October 7, 2011

Either Rahm or Obama himself pushed to spotlight Solyndra...

"... despite numerous internal warnings that the company could be financially unstable, according to newly obtained e-mails," reports the Washington Post.

Then there's this Steve Spinner character, who, oddly, appears in 2 different places in the article:
“Any word from OMB?” Department of Energy stimulus adviser Steve Spinner wrote to a department staffer about final terms of the Solyndra loan to be approved by the Office of Management and Budget. “I have the OVP [Office of the Vice President] and WH [White House] breathing down my neck on this.”...

Steve Spinner, a DOE loan program adviser who had served as an Obama fundraiser in 2008, was married to a partner at the law firm of Wilson Sonsini, which was representing Solyndra in its loan application. He had signed an ethics agreement in which he said he would not engage in negotiations about the loan or loan terms for the company.

Yet throughout Solyndra’s loan process, Spinner worked hard to defend the company from criticisms inside the government, including questions from climate czar Carol Browner’s office. He pushed to get a final decision on approving the loan in August.

“How [expletive] hard is this?” Spinner wrote on Aug. 28 to an another department official. “What is he waiting for? Will we have it by the end of the day?”
I'm seeing other news reports headlined the material about Spinner, which makes me suspect that WaPo deliberately buried it.

ABC News: "Obama Fundraiser Pushed Solyndra Deal From Inside." Politico: "Solyndra loan supported by Obama fundraiser." CBS News: "Obama fundraiser pushed Solyndra loan." Bloomberg: "Energy Official With Solyndra Links Pressed for Loan."

40 comments:

sorepaw said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
mesquito said...

Green Slime.

ricpic said...

Obama is untouchable, knows he's untouchable and will actually up the theft as the end approaches. Who's gonna stop him? The (ha ha) watchdog media? The gentlemanly Republicans? The (falling down laughing) Justice Department under Eric?

veni vidi vici said...

Spinner = designated fall guy.

He will be quickly cashiered by the administration in an attempt to nip this scandal in the bud.

Ursus said...

looks like they found their scapegoat

Automatic_Wing said...

Steve Spinner sounds like a name invented by a satirical novelist.

That was my first thought as well. You really can't make this stuff up.

Winding down said...

Chicago- style operation. Writ large

David said...

Spinner indeed.

This whole process is one big cf'ing merry-go-round. The White House was pushing this hard via and on behalf of big donors. The VP was doing the same. All for a loan that no sane private lender would have considered for more than 10 minutes, once they saw the facts.

I do not think Rahm would be stupid enough to "spotlight" the loan. (Remember, Rahm had been an investment banker (for about a year and a half) and made $10-20 in his rookie year. But that's another scandal--one that will never be highlighted or punished.)

The whole thing stinks, not just for the process and substance of the loan guarantee itself, but for attitude towards taxpayer money. It's utterly irresponsible.

mesquito said...

Hey, isn't this the jackass who's always wagging his finger about "risky investments on Wall Street"?

Yeah.

Obama's a dick.

David said...

Rahm made $10-20 million, not $10-20, in his short stint as an investment banker. All very legal. They bring him in. They set him up (and his connections do help quite a bit.) They shower him with compensation. He leaves a rich and grateful man.

David said...

Wilson Sonsoni, a wealthy nest of Obama backers, got bailed out of a $2.4 million investment of legal services that otherwise probably would not had been paid. Supposedly for work on the failed IPO.

A Wilson Sonsoni spokes speaker said that Spinner's wife was Chinese walled from any work on the Solyndra offering. It would be fun to do discovery of their files and billing records, and depose some of their partners. Do not count on this happening before the 2012 election.

You are looking at modern American government, Obama style. Corrupt but arguably legal.

David said...

Actually, you are looking at modern American government, period. Obama just has raised the ante of the corruption.

Remember, corrupt and illegal do not mean the same thing.

This transaction was and is deeply corrupt.

Irene said...

