Obamanomics equals bankruptcy. It seems as if every day we get a new story of a “green jobs” enterprise laying people off, or closing its doors. When forensic technicians finally do manage to locate “green jobs” with the aid of powerful microscopes, it turns out they cost the taxpayers hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of dollars apiece to create.
The latest Obama Epic Fail is Solyndra, a solar technology company in California that coughed up red ink and died today, as reported by NBC Bay Area:
"I was told by a security guard to get my [stuff] and leave," one employee said. The company employs a little more than 1,000 employees worldwide, according to its website.
Shortly after it opened a massive $700 million facility, it canceled plans for a public stock offering earlier this year and warned it would be in significant trouble if federal loan guarantees did not go through.
The company has said it will make a statement at 9am California time, though it's not clear what that statement will be. An NBC Bay Area photographer on the scene reports security guards are not letting visitors on campus. He says "people are standing around in disbelief." The employees have been given yellow envelopes with instructions on how to get their last checks.
Bloomberg News reported on the statements duly delivered by company executives:
“Regulatory and policy uncertainties in recent months created significant near-term excess supply and price erosion,” Solyndra’s President and Chief Executive Officer Brian Harrison said in the statement.
[…] “The changing economics have affected a number of solar manufacturers in recent months, including unfortunately, Solyndra,” Dan Leistikow, director of the Energy Department’s Office of Public Affairs, said today in an article on the department’s website.
“We have always recognized that not every one of the innovative companies supported by our loans and loan guarantees would succeed.”
Which ones have been roaring successes?
Solyndra was a centerpiece of Obama’s wise economic stewardship, not just some puny little electric-car battery manufacturer that could be left to die after whelping a couple of million-dollar paper-pushing “green jobs.” As the NBC report explains:
Solyndra was touted by the Obama administration as a prime example of how green technology could deliver jobs. The President visited the facility in May of last year and said "it is just a testament to American ingenuity and dynamism and the fact that we continue to have the best universities in the world, the best technology in the world, and most importantly the best workers in the world. And you guys all represent that. "
The federal government offered $535 million in low cost loan guarantees from the Department of Energy. NBC Bay Area has contacted the White House asking for a statement.
Some Republicans have been very critical of the loans. "I am concerned that the DOE is providing loans and loan guarantees to firms that aren't capable of competing in the global market, even with government subsidies" Florida Congressman Cliff Stearns told the New York Times.
Looks like “some Republicans” were right again, and Obama was wrong, wrong, wrong.
The President even alluded to Solyndra in his January 2010 State of the Union speech:
Last year, we made the largest investment in basic research funding in history -– (applause) - an investment that could lead to the world's cheapest solar cells or treatment that kills cancer cells but leaves healthy ones untouched. And no area is more ripe for such innovation than energy. You can see the results of last year's investments in clean energy -– in the North Carolina company that will create 1,200 jobs nationwide helping to make advanced batteries; or in the California business that will put a thousand people to work making solar panels.
(Emphasis mine.) These massive failed attempts to restructure the free market with raw executive power have a number of ill effects, besides wasting millions in loan guarantees and taxpayer subsidies. They pump false data into the market, causing other companies to behave as if the illusory non-market actually exists. Solyndra employees just got a stiff dose of “green jobs” failure, but they’re not the only ones who will taste that bitter brew. Solyndra had suppliers, contractors, and other peripheral business contacts. All of them will be affected.
Meanwhile, the money poured into this “green” rat hole could have been used in a thousand better ways, all of them completely unknown to Obama and his central planners. Solyndra is but one of their many expensive failures. How long will it take us to recover from the damage this Administration has inflicted? Does anyone want to try blaming this on George Bush?
The death of Solyndra isn't difficult to understand, for anyone outside of the money-burning maniacs of the Obama Administration. The government does not create jobs. The government does not create markets. The most important step we can take toward economic growth is getting our money as far away as possible from people like Barack Hussein Obama.
