A commenter mentioned that FoxNews was waiting for a document dump. Among today’s items to be buried:
The Obama administration knew before the 2010 election that Solyndra LLC, a solar-panel maker that received a $535 million U.S. loan guarantee, planned to fire workers, according to e-mails released today.
The messages don’t indicate that anyone from the White House directed Solyndra to delay announcing the layoffs until after the vote. Previously released e-mails, indicating the Energy Department urged Solyndra to postpone the cuts, have been cited by House Republicans who say politics influenced Solyndra’s award and last-ditch rescue bid that put taxpayers behind $75 million in private investment.“Here’s the deal — Solyndra is going to announce they are laying off 200 of their 1200 workers,” Heather Zichal, a White House adviser, wrote to Carol Browner, then director of the office of Energy and Climate Change Policy, and other officials on Oct. 27, 2010. “No es bueno.”
This is the closest we’ve gotten to proof the White House requested the layoffs be delayed until after the election, and, while we’re not there yet, the paint-by-numbers picture is getting filled in one blot at a time.
If one compares and contrasts the impact of the Solyndra investment with that of the Auto Industry investment, some rather dramatic magnitudes of scale would be readily appreciated.
We should pay at least some attention to Mitt Romney. In the world of capitalism (whether entirely private or whather private/public partnerships) there will always be winners and losers. What determines success versus failure is the magnitude of the successes, compared and contrasted with the magnitude of the failures.
There have been so many thousands of words written on this blog over the past several months, about the Solyndra failure. By contrast, there has been a comparative silence about the Auto Industry success. The positive impact of the Auto Industry success makes up for the Solyndra failure a hundred times over.
As Mitt has noted; it’s the nature of capitalism. Success and failure. Winners and losers.
Solyndra was essentially a venture capital type of project. Well over half of all venture capital projects lose money for their investors — more often than not, it’s a total loss. But the odd successes more than make up for the losses along the way.
There’s an old saying; nothing ventured, nothing gained. Ventured. Venture capital. Not a conservative investment, by any means. Not for the risk averse. But without risk, there is only stagnation.
– Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA
Amazing Video via ABC News:
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/video/anti-obama-ad-americans-prosperity-solyndra-15357197
@openid.aol.com/runnswim: And the success of the auto industry is reflected in the recall of all of the Volts? GM also paid off the loan with another loan from the government. The success of the auto industry is about on par with the CA bullet trains!
Hi Randy, The Volt is a brand new vehicle, with new technology. The internal combustion engine is well over 100 years old. The risk of engine fires remains hugely greater with gasoline powered cars than with the Volt (the recall fixed the problem). The Volt is a pioneering vehicle. There will be lots of growing pains. But it’s more than paid for itself in garnering favorable publicity for GM, which is changing its image from that of a stodgy old company, building stodgy old cars to a cutting edge world class competitor. They have new vehicles at all levels — from electric compacts to a high performance BMW competitor. Meanwhile, Chrysler is going to be manufacturing Maseratis in Detroit — for a global market. They are serious with their “imported from Detroit” campaign.
Here’s the case made by the “auto czar” who oversaw the program (currently working for Michael Bloomberg):
http://www.thedetroitbureau.com/2011/12/auto-bailouts-%E2%80%9Cunambiguous-success%E2%80%9D-despite-14-bil-cost-argues-rattner/
– Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA