Free Republic

White House gives up more Solyndra docsBy Andrew Restuccia and Ben Geman - 02/03/12 06:45 PM ET Amid threats by a top House Republican to pursue contempt charges, the White House on Friday sent lawmakers more internal documents related to the $535 million loan guarantee to failed solar firm Solyndra. The White House, in providing the 313 pages of documents, again denied that approval of the loan guarantee in 2009 was influenced by politics, an allegation that Republicans have repeated for months. “Notwithstanding the lack of any evidence supporting the Committee’s allegations of favoritism to campaign donors or other alleged...

Is sugar as dangerous as alcohol and tobacco? One group of researchers from the University of California, San Francisco, says so. And they are urging a tax on sugary treats and some action by the government to get Americans to cut back on sugar. In an editorial published today in the journal Nature, the UCSF doctors, Robert Lustig, Laura Schmidt and Claire Brindis, said the ballooning rates — and costs — of obesity, diabetes and other diseases, mean it’s time for regulators to lump sugar into the same category as booze and cigarettes and put similar restrictions on its sale...

If anyone is tired of the daily European soap opera with surrealistic tragicomic overtones, they can simply shift their gaze to the 8th largest economy in the world: the insolvent state of California, whose controller just told legislators has just over a month worth of cash left. From the Sacramento Bee: "California will run out of cash by early March if the state does not take swift action to find $3.3 billion through payment delays and borrowing, according to a letter state Controller John Chiang sent to state lawmakers today. The announcement is surprising since lawmakers previously believed the state...

Yesterday I noted that another green energy investment by the Obama administration had gone bankrupt. I posted video of the Vice President visiting the company. Today I’ve got video of the President touting his green investment in Indiana, including the now bankrupt EnerDel. This is from August 2009:

While politicians may debate whether or not America is the most "generous" (with other generations' money of course) socialist welfare state in the history of mankind, the undoctored numbers make the affirmative case quite clear and without any chance for confusion. The single most disturbing statistic: in 2011 nearly half of the population lived in a household that receives some form of government benefit, which in turn accounted for 65% of total federal spending, or $2.5 trillion, and amount to 15% of GDP. And yet some people out there still think these people, long since indoctrinated to do little but...

Obama delays budget for 2013 By Erik Wasson - 01/23/12 02:08 PM ET President Obama will release his 2013 budget one week late, an administration official said Monday, the third time the administration has missed the legal deadline. Under the law, the budget is to be released on the first Monday in February, but the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) will be releasing the 2013 budget on Feb. 13. The Obama administration also delayed the release of the budget last year, waiting until Feb. 14. House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) said the delay is symptomatic of a...

Despite history – and current events involving alternative energy companies – many Americans buy into the notion that for good things to happen, the government needs to be involved, even in charge. How many Solyndras is too many?

Obama Was Warned By His Economic Team That His Campaign Promises Would Create A Mountain Of Debt Michael Brendan Dougherty Jan. 23, 2012, 8:57 AM Ryan Lizza reports for the New Yorker that on December 15 2008, a few short weeks before his inauguration, president-elect Obama was presented with a 57-page memo on the depth of the economic crisis drafted by Lawrence Summers and other economic advisors. The memo informed the president that if he enacted his campaign promises in the current environment, he would shoot a gigantic hole into the nation's budget. “Since January 2007 the medium-term budget deficit...

After saddling the country with as much new debt as the rest of the world combined in one year flat, one would think that Uncle Sam wouldn’t have the cojones to dish out debt advice to others. But one would be wrong. In an unwitting self-parody worthy of Froma Harrop on The Daily Show, the Federal Trade Commission has created a step-by-step web guide for Americans “Knee-Deep in Debt.” The first step, says the agency, which represents a government that went over 800 days without passing a budget, is: create a budget! Get a “realistic assessment of how much money...

Sometimes it helps to offer an analogy to show how utterly out of their minds they are in Washington when it comes to financial matters. We offer for your consideration, this short video. The names have been changed to protect the politicians.

