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Attribute This To What?
Which Is It?
Sometimes when things just don't seem right I latch onto them like a pit bull onto someone's trouser leg, such was the case with Boeing and the NRLB and Operation Fast & Furious. I know stink when I smell stink. The case with Boeing ended with the NLRB dropping its suit and Fast & Furious is far from over. Ultimately, both of those incidents cost the tax payers money and in the last case it is also taking its toll in human life. Yesterday I caught the whiff of stink again when I ran across the fact that Solyndra, the bankrupt green energy company, was proposing to pay some of the hangers on bonuses for being incompetent. In this case, incompetence runs rampant since the federal government somehow ignored the fact that Solyndra was in deep, too deep. If you missed it, here's the link and please take a read and then come back because this seems to be just the tip of the iceberg.
Just The Tip Mind You...
As I proceed with this, bear in mind that many of these loan guarantees were included in the now "not so infamous" Stimulus bill Obama has touted as such a great job creator. I have a different term for it - "The Jobs For Friends" bill, and in some cases a matter of political pay back.
Solyndra is more than likely going to look like a small fish in the larger frying pan as this scandal fleshes out. After all, it only cost the US tax payer a measly $500 million of our hard earned cash. One of the pivotal figures in this ruse is a man named George Kaiser. He happens to be a top Obama contributor and was bank rolling a smoke and mirrors fantasy company we now know as Solyndra. But guess what appeared after I wrote that Hub about Solyndra? Yeppers! It seems that more Solyndras are hovering and appearing over the horizon. I used the word measly so lets up the ante in the game and raise the figure to $6.5 billion of our money, not Obama's but ours. If he wants to play craps he needs to go to Vegas with his own money, not ours.
It seems that CBS News has uncovered twelve (12) more of these "green energy" companies that pulled up to the stimulus tank for a fill up. So lets take a look at the facts. I know some people don't care to be bothered with facts but I happen to.
There is the case of Beacon Energy, which received $43 million of our money. What should the Department of Energy have known, if they didn't, before bankrolling a company that Standard and Poors had given a grade of CCC-plus at best? When Peter Morici, an economist, was asked if he'd put his money on Beacon, his reply was, "Not on purpose." He went on to add that Beacon is a junk bond and not even a good one. Something about "below investment grade." He gave it a 70% chance of failing over the long haul so why did the federal government decide to invest our money in junk bonds? Now for the bad news. Beacon Energy filed for bankruptcy a mere 2 months ago. Long haul? I don't think so.
Now for more bad from CBS news on the 12 they identified. Remember the $6.5 billion as we move along please. Five (5) of the twelve (12) who ate at the federal feed bag have already filed for bankruptcy. The remaining seven (7) appear to have one foot in the grave and the other on the proverbial banana peel. For the investors out there the other four (4) are Evergreen Solar, SpectraWatt, AES' subsidiary Eastern Energy and Solyndra. Stellar portfolio to hold huh? The problem is that they're in our portfolio.
Then there is the case of Nevada Geothermal (NG), the pet project of none other than Harry. (I got to get home to tend to my petunias) Reid. New SEC warnings project defaults over the horizon. In this case a shell game seemed to be in progress at the time the loan guarantee was slid into the stimulus bill. You see NG was having a bit of an issue with paying its bills - to the tune of about $80 million. Harry had to know this. So they got $98.5 million in tax payer largesse. They promptly caught up on the past due loans of $80 million using our money. Isn't that the way the free market system is supposed to work? Borrow from Peter to pay Paul never was a good idea and still isn't. Where's the tie in to Harry? He had received $43K in campaign contributions in 2009 from the Nevada geothermal industry. Coincidence in timing? $43K for $98.5 million in bailout money? What a horse trade that must have been. Of course again the US tax payer was the horse. On top of those loan guarantees, NG also received $66 million in grants according to the NY Times. Grants mind you, nothing to do with making a loan.
Lets review a company named Sun Power. Sun bellied up to the bar to the tune of $1.2 billion. So what happened next? A French oil company took Sun Power over. Is there something here I'm missing? A review of Sun's financials reveal that they owe more than they are worth. The significance of Sun Power is that they are design, build, operate and maintain the California Valley Solar Ranch Project. If you want to know how that's going just Google it. Another clunker that we bought into which I suppose the French find a bit amusing.
