Green subsidies: A breeding ground for corruption
by Timothy P. Carney Senior Political Columnist
(Getty Images)
- Solar panel company Solyndra, which went bankrupt after getting a half-billion subsidy from the U.S. government, is largely owned by Obama fundraiser George Kaiser, who has visited the White House 16 times.
- Al Gore acolyte Cathy Zoi was Obama's assistant secretary for energy efficiency and renewable energy while her husband was an executive at a company that received direct subsidies from the Obama administration and profited from the Cash-for-Caulkers bill Zoi's division implemented. Zoi has since left DOE to run a clean-tech hedge fund owned in large part by Democratic mega-donor George Soros.
- A group of Democratic operatives have formed an investment company called U.S. Renewable Energy Group, or US-REG, which seems to exist for the sake of buying green-tech companies, and then helping them get subsidies. In at least one case, US-REG appeared to be a U.S. beard for a Chinese company seeking U.S. dollars to make wind turbines in China.
- The Department of Energy's inspector general has repeatedly found that a loan program created by the 2005 energy bill and expanded by Obama's stimulus falls short on transparency and accountability.
- The company with the biggest investments in green energy is General Electric, whose CEO is a top Obama advisor.
- Treasury Department chief of staff Mark Patterson was a Goldman Sachs lobbyist advocating susbidies for cellulosic ethanol while Goldman was buying up a cellulosic ethanol company. Patterson never received a waiver from the administration's restrictions on former lobbyists, but the adminstration has never explained how a Goldman lobbyist could work at Treasury without working on issues affecting tax law, finance, banking, or Goldman.
- A Soperton, Ga., ethanol plant -- founded by major Democratic donor Vinod Khosla -- sucked up more than $162 in federal and state subsidies before shutting down without ever producing a drop of ethanol.
The more we dig into green energy subsidies, the more rot I expect we will find. |