Now seems an unlikely time for handing out bonuses at bankrupt Solyndra LLC, but that’s the plan of company attorneys intending to dole out up to a half-million dollars to persuade key employees to stay put. Nearly two dozen Solyndra employees could receive bonuses ranging from $10,000 to $50,000 each under a proposal filed by Solyndra’s attorneys in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware. The attorneys say the extra money will add motivation at a time when workers at the solar company have little job security and more responsibilities because so many of their colleagues have been fired. The names of...

How the U.S. National Debt Could Drain Your Savings January 9, 2012 By David Zeiler, Associate Editor, Money Morning Now that Congress has allowed the U.S. national debt to grow bigger than the American economy, it won't be long until the American public suffers the consequences by losing most of its savings to inflation.Figures for last year show the national debt officially exceeded 100% of the nation's gross domestic product (GDP). According to government figures, the national debt stood at $15.23 trillion at the close of 2011, compared to a GDP of $15.18 trillion. "The 100% mark means that your...

CHICAGO (CBS) — Eighty-five Illinois Lottery winners last week probably thought they were lucky — until they tried to cash in their winnings, that is. Their checks, totaling $159,000 in lottery winnings, were no good. Two days after Christmas, Maureen Furio of Lake Zurich bought an instant scratch-off ticket and won $1000. The next day, she got a check from the lottery. “I deposited it the same day and went ahead and paid some extra Christmas bills,” Furio says. “And Jan. 3, it bounced.”

Media propagandists continue to advance the Democratic Party line. On December 21, Bloomberg News breathlessly reported, "The leading Republican candidates for president have embraced an explanation of the financial crisis that has been rejected by the chairman of the Federal Reserve, many economists and even three of the four Republicans on the government commission that investigated the meltdown." Reporter David J. Lynch further explained, "Both former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney lay much of the blame on U.S. government housing policies, saying they led to the real estate crash that almost brought down the banking...

The U.S. government-run mortgage finance firms Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac could play a bigger role in turning around the battered U.S. housing market, the Federal Reserve told Congress, a call that looks set to run into stiff political opposition. The Fed, in a paper sent to lawmakers on Wednesday, outlined an array of steps that could be taken to help the housing sector, including allowing Fannie and Freddie to provide cheaper mortgages to a broader pool of homeowners. The two companies, the biggest sources of U.S. mortgage funding, were seized by the government in 2008 when they were on...

KAILUA, HAWAII - President Barack Obama and his family and friends left Oahu on January 2, 2012, after a 17-day, notably low key vacation. While the Obamas were in the islands, they visited the grave of Stanley Dunham, President Obama's grandfather, at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific and an exhibit at the East West Center that featured work of Stanley Ann Dunham, the president's deceased mother. The family also stopped at the President's favorite Kailua shave ice store, Island Snow, and the President played golf with his friends at Mid Pacific Country Club in Kailua and at Ko'olau...

The Obama administration delayed asking Congress to raise the U.S. debt ceiling by $1.2 trillion after congressional leaders objected to the time frame. The White House said the delay won't affect the nation's creditworthiness, The Washington Post reported.Under the request the administration originally planned to submit Friday, Congress would have had 15 days to disapprove the request or else the debt ceiling automatically would have been raised from $15.2 trillion to $16.4 trillion.Congressional leaders, however, objected to the timeline, saying it would have been difficult for lawmakers to vote on the measure. The House doesn't return until Jan. 17 and...

HONOLULU -- President Obama will hold off on asking Congress to raise the debt limit on Friday as the Treasury Department had originally intended, White House principal deputy press secretary Josh Earnest said. Listening to requests from House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) to have more time so that both houses can vote on a measure of disapproval. As part of the $1.2 trillion deal reached in August, both houses voted on a similar incremental increase in September. It passed in the House but fell in the Senate, and would need a two-thirds majority...

