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FBI raids solar panel company hailed by Obama

by Bob in Breckenridge ( 7 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Breaking News, Crime, Cult of Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Elections 2012, Energy, Environmentalism, Headlines, Politics, Progressives, Tranzis at September 8th, 2011 - 3:53 pm

Obungler…Another epic fail. BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Of course the bad news is that this company got $500 million of our money, and with the FBI raiding it, it’s a good bet that a lot of our money wasn’t used for many so-called “green jobs”.

FBI raids solar panel company hailed by Obama

Firm got $500 million in stimulus funds

FBI agents on Thursday executed search warrants at the headquarters of Solyndra LLC, which was awarded more than $500 million in federal stimulus loans in 2009 to make solar panels in what the Obama administration called part of an aggressive effort to put more Americans to work and end U.S. dependence on foreign oil.

But the company filed a bankruptcy petition Tuesday in Delaware, asking a court to bar phone, electricity and water and sewer service providers from “altering, refusing or discontinuing service,” and now is the focus of an investigation by the FBI and the Energy Department’s Office of Inspector General.

FBI spokesman Peter Lee said he could not provide details about the investigation.

A little more than a year ago, President Obama hailed Solyndra during a tour of the company, saying it expected to hire 1,000 workers and make enough panels over the lifetime of its planned expanded facility that it would be like replacing eight coal-fired power plants.

“It’s here that companies like Solyndra are leading the way toward a brighter and more prosperous future,” Mr. Obama said.

The company’s bankruptcy petition came two years after Energy Secretary Stephen Chu and Vice President Joseph R. Biden announced approval of $535 million in federal loans to Solyndra.

“This announcement today is part of the unprecedented investment this administration is making in renewable energy and exactly what the Recovery Act is all about,” Mr. Biden said.

Instead, Solyndra, which was launched in 2005, last week shed more than 900 full-time employees, leaving just a “core group” of 113 employees, according to bankruptcy records. The price for solar panels has dropped by more than 40 percent, in part because of heavy competition from Chinese companies.

Republicans have been looking into the Solyndra loan for several months and has subpoenaed documents concerning it from the White House Office of Management and Budget.

Rep. Cliff Stearns, Florida Republican and chairman of the subcommittee for oversight and investigations on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said last week the company’s collapse should raise concerns about the entire stimulus program.

Only in Obama’s America: Man prosecuted for shooting bear to protect his young children

by Bob in Breckenridge ( 16 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Headlines, Progressives at September 1st, 2011 - 12:02 pm

This is about where we are with these imbecilic libturd lunatics running the asylum- The life of a female grizzly bear, endangered species or not, is more important than protecting the lives of two young children after it entered their backyard where they were playing and their father shot and killed it.

Not guilty plea entered in federal case of shot grizzly

Officials, many in community question prosecution of father

A Boundary County man pleaded not guilty Tuesday to unlawfully killing a female grizzly bear in his yard.

So many friends and family members showed up to support Jeremy M. Hill at his arraignment that the hearing was forced to move into a larger room at the U.S. Courthouse in Coeur d’Alene. Hill, 33, faces one charge of killing a grizzly – a federally protected species.

Supporters said that Hill, a father of six, acted responsibly in shooting the female grizzly on May 8, which appeared with two cubs in the yard of his home near Porthill, Idaho, while his children were playing outside.

“It seems unjust to me that someone would be charged when they were protecting their family,” state Sen. Shawn Keough, R-Sandpoint, said after the hearing. “I’m at a loss to understand why the U.S. government is pursuing this in the manner they are.”

After shooting the grizzly with a bolt-action rifle, Hill contacted the Idaho Department of Fish and Game.

“Jeremy did the right thing, he called Fish and Game,” Keough said. “I think that prosecuting this case really sets back the grizzly bear recovery effort. … People are saying, ‘Boy, if that happened to me, there’s no way that I’d report it.’ That’s a human reaction.”

Hill’s wife and six children – the oldest is 14 and the youngest is an infant – attended the arraignment. The family declined to comment.

A jury trial has been scheduled for Oct. 4. If convicted of illegally killing a federally protected species, Hill faces penalties of up to a year in prison and fines of up to $50,000.