No! No! Look over here: don't forget Bush, Cheney, and Halliburton .

Anonymous said...

The common theme in these recent scandals is cronyism and corruption running rampant in all branches of our government. This is just another example.

Consider what just happened in a federal court in Texas. A Dallas business owner was involved in a civil dispute and paid millions of dollars to lawyers, and when he objected to their fees, they had a “friendly” judge seize all of his property, without any notice or hearing, and essentially ordered him to be an involuntary servant to the lawyers. The business owner has been under this "servant" order for 10 months and is prohibited from owning any possessions, prohibited from working, etc...

http://lawinjustice.com/d7/nod... has details about this disturbing case.

Gahrie said...

He will be quickly cashiered by the administration in an attempt to nip this scandal in the bud.

Already was earlier this week.....

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

And remember.. these are the guys who are going to pick our doctors.

RichardS said...

There's a sleeper issue here. With the rise of the two-career couple, conflicts of interest, and apparent conflicts of interest increase. Many elected and appointed officials are married to lobbysts, judges, journalists, and others in a position to influence policy. There were always family and friendship connectsion, but with both partners in a marriage working, it's not more likely. The kinds of people who make good partners for politicians are likely to be connected.
We have not dealth with this issue. My guess is that we're afraid such a discussion will be read as an attack on equality of the sexes.
Actually, I see it as a classic case: every solution creates new problems.

David said...

Is it clear how much of an outrage I think this is?

Plus $2.4 million is an obscene fee for an IPO (failed!) of a company with a relatively simple business model.

This really burns me but I will shut up now. (You may say GOOD! if you like.)

RichardS said...

Any way to put a speel check in the comments section? Sorry about the typos.

Mary Beth said...

The e-mails also show that the Department of Energy was told by the Treasury Department that its refinancing arrangement for the Solyndra loan in early 2011 might be improper and should be cleared with the Department of Justice.

As if the DoJ cared about what is improper.

edutcher said...

Add Solyndra to Gunrunner and Gibson Guitar and this crowd makes the Ozark bunch look good.

ricpic said...

Obama is untouchable, knows he's untouchable and will actually up the theft as the end approaches. Who's gonna stop him? The (ha ha) watchdog media? The gentlemanly Republicans? The (falling down laughing) Justice Department under Eric?

He's very touchable and he knows it; that's why Dr Evil is orchestrating the OccupyWherever protests.

The Republicans don't need to do much more than nominate somebody; unless something even worse comes out - and it might - doing the impeachment thing with one House of Congress in enemy hands right now is an exercise in futility, so Issa's doing all he can to make sure everybody knows how dirty this crowd is.

Mark O said...

If you ever worked in a big law firm and watched one of these, what used to be called "Chinese" walls, you would laugh out loud at this. This gives new understanding to the claim of conflict of interest. Where is the Cal Bar? Someone could be in the kind of trouble that could cause them to do what the Obamas did, surrender a law license.

traditionalguy said...

The art of plausible deniability as Federal money flows unchecked to cooperative con men.

What do we need to send to DC to stop this method of operation dead in its tracks?

How about a mathematics expert with experience demanding businesses turn around and operate at a profit.

That would disqualify the career politicians...Hmmm.

Real American said...

it's the lefty media's job to cover Obama. It's their job to cover FOR Obama.

Hagar said...

I have concluded that "crony capitalism" is when a person or corporation thinks there is money to be made in a business and petitions the government for aid to get the business started, but ultimately expects the profits to come from operating the business.

"Crony socialism" is when government officials wants a business to get underway for ideological reasons and gives money to private persons or firms to do it, and these do not believe the business will succeed, but take the money anyway, in tending to make their profit by siphoning off as much as possibel before the venture goes bankrupt.

"Solyndra," and I think many others like it, thus are examples of "crony socialism," not "crony capitalism."

coketown said...