The same man who oversaw MF Global’s $1.2 billion in missing funds, Bradley I. Abelow, is also currently listed on the Environmental Protection Agency’s website as the current chairman of the EPA’s Financial Advisory Board. SNIP Mr. Abelow also served as former New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine’s chief of staff before Mr. Corzine went on to become MF Global’s CEO. Interestingly, current EPA Administrator Lisa Smith also previously served as then-Gov. Corzine’s chief of staff. Whether the Corzine connection played any role in Mr. Abelow’s appointment to the chairmanship of the EPA’s Financial Advisory Board is as yet unclear. Mr....

10 Things Medicare Won't Tell YouThe government's massive entitlement program is full of costly glitches By CATEY HILL DECEMBER 20, 2011, 6:05 P.M. ET 1. "We fork over millions for unproven procedures." 2. "Think Social Security is broke? Just look at Medicare." 3. "We pay for dead people." 4. "Don't expect a five-star plan." 5. "We're not popular with many doctors." 6. "We get ripped off a lot." 7. "We don't cover a lot of the care seniors need most." 8. "Paws off that cash, grandpa: Your settlement is ours." 9. "Complain all you want ..." 10. "Want Your Way?...

Fitch, when it lowered its outlook to negative, had said it was giving the U.S. government until 2013 to come up with a "credible plan" to tackle its ballooning budget deficit or risk a downgrade from the AAA status. "A key task of an incoming Congress and administration in 2013 is to formulate a credible plan to reduce the budget deficit and stabilize the federal debt burden. Without such a strategy, the sovereign rating will likely be lowered by the end of 2013," Fitch reiterated. Rival ratings agency Standard & Poor's cut its credit rating on the United States to...

Politics: Lost in Beltway wrangling over a payroll tax cut, an ugly reality lurks: Our politicians are plotting yet another raid on the Social Security "trust fund," which is already near insolvency. When will this madness stop? President Obama and his congressional Democrats know well how bad their spendthrift reputation is among voters as election day approaches. With Obama at sub-50% approval numbers and Gallup reporting Congress clocking in at a record-low 11%, they expect a bloodbath at the polls in November — and maybe another slashed debt rating, too. What then could be better for Democrats than to be...

A legal loophole in international brokerage regulations means that few, if any, clients of MF Global are likely to get their money back. Although details of the drama are still unfolding, it appears that MF Global and some of its Wall Street counterparts have been actively and aggressively circumventing U.S. securities rules at the expense (quite literally) of their clients. MF Global's bankruptcy revelations concerning missing client money suggest that funds were not inadvertently misplaced or gobbled up in MF’s dying hours, but were instead appropriated as part of a mass Wall St manipulation of brokerage rules that allowed for...

The millions that Jon Corzine amassed as head of Goldman Sachs have become an alluring target for investors who were crushed by the collapse of MF Global, the brokerage firm he led until earlier this month. And Corzine isn't the only one who may be financially vulnerable after the eighth-largest bankruptcy in U.S. history. Others include MF Global's other top executives; its auditor, PricewaterhouseCoopers; and some big Wall Street banks. Even MF Global itself, which can't be sued while in bankruptcy protection, could sue its former executives.

Vice President Joe Biden, now best known for being the man who relies primarily on Jon Corzine for financial advice, continued his recent roll of epic linguistic blunders this morning. As Reuters reports, the VP, "joked during a visit to debt-choked Athens on Monday about bringing money to help Greece out of its deepest financial crisis in decades. Introducing a member of his delegation during a meeting with Greek President Karolos Papoulias, Biden said: "This man represents the Treasury department. He's brought hundreds of millions of dollars." His comments drew laughs from both the Greek and U.S. delegations." It...

Solyndra saw staff "mutiny" before Obama visitBy Roberta Rampton | Reuters – 15 hrs ago **SNIP** An initial public offering was on the skids, and finally, there was a "mutiny" by the company's entire executive team, who flagged the crisis to the company's board of directors. The e-mails between senior advisers to George Kaiser, a major investor in the company, provide the best view yet into how problems took root early at Solyndra. The company had received a $535 million federal loan guarantee in 2009 and was held up by the Obama administration as an example of how it could...

