From the San Francisco Examiner; In the days after Obama’s inauguration, Jeffrey Immelt, the General Electric CEO who would go on to head up the president’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness celebrated the emerging new order.
“The global economy and capitalism will be ‘reset’ in several important ways the interaction between government and business will change forever,” Immelt said.
"With the federal government serving as “a regulator; an industry policy champion, a financier and a key partner,” Immelt wrote, this environment would present “an opportunity of a lifetime.”
To be sure Mr. Immelt has made the most of this new relationship and while it has done much to revive a company that was on the verge of failure when Obama took office its hard to argue that's it's been an unmitigated blessing to the US taxpayers. Sharing this vision of government as an industrial policy champion, financier, and key partner, a horde of avaricious rent seekers who had aided the administration in its election descended upon Washington to collect their due. Perhaps the brightest of the new stars was Solyndra, a company without any productive capacity but with capital and very good political connections, seeking a financier and key partner. After what seems now to be an all but inevitable bankruptcy it was learned that the DOE had subordinated the taxpayers' interest to that of an Obama fund raiser, George Kaiser. As White House documents were released suspicion was heighten until a Republican majority issued a subpoena to the White House for all documents. To date the Obama administration has not complied and has indicated it will not. Democrats accuse the Republicans of releasing to the public only the most damaging evidence but when a congressional investigation follows a raid by the FBI on the firm's offices and the executives of the firm invoke the protection of the fifth amendment it fair to speculate that the Democrats have an uphill battle to convince the public that the other party has prejudged the case.
Kathryn Ruemmler is the White House counsel, and surely knows what a subpoena means and what its recipient is obliged to do when it comes to good faith compliance. Still she complains complying "would require the devotion of substantial resources to gather and review many documents," creating "an unreasonable burden on the president's ability to meet his constitutional duties." In other words she doesn't have time.
The emails released by a House committee appear to contradict repeated assurances by the Obama administration that the donor, George Kaiser, never talked about Solyndra with the White House. Also it is known that Solyndra was discussed with the Vice President's people."They about had an orgasm in Biden's office when we mentioned Solyndra," reads a Feb. 27, 2010, email from Ken Levit, the executive director of the Kaiser fund to Steve Mitchell,who manages Argonaut Private Equity and was a member of Solyndra's board. A follow-up email from Mitchell to Levit later that day responds with: "That's awesome! Get us a (Department of Energy) loan."
In another email Mitchell writes, “It appears things are headed in the right direction and Chu is apparently staying involved in Solyndra’s application and continues to talk up the company as a success story".
Considering George Kaiser and the White House had previously denied speaking about the loan guarantees I can't wait to see the emails that will eventually come from the White House and they will eventually come. The Washington Examiner which smells cover up quips;
"Some enterprising publisher will recognize that the game is just now begun, and should advance some credentialed crusader a considerable sum to come out with a Solyndra book in October 2012. The sales it will have! Toss in Fast and Furious and it will stay weeks at the top of the New York Times' list."
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