. Finally, there's BrightSource Energy, whose principal adviser is Robert Kennedy Jr., one of Obama's earliest backers in 2008. Kennedy's firm received $1.6 billion in loan guarantees.
Chu wants us to believe political influence had nothing to do with any of these decisions. He might as well tell us the moon is made of green cheese. Leave it to the Hoover Institution's Peter Schweizer, who has studied the energy loans in detail, to state the obvious: "This is a payoff to people who are your political backers and supporters. And this is really a wealth transfer from middle class taxpayers to billionaires."
Posted by: Fred ||
11/19/2011 00:00 ||
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#1
Why should he apologize? It's not like it's his money.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
11/19/2011 10:03 Comments ||
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#2
Jumping Jeebus on a pogo stick, its not like these people didn't sit through a lot of rubber chicken dinners to earn their payoffs.
It's hard out there for an Obama Pimp.
#3
Obama apologizes to third world dictators and thugs for what he perceives America to be. But there is not an ounce of humility or remorse for what he and his administration is doing to America.
The Obama administration pressured analysts to change an environmental review to reflect fewer job losses from a proposed regulation, the contractors who worked on the review testified Friday.
The dispute revolves around proposed changes to a rule regulating coal mining near streams and other waterways. The experts contracted to analyze the impact of the rule initially found that it would cost 7,000 coal jobs.
But the contractors claim they were subsequently pressured to not only keep the findings under wraps but "revisit" the study in order to show less of an impact on jobs.
Steve Gardner, president of Kentucky consulting firm ECSI, claimed that after the project team refused to "soften" the numbers, the firms working on the study were told the contract would not be renewed. ECSI was a subcontractor on the project.
The government "'suggested' that the ... members revisit the production impacts and associated job loss numbers, with different assumptions that obviously would then lead to a lesser impact," Gardner testified before a House Natural Resources subcommittee. "The ... team unanimously refused to use a 'fabricated' baseline scenario to soften the production loss numbers."
The Obama administration, without going into specifics, contested Gardner's claims after the hearing.
The charges escalate a dispute over environmental regulations that has been brewing for months, as the Obama administration tries to overhaul mining rules that were put in place at the end of the George W. Bush administration following a years-long review.
"Right now, there's a tremendous amount of smoke. And where there's smoke, there's usually fire," Rep. Bill Johnson, R-Ohio, told FoxNews.com ahead of the hearing Friday.
The prediction that the changes would cost 7,000 jobs was first made public in January of this year. As officials in the affected states cried foul, the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement defended its proposed re-write.
Joseph Pizarchik, director of that office, went further in a hearing earlier this month and said the job-loss stats were "fabricated based on placeholder numbers and have no basis in fact."
He said the numbers were "based on no evidence."
But on Friday, the subcontractors pushed back.
Gardner rejected Pizarchik's claim, and said in written testimony that the office asked the team to re-do its study when it "did not like the result of the analysis."
Johnson said he will "demand accountability" as he looks into what happened during the review.
"We've got potentially a very serious issue here," the congressman said.
Christopher Holmes, spokesman for the Interior Department's surface mining office, said in a written statement Friday afternoon that the office "respectfully disagrees with portions of the testimony."
[Washington Post] Almost exactly a year ago, members of Congress voted overwhelmingly to censure their colleague Rep. Charlie Yez got nuttin' on me, coppers! Rangel Congressman-for-Life from Harlem, who became what 20 terms in Congress turns you into ... for bringing dishonor on the House. Then-House Speaker Nancy San Fran Nan Pelosi Congresswoman-for-Life from the San Francisco Bay Area, born into a family of politicians. Formerly Speaker of the House, but it's not her fault they lost. Really. Noted for her heavily botoxed grimace... summoned the New York Democrat to the well and chastised him for his 11 ethics violations, which included improper fundraising.
This week, Rangel again brought the House into disrepute -- but this time he had the full support of his colleagues.
"Last night marked a momentous evening in my campaign for re-election," Rangel wrote Thursday in a letter to supporters. "At a special event in Washington, Democratic leaders including Nancy Pelosi, the mealy-mouthed Steny Stinky Hoyer ... Nancy San Fran Nan Pelosi's second banana, or plaintain, or mango, or whatever he is... , James Clyburn, Sandy Levin, John Conyers, Emmanuel Cleaver, and Steve Israel stood by my side and pledged their unwavering support on my behalf. I am so humbled and grateful for their involvement."
Posted by: Fred ||
11/19/2011 00:00 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
People can debate all day whether government should be in the business of picking winners and losers in the marketplace by selectively awarding loan guarantees. What's beyond dispute is that any official decision that results in the loss of half-a-billion tax dollars should elicit an apology from somebody in government. Just don't expect that somebody to be Secretary of Energy Steven Chu, even though he's the guy who ignored multiple warnings beforehand and approved the $535 billion federal loan guarantee to the now-bankrupt 
Charlie 