CHART OF THE DAY: KYLE BASS: This Is What The End Of The Global Debt Super-Cycle Looks Like Joe Weisenthal Dec. 1, 2011, 10:39 AM In his latest investor letter (via Gurufocus), Kyle Bass lays out his case that a wave of hard defaults is coming. His basic argument: The world is just saddled with too much debt. Throughout history, he says, total debt-to-GDP only ever breached 200% when nations were spending on war. Today we're at 310%. Says Bass: "There is no savior large enough with a magical pool of capital to stafe off this unfortunate conclusion to the...

The long slog continues. The feature of the post-crisis economy has been a two-speed recovery. As a group, companies have done extremely well. Corporate profits and cash holdings are at record highs. The stock market has bounced back smartly since the lows of March 2009. But consumers haven't done quite as well. For consumers, it takes a lot longer to restructure debt. Families can't fire their kids, or walk away from financial commitments so easily. For most families, the biggest fixed cost is generally housing. And while it's possible to cut housing costs by defaulting, or refinancing, or downsizing, people...

As was reported yesterday, while nobody gives a rat's behind about events in Greece any more now that the focus is completely on Italy, Spain, Belgium, Austria, and France, or in other words, the core, things in Greece have been getting far worse since the so called coalition government was implemented. As AP reported recently, "protesting power and municipal workers blockaded several state electricity company buildings around Greece Monday, in protest at an emergency property tax being collected through electricity bills. Members of an electricity workers' union cut off power last week to the Health Ministry for four hours, and...

With Detroit Mayor Dave Bing preparing to explain the city's fiscal crisis tonight in a rare televised address, Council President Pro Tem Gary Brown says the situation is even worse than anyone has let on. Bing is expected to discuss a confidential Ernst & Young report obtained by the Detroit Free Press that suggests Detroit could run out of cash by April without steep cuts to staff and public services. That's a grim prognosis, but according to Brown, the city actually could be unable to make payroll "as early as December." "I know the report says April, but there are...

Scoffing at Washington's troubled effort to cut just $1.2 trillion in federal debt over 10 years, the Tea Party's own debt commission today unveiled a shocking plan to slash nearly $10 trillion over the next decade, in part by eliminating several federal agencies, balancing the budget by 2015, and killing foreign aid to unfriendly nations. "Go bold or go home," says the report from the Tea Party Debt Commission. "Are you listening, Washington?"The FreedomWorks-led effort started months ago by asking Tea Party members for ideas on what to cut from the federal budget. They ended up going much further than...

Trouble is, Democrats don't buy into it -- at least not yet. Senate supercommittee members Patty Murray and John Kerry have opposed real tax reform. And it has been reported that House supercommittee member Xavier Becerra opposes it (although Chris van Hollen might be looking at it). But the whole trouble with the machinations of the two sides in this deficit-cutting episode is that the closer you get to the Nov. 23 deadline, the more compromises are made. Democrats are pulling hard for higher tax rates, which would damage the economy, while Republicans are making no progress getting any meaningful...

HOLY S*** GUYS STRUGGLE STRIKES GOLD AGAIN! http://il.findacase.com/research/wfrmDocViewer.aspx/xq/fac.20110324_0000757.NIL.htm/qx LOLOLOLOLLLOLOLOLOLOLOOLOL So that’s why Zuckerman wants money! Send this to Cain and all your media outlets!

Jon Corzine has been the CEO of Goldman Sachs, a United States senator, and the governor of New Jersey, the position he held in 2009, when the Obama administration was preparing to take office. His mix of Wall-Street and public-sector executive experience is doubtless why the Obama transition team called on him for advice. As Joe Biden tells it, they'd gathered a few dozen economists in Chicago to talk over the financial crisis. Some were suggesting a bank holiday. "I literally picked up the phone and called Jon Corzine and said Jon, what do you think we should do," Biden...