What bothers me about all of this, besides the fact that it is our money that is being bet at the craps table, is that none of this makes the least bit of sense in an economic or free market sense. Then I read where Bain Capital is a bad guy? It should be obvious even to a casual observer that in the free market place there aren't enough idiots to invest willingly by putting their skin in that game. What the federal government in essence is doing is to make it compulsory that the American tax payer cover the bet. Leave it up to our phony politicians and predatory lobbyists to pull out the smoke and mirrors for our viewing pleasure.
One writer termed it "polluting the market with false data." I have to agree with that assessment. In a free market system capital is injected into opportunities that appear both viable and useful. That's call "doing business" as it should be done. What our government is doing is diverting that capital from useful, viable businesses and playing craps with our money. That boils down to hostage taking to me and the tax payers are the ones being held hostage by this nonsense. The federal government, and in this case in the persona of Obama, has no business picking and choosing who it thinks need to be the winners and losers in the marketplace. I will continue to stand by that statement being the capitalist that I am.
The bottom line? You may have thought that Bush was bad. He wasn't exactly a saint because he got mixed up too often with this form of stinkin' thinkin' himself. What we seemed to have done rather than exorcise the disease here is to switch seats with a person who isn't exactly qualified to sit in the seat. Under new management isn't a good idea when the apple itself is rotten to the core. Think about four more years of economic insanity that Obama has vividly illustrated the last the last three (3) plus years with Harry Reid continuing to to pull his strings. How much pain do you care to inflict upon yourself and your fellow Americans? Solyndra will seem like child's play if you ask me.
I asked the question in the headline. What do you attribute this to? Is it stupidity, is it incompetence? Or is it a combination of both or maybe something else? Your turn...
I'm just askin...
As Always,
The Frog Prince
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Years ago, Froggy, Al Capp drew a popular comic strip, 'Lil Abner' in which one of the main protagonists was a politician named General Bullmoose. Bullmoose' credo was: "What's good for me is good for the country."
More and more, expecially as I read your literate and carefully researched hubs, I am beginning to believe that Obummy is Bullmoose reincarnated!
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BPOP - With some of the supposedly top economists and economic advisers at beck and call, how is it that they don't check in with the SEC and do some digging into some of these pipe dreams. If they didn't, which I think they would almost be compelled to do, then that indicates total incompetence. If they did, and ignored it as in the case of Solyndra, that is negligence, reckless disregard for the tax payer's money and a whole lot of other legal words.
Wayne - Legalized theft? Imagine that and they've been getting away with it for years. But it isn't their money they are stealing, it is ours.
Ed - I write to inform and some people here like to be, and remain, informed. The brain dead here like to hit the "vote down" button and never bother to read what is being said then go back and snicker with their buddies that they voted down something factual. Seems when they do bother to comment, which is rare, it usually on a personal attack level and not an attempt to refute the facts. Facts are hard to refute.
The Frog
Frog
Thanks for the welcome back. Love to read your followers, makes me realize there's still some sane people in the good ol' USA, that can't be BSed by Obama, the Dems and the brain drain news media. The fact that Obama is doing all this with the purposeful intent of destroying our nation is beginning to be realized by more and more people. Nobody can be stupid enough to enact the kind of destructive policies we've seen in the last three years by mistake. And if any president ever deserved to be impeached it's our marxist in chief, for willfully disregarding his sworn oath to defend the Constitution and the country, not trample them under his commie green feet. Well done!
This is a perfect outcome for which the taxpayers of America should be holding someone accountable. Don't gamble with your money unless you expect to pay the price. Not only was the stimulus the biggest lie ever played on the American taxpayer...it was the biggest theft by elected officials. I say we put them all in jail. I think Harry Reid's face has a perfect shape when surrounded by the bars of a prison cell. WB
I don't think we can chalk these fiascos up to incompetence. I do think we have to look at Chicago style politics which is at play here. It's payback time for Obama and he's doing it with our money. We put Clinton through the impeachment process because of a stupid cigar. Now when we have lots of evidence that Obama is driving us to the edge, we sit on our hands. It's maddening. Great hub. Up interesting, useful and awesome.
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poetvix - Now I remember why I like you. You think outside the box as I do. Of course they knew that these companies were on a slippery slope. They had to. Morici pegged it square on as an economist. The "green" thing is part of Obama's agenda and the world isn't operating like that even though he thinks it should. That's a pipe dream. That's not to say that it shouldn't be a goal to strive for. But the world, and technology, just isn't on that same sheet of music as his pipe dream. Ideologues, being what they are, just don't understand why though science and technology are also saying we're far away from the goal. In the meantime, lets spend tons of tax payer dollars trying to make something like that happen immediately? Give me a friggin' break.