The Hills’ Porthill home lies between two federal grizzly bear recovery zones – the Selkirk zone to the west and Cabinet-Yaak zone to the east. Roughly 100 grizzlies are believed to inhabit the zones, which include parts of Idaho, British Columbia and Montana.

Grizzlies are a controversial topic in Boundary County, where protecting their habitat has led to Forest Service road closures and some timber harvest restrictions. In recent years, a collaborative effort called the Kootenai Valley Resource Initiative has worked to reduce conflicts between people and bears.

Ronald Smith, chairman of the Boundary County Commission, said he’s dismayed that Hill faces prosecution. County commissioners support grizzly bear recovery efforts, saying a recovered population will ease land-use restrictions, but charging Hill doesn’t make sense, Smith said.

“Jeremy Hill … has been falsely accused of a crime that did not happen,” Smith said in a statement. “… We feel that at all costs, this man has the obligation and responsibility to protect his children. This is not some flagrant or malicious act.”

Assistant U.S. Attorney Nancy Cook declined to comment on the case.

Community members raised $19,558 for the Hill family last week at a 4-H animal sale in Bonners Ferry. Hill’s 14-year-old daughter, Jasmine, was selling a pig she raised named Regina. Bidders bought and sold Regina 15 times, with the final bidder giving the pig back to Jasmine Hill, saving it from a trip to the butcher.

“It was a statement – we’re with you, Jeremy,” said Rob Pluid, of Bonners Ferry, who helped organize the continuous bidding.

Accounts for the family have been set up at Mountain West Bank, Wells Fargo and Panhandle State Bank, said Donna Capurso, chairwoman of the Boundary County Republican Central Committee.

Meanwhile, Boundary County commissioners sent letters to Idaho’s congressional delegation and state legislators, asking for support for Hill. They also issued a news release, saying that Idaho Fish and Game officials had recommended against filing charges in the case, and that local U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officials had concurred.

Chip Corsi, Idaho Fish and Game’s regional manager, declined to comment on his agency’s stance on charges, but said: “He had three grizzly bears in close proximity to his kids, family and livestock. He had reason to believe there was a threat.”

Joan Jewett, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Portland, said she couldn’t comment on the case specifically. In general, however, “we do an investigation and turn over our information and evidence to the U.S. Attorney’s office and the U.S. Attorney makes the decision on whether to prosecute or not.”

Regulators Gone Wild, Farmers Latest Hit!

by Flyovercountry ( 95 Comments › )
Filed under Economy, Regulation, unemployment at August 30th, 2011 - 8:00 pm

For the last couple of years, one of my favorite daily features has been at HotAir.com.  It is a daily posting by Ed Morrisey called Obamateurism of the day.  Yesterday’s example proves my point about government regulation almost perfectly.  For a while now, the Tea Party/Socialist debate has been reported as being about taxes.  I must tell you that I believe this to be a secondary problem for our economy.  While important, and far too complicated, It is the over zealous culture of regulation that is taking the lead position on the destruction of our economy and culture.  You can read the Morrisey piece by clicking here.  If you don’t wish to, I’ll summarize it for you.  During his Midwest tax payer funded family preparation for vacation campaign bus tour, President Obama spoke to some farmers in Southern Illinois.  A concerned farmer, frustrated with the government’s full out assault upon his business asked about the latest asinine regulation rumored to be coming down the pike.  The rumor was that farmers, will be required to attain CDL’s to operate their farming machinery.  The President’s response was recorded in the following video.

Special note for the Blogmocracy gang. I am not savvy enough to embed any videos outside of youtube videos. Follow the link, it works.

Please click here to see the video.

After listening to the answer, a reporter for Politico, which by the way is as left leaning an organization as there is, took the President’s advice and called the appropriate authorities.  That one phone call led to a two day journey through the very depths of bureaucracy land.  Bounced from one governmental agency to another on both the Federal and State levels led to a sense of frustration for a reporter who had no actual skin in the game, and yielded not a single definitive answer.  Just imagine the frustration level for someone who’s livelihood depended on the answer.