The biggest fashion spenders in America aren't New Yorkers, Los Angelinos or even Chicagoans. They're Washington, DC locals. A new list by Bundle.com focuses on different spending habits across the U.S. - and has thrown some less than predictable cities into the fashion spotlight. Focusing on average monthly spend on clothes, shoes and other wear, the figures show that DC - not normally associated with fashion - is packed with shopaholics who spend, on average, a massive $263 each month on clothes and shoes. Serious spending: As much as NYC is viewed as a shoppers' city, it is Washington DC...

Some members of a bankrupt Orange County, Calif. megachurch are expressing outrage after fielding an email request for congregants to deliver food to waiting limos so that it can ferried to the founder's sick wife. The appeal comes weeks after a lawsuit charged that the founder of the Crystal Cathedral house of worship, Rev. Robert Schuller, and his family had been paying themselves lavish salaries and other benefits while the church was in financial straits. "They've completely depleted the church's funds," one member, Bob Canfield, told the Orange County Register. "But they have shown that they have absolutely no remorse...

Earlier today, we highlighted two bankruptcies involving taxpayer-backed loan guarantees for federal social engineering, and involving some bad judgment — or worse. One might wonder how many more of these taxpayer-backed loan recipients might go under in the coming weeks and months. CBS might have given us a sneak peek of the next Solyndra — or at least the next Beacon Power: A company whose subsidiary received $118 million in stimulus grant money from the U.S. Department of Energy to build new electric car batteries has now been removed from trading on NASDAQ. EnerDel got an Energy Department grant in...

POLITICO Pro’s early-morning energy newsletter reports on the closing of another environmental company that was backed by the Energy Department, shortly after the White House announced that it would review the loan process that awarded money to Solyndra: This time, it’s Massachusetts-based energy storage firm Beacon Power Corp., which filed for bankruptcy this weekend despite receiving a federal $43 million loan guarantee in August of last year. In the filing, company CEO William Capp cited the current economic and political climate and DOE’s financing terms as reasons for Beacon’s failure, Bloomberg reports. KEY DIFFERENCE FROM SOLYNDRA: Taxpayers appear positioned to...

(Reuters) - Beacon Power Corp filed for bankruptcy on Sunday, just a year after the energy storage company received a $43 million loan guarantee from a controversial Department of Energy program. The bankruptcy comes about two months after Solyndra -- a solar panel maker with a $535 million loan guarantee -- also filed for Chapter 11, creating a political embarrassment for the administration of President Barack Obama, which has championed the loans as a way to create "green energy" jobs. Beacon Power drew down $39 million of its government-guaranteed loan to fund a portion of a $69 million, 20-megawatt flywheel...

MF Global, the brokerage run by former Goldman Sachs chief Jon Corzine, today filed for bankruptcy protection, becoming one of the highest-profile U.S. victims of bad bets on European government debt. With the Chapter 11 filing, MF Global also is likely to be added to the ignominious list of the 10 largest bankruptcies in U.S. corporate history.

Second Energy Department-backed company goes bankruptBy Ben Geman - 10/31/11 08:04 AM ET A Massachusetts company that received a $43 million Energy Department loan guarantee last year filed for bankruptcy Sunday, a step certain to fuel criticism of federal green energy financing in the wake of the solar company Solyndra’s collapse. Beacon Power Corp., which develops energy storage systems, filed for bankruptcy protection in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware. Beacon Power had received federal loan guarantee to help build an energy storage plant in Stephentown, New York that began operating in January. The Treasury Department’s Federal Financing Bank provided...

At the same time that the Obama campaign has doubled down in its efforts to woo millennials, the president himself has made a point to pander to loan-burdened college graduates. He first announced his plans to help students pay off their loans as a part of his budget proposals — but, in the furor of the Occupy Wall Street protests, he’s seen fit to promote them more intentionally.Right now, graduates enrolled in the federal government’s student loan Income-Based Repayment Plan make monthly payments of 15 percent of their discretionary income — and all debt is forgiven after 25 years. Congress...