Pegasis - Well now, first of all good to see you weigh in and secondly, Obama himself has admitted there is no such thing. The only thing being buried is our tax dollars.
The Frog
Remember recently when Obama got such a great snicker at the phrase "shovel ready jobs?"
Now we know why....
Just my opinion here, Sir Frog, but I think it's something else entirely. These so called leaders have access to the best economist, lawyers and such in the world. They knew these companies would fail. They gave them our money anyway. The entire time I was reading this the music and scenes from the movie "Good Fellows" kept rolling around in my head. That's what they impress me as... a bunch of organized criminals with the difference being the good fellows in the movie were not our to bankrupt a nation. They were just local vultures preying on the surroundings. The not so good fellows we are dealing with make them look like children playing at cops and robbers.
As always you have done a remarkable job of applying common sense as a sword through the smoke screen of propaganda. Thank you!
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Stu - Since the EU, or the majority of the major hitters, have just been down graded I expect this country is about to be hit. Then what? We've been issued a warning, more than once in fact, and Obama has chosen to ignore the call. It's about to become one big ass mess just like Obama was one big assed mistake. People were warned back when he was running and ignored the warning then too.
The Frog
Hi Frog,
This kind of crony capitalism is just what you would expect from a socialist President. It not only puts money in his wallet (essentially, kickbacks paid in advance in exchange for federal bialouts), but it allows Obama to build "street cred" with his uber-liberal support base.
Sadly, corporate bailouts, and even TARP, are chicken feed compared to what the federal government is doing internationally. Between the IMF and Federal Reserve, literally trillions are going out the door making shaky bailout loans to weak European nations and banks. The FRS is even buying toxic European bank assets at above market prices, in an attempt to shore up certain banks. Admittedly, this practice is spurred in part because some European banks have heavy exposure to weak US mortgage debt, but nobody forced them to buy the CDO's. You basically have a case of crooked US banks cheating honest European banks - this is an issue for damages awarded by a jury against the rogue US banks, not US taxpayer bailouts of the European victims. You and I didn't peddle the garbage securities at AAA prices, the originators and resellers of the loan packages did.
It all wouldn't be so galling if our largesse to our European buddies were proferred during a time of great American prosperity. But we are drowning in federal debt, 48 out of 50 states are running deficits, credit card and LBO debt have yet to have their busts, real inflation is probably near 7% when you include food and energy but wages are going down, and real unemployment is probably near 20% if you add those who've given up trying and the underemployed to the official number. We aren't exactly the financial powerhouse we used to be, and should be focusing on reducing our own debt, rather than bailing out nations and banks on the opposite side of the globe.
The President, by his actions, has demonstrated that he cares more about "transnational harmony" than saving America from financial collapse. In all truth, his transnational agenda is making our fiscal and monetary crises more severe, as the associated loans to weak debtors require US cash that in many cases probably won't be fully repaid, adding to our endless buildup of federal debt and inflationary fiat money magic from the Fed. We can only prop up selected European entities by issuing debt here at home to raise the cash, or simply printing money. I appreciate that a sovereign default in Europe would be a crisis for their currency and EU cohesion, but we have a crisis of our own. What is Europe doing to help us?
Stu
FP - The truly sad part of this scenario is that we can do absolutely nothing about what has already transpired. There is no way we can go to these companies and demand that they give us our money back. Our only recourse is to voice our disapproval to our elected representatives. We also know that most of them could care less.
It seems our only hope is to clearly identify those individuals responsible for allowing this to happen, and make sure all of America knows who they are. We can hope Americans will take care of these individuals at the polls in the 2012 election. Each and every one of those idiots responsible should be joining the ranks of the unemployed after the next election.
When Mexico said, "All those guns are coming from America," the news dismissed it as crazy talk. Now we know better. Makes me wonder if maybe Iran really is just working on nuclear power.
In my humble opinion, it doesn't really matter whether it's incompetence or schemed. Living on the Gulf Coast, I didn't care why it was a hurricane only a THAT and it was a hurricane. Point is we have to put an end to this insanity. Getting a new Prez won't hurt anything for sure. And once the Republicans control both the house and the senate will have a whole new batch of problems, but I'm guessing will be able to manage those little better. Speaking of Congress, how do those guys live to be so old? Dang, I wish they'd follow in the footsteps of old Ted Kennedy, and do a little dying so the young bloods can give us a shot. I understand the feds are monitoring me, so let me make it clear. I'm talking about dying of old age and natural causes. Crap, you have to cover all your bases.
You did an exceptional job in putting this together. You are back in full frog force, and that's a good thing.
Jim
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