Solyndra isn't the first speech-friendly anecdote that went sour on Obama. In theory, having a concrete example of what you're arguing makes said argument more persuasive. It seems more persuasive, if you're arguing in support of the necessity of government in facilitating the transition to a green economy, to have a company that benefited from federal money, hired workers, and managed to turn a profit. Solyndra failed on the last two counts.

Also, Obama's mom wasn't the helpless victim of her health insurer that Obama said she was.

Also, that diner in Ohio closed down the week after Obama mentioned it as an example of a small business benefiting from his policies.

Ultimately, it's poor practice to draw attention to everything your administration has touched when everything your administration touches turns to shit. Maybe Obama had the right idea speaking in vague abstraction during the entire 2008 campaign?

Dust Bunny Queen said...

that's why Dr Evil is orchestrating the OccupyWherever protests.

Exactly.

Obama WANTS to have chaos, destruction and even death. He doesn't care as long as it keeps him and his cronies in power.

The destruction of the economy is on purpose. The inflation in prices ...on purpose. The cost of oil for heating and gasoline for transportation....on purpose. He said so.

The man wants to destroy the United States and has a couple of generations of useless idiots programed by the union controlled school system to help him in the destruction.

By the time they figure out that they have been used....it will be too late for all of us. Too late for generations to come and decades and decades to recover, if ever, what we have lost because people carelessly threw away their votes on this evil man, just so they could feel good about themselves.

The only thing that can or will stop this runaway train is going to be ugly and it has to start soon.

Paul said...

Let's see...

Solyndra .. Rahm.. $$$
Fast & Furious.. Holder.. dead bodies
LightSquared.. who knows.. $$$

And who knows how much graft was in the 'stimulus' that was passed over two years ago.

But funny how the press gets no where near upset as they did with Ed Meese and his cuff links (and they called that the SLEEZE FACTOR!)

BJM said...

Overheard outside the Oval Office:

"Well, Steve, I'm sorry indeed to lose you, but I want you to know I couldn't be fonder of you if you were my own son. Well, if you lose a son, it's possible to get another. There's only one White House. When you're an underling, you simply don't understand these things."

(Apologies to John Huston and Dashiell Hammet)

Bruce Hayden said...

Actually, you are looking at modern American government, period. Obama just has raised the ante of the corruption.

Yeh, they used to take millions, now it is billions. When it was millions, we could chalk it up to the cost of having government. But billions quickly turn into trillions, which is where we are now, and a good part of why we are in trouble now.

And, if you thought that Soyndra was bad, just wait. The Obama Administration had some $8 billion or so of "green energy" loan guarantees that it needed to give away by the end of last month, and they did yeoman work doing so, giving more to the people who funded Solyndra, $3/4 billion to Pelosi's husband's company, etc.

It was almost as if they knew that they had only 4 short years to loot the treasury and stick the American people with the tab, and went gung ho doing it. And, now we will be spending the next generation or so paying off their looting.

I'm Full of Soup said...

"Walled off" ?

Interesting attempt to say she did not benefit from the deal. Maybe the Wall Street banks should have claimed the TARP money was "walled off" from the bonuses they paid.

Then the Dems would have left them alone? and we would not be having these protests?

Lastly, why did we [the govt] also pay Solyndra's legal fees when we were lending them $535 Million?

kimsch said...

Richard S. -

there is a spell check in the comments. At the bottom right corner of the text box you write your comment in there is a little checkmark with ABC right above it. Click on that and your misspelled words will show with red underlines. Right-click on a word with a red underline and it will suggest spellings for you. Just click on the correct one.

wv: recaters - The company doesn't like the first caterer for the event so it recaters.

David said...

Lastly, why did we [the govt] also pay Solyndra's legal fees when we were lending them $535 Million?

All legal.

They just use part of the loan proceeds to pay the lawyers.

No laws were broken. Just any sense of ethics or honor.

T J Sawyer said...

Kimsch.

I find that fascinating. I don't see any such "abc" on my browser, Firefox 7.0.1

But I have always had spell check! It doesn't like your name and underlines in in red.