GALVESTON - Francisco Martinez wasn't happy about the free trip back to Mexico offered to him by a social worker at the University of Texas Medical Branch. Martinez, 37, of Bacliff, broke his back Aug. 17 after falling off a ladder while working on the roof of a bait shop where he was employed. UTMB doctors saved his life, but he is paralyzed from the chest down, can barely move his hands and needs special care.

Tennessee Electrified Truck Terminal Files for Bankruptcy After $400,000 Stimulus InjectionBy Jonathan Serrie FoxNews.com Published October 19, 2011 DANDRIDGE, Tenn. – Just months after obtaining more than $400,000 in federal stimulus funds, TR Auto Truck Plaza off Interstate 40 sits idle. The Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT) handed out the $424,000 Environmental Protection Agency stimulus grant for electrical hookups so that truckers wouldn't have to burn diesel fuel while resting. Both the state and EPA were apparently unaware that owner Rick Lewis had a history of legal and financial problems and had filed for bankruptcy. What was originally lauded as...

Our tax dollars at work… a half-billion dollar loan (actually $529 million) from the U.S. Department of Energy to develop a hybrid toy for the wealthy and/or celebri-licious (like Leonardo DiCaprio, one of the first customers) that, in real world driving, won’t get much better mileage than your average crossover utility vehicle. Not only that, but the cars are manufactured in Finland — that’s right, Finland – and shipped here for sale, where their purchasers will then receive a $7,500 tax credit for buying one (the “cheap” base model starts at $96,895, with the full-zoot Eco Chic model going for...

BRUSSELS—The European Commission is leaning toward proposing a ban on the issuing of sovereign credit ratings for countries in bailout talks, a top official said on Thursday. "I think it's legitimate to have a special treatment when a country is in negotiation or is covered by an international solidarity program with the IMF or a European solidarity" program, said Michel Barnier, European internal market commissioner. Should the commission, the executive arm of the European Union, come to view these sovereign ratings are inappropriate, "we could ban it or suspend the rating for the necessary time frame," he said. "I am...

California plan(s) to launch their long-promised cap and trade program to fight global warming starting tomorrow (Oct. 20, 2011). (Not coincidentally) Tomorrow’s Wall Street Journal will include these two headlines that are up already online: Japan Reconsiders Plan to Cut Carbon Emissions And, EU Weighs Pullback on Cutting Emissions

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The government ran a $1.3 trillion for the budget year that ended last month, the third straight year it has operated more than $1 trillion in the red. The 2011 budget deficit was the second highest on record. It's slightly ahead of the previous budget year's $1.29 trillion deficit but below the $1.41 trillion imbalance record in 2009. A decade ago, the government was running surpluses and trillion-dollar deficits seemed unimaginable. But those deficits now loom over tense negotiations in Washington. Lawmakers are under pressure to agree by Thanksgiving on where they can cut $1.2 trillion over...

I want to welcome this groundbreaking scientific expedition to the savage lands of the Left Coast. You are here in California to answer an important theoretical question and now you have your answer. Yes, this is what Barack Obama’s second term would look like. Study it. Fear it. And then go home and make sure that it never happens to the rest of the country. Of course, in spite of all of its problems, California is still one of the best places in the country to build a successful small business. All you have to do is start with a...

As states such as Alabama and Georgia make waves with a hard-line approach to illegal immigration, California took a leap in the other direction this weekend when Gov. Jerry Brown signed a host of bills that make the nation's biggest state one of the most accepting of immigrants living here illegally. Some saw the flurry of new laws, especially the California Dream Act, as a rejection of the political fervor against illegal immigration in other parts of the country. "Wherever California goes, so does the nation. It may put a halt to some of this," said Assemblyman Paul Fong, D-Cupertino,...