So I switched over to IE 6.0 and it also doesn't have any little "abc" either. - but it doesn't have any spell checking!

Ah the wonderful world of HTML, browsers and standards. Too bad I can't try this on an Apple product.

sorepaw said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
jerryofva said...

Solyndra is nothing more then Altgeld Gardens on steroids. Young Barry went to organize the Algeld Gardens community to bring jobs and better housing to the masses. After he was finished the people he was "trying" to help were worse off for his efforts. However, Tony Rezko was a couple million dollars richer. It was all just a scheme to transfer tax payer money into the pockets of members of the Chicago machine.

Green energy is the same thing. Obama and his buddies tell us that they are saving the planet and making the economy grow but the planet doesn't need saving and green energy is destroying jobs by thousands just like it did in Spain. Think of the country as one big Chicago machine dominated neighborhood. The entire purpose of green energy is to create shell companies for friends of Obama to receive billions of taxpayer dollars.

Socialism, like alcoholism is a progressive disease. While never being in power the Democrat Party, like all advanced socialist parties, has become nothing more then one organized criminal enterprise. We are not dealing with old style Tammany Hall style corruption. It is more like Spectre come to life.

AllenS said...

Can you imagine if we have four more years of this obama character?

Mick said...

Dust Bunny Queen said...
"that's why Dr Evil is orchestrating the OccupyWherever protests.

Exactly.

Obama WANTS to have chaos, destruction and even death. He doesn't care as long as it keeps him and his cronies in power.

The destruction of the economy is on purpose. The inflation in prices ...on purpose. The cost of oil for heating and gasoline for transportation....on purpose. He said so.

The man wants to destroy the United States and has a couple of generations of useless idiots programed by the union controlled school system to help him in the destruction.

By the time they figure out that they have been used....it will be too late for all of us. Too late for generations to come and decades and decades to recover, if ever, what we have lost because people carelessly threw away their votes on this evil man, just so they could feel good about themselves.

The only thing that can or will stop this runaway train is going to be ugly and it has to start soon."






Hmmm. Maybe some are coming around to the danger that Obama the Usurper represents. Like I have said many times, Obama is not "stupid". It takes intelligence to Usurp the most powerful office in the World!

He was chosen specifically by the NWO Central Bankers to oversee the destruction of the US economy and Constitution-- Why? Because:

1) He lacks the attachment and allegiance to America necessary to be it's leader, as envisioned and required by the Framers, since he is not a natural born Citizen (born British of a British subject father).

2) The fact of his ineligibility corrupts the whole political system, and degrades the US Constitution, and the sovereignty of We the People. What Constitution is there if the Chief Magistrate is not even eligible according to the Cnstitution he swore to "protect and defend"? (Did he even take that oath?)

3) The US Constitution must be destroyed in order for America to fall in line with the New World Order, led by the Oligarchs of the World Central Banks.

4) Congress, who knowingly allowed the Treason of Obama's Usurpation are now easily blackmailed and molded to the NWO, as is Obama--- bought and sold.

It's really quite plain to see, but the "law prof" and others here, can't see it because of false assumptions, and normalcy bias. This whole nightmare can begin to be halted ONLY when Obama is thrown out of office for his ineligibility, because he was born British-- that is his Kryptonite.

Use Obama's Kryptonite, and everything he signed, every one he appointed, would be deemed a nullity. Only the can the Nation heal from the stain on our history that is Obama, and the Treasonous Congress that allowed him to ascend to power.

The Kryptonite is right there for the "law prof" to use. Imagine the firestorm that would ignite if such a widely read blog as this shone the light on it? But alas, she is cowed by the "racist" and "birther" epithets. I mean, she must know--- she is a "law prof" , right?

wv: poprents--- gay male "parents"

sorepaw said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
John said...

Just wondered if you're aware that the article you linked has gone done the memory hole. The link still works, but it no longer says anything about Rahm or Obama spotlighting anything.

Also see this post at Hot Air that includes quotes that no longer exist in the current article.