We have indeed reached a surreal point in America my friends.  The good news for the farmer, and those of us wishing to buy groceries at an affordable price, is that with a bevy of regulation so thick that our overlords are no longer capable keeping up with all of them, he may very well be able to operate his machinery for at least a little while before someone in the government realizes that he is indeed in violation of rule 12.1647/sj75.prc12.578/jx/b.  On the other hand, the fine may be the amputation of his right arm and confiscation of half his land.  Candidate Obama campaigned on a platform of being a pragmatist, and depending on what crowd he was speaking to at the time, even managed to sound as though he were well to the right of John McCain.  As President, he has promised to put an end to cumbersome regulations, which he admitted to having the knowledge were choking our economy.  During his last State of The Union Address, he pledged to roll back over burdensome regulations, and pledged to not increase upon them.  Since that time, he and his executive branch team have starred in the upcoming video, regulators gone wild.  Putting aside for the moment the surreal optics of 9 year old children across the country being busted in a series of lemonade stand stings, (a great example by the way of teaching children the values of self reliance and hard work,)  we now live in a society where over half of us need some form of government permission to work, and where  hair dressers require more class time than medical doctors.  These regulations are doing much more damage to our economy than the tax code, and as the above video shows, it is affecting every industry.  It is far too easy to point to the chosen corporations selected for purely demagogic reasons as deserving of punishment for having provided too much benefit to their fellow citizens.  When it is your industry or job however, it stings just a little more.  In the end, we all pay for it.

Just one more thought.  Late last week, the Holder Justice Department raided Gibson Guitars for using rosewood on their fretboards.  The reason for the raid was not given, as Gibson actually was not in violation of any U.S. laws, that anyone was able to determine.  This was the 3rd time in 2 years Gibson has been raided for the rosewood.  Since Michelle Obama gave a Gibson Guitar as a Present to the wife of the French President, she is also guilty of felonious behavior should Gibson be guilty of anything.  Teams of legal analysts should be done researching whether or not Gibson is guilty of violating any government regulations by the time the Obama’s leave Washington permanently, in January of 2013.

Cross Posted at Musings of a Mad Conservative.

If you think 5000 new high paying, high tech jobs would be a good thing to the Obama administration, you’d be dead wrong

by Bob in Breckenridge ( 51 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Elections 2012, government, Politics, Progressives, Socialism, Transportation, unemployment, Unions at August 25th, 2011 - 11:30 am

I haven’t ranted about something that has really teed me off in awhile, but this has me steaming mad…and it should make you mad also. But unfortunately, it probably won’t surprise you.

As with almost everything that liberals claim they’re for, don’t listen to their empty rhetoric and platitudes, but rather, watch what they do if you want to get, as they say in court, the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

Take, for instance, Boeing Corporation, one of our nation’s oldest and most respected companies, and the largest exporter of American products to foreign markets, namely, its airplanes.

Its newest plane, seen above, is the 787 Dreamliner, and Boeing has orders to build over 850 of them, worth a whopping $165 billion dollars, but it’s three years behind schedule building them due to a myriad of reasons, mainly getting the thousands of parts being built by sub-contractors from around the world.

Boeing is now ready to start building the airplane, which will be the most fuel-efficient commercial airplane ever built, resulting in amazing environmental performance, and it will also the quietest commercial airplane ever built. And as for the “cherry on top of the cake”, the airplane will use 20 percent less fuel than any other similar plane currently being built.

Nothing its only current competitor (E.U.-based Airbus) in the commercial airplane design and building arena has rivals this extremely high-tech and fuel-efficient airplane, which explains why about 850 have been ordered by airlines all over the world, including most U.S.-based carriers.

So, in an attempt to catch up on the backlog of building these fuel-efficient planes, which the airlines want as soon as possible, with jet fuel prices being sky-high (pun intended), Boeing decided to build a second plant, in addition to its main airplane-building plant in Everett, Washington.

This plant would create, at a minimum, 5000 high-paying jobs for skilled employees assembling these planes, at a time when we have record-breaking unemployment and a dismal economic picture for the foreseeable future.

We also have a President, Barack Obama, who claims to care so much about creating jobs for American workers that he went on a bus tour throughout the heartland of America (on a Canadian-built bus) to push American companies to create more jobs for the American people.

I emphasize the word “would” for a good reason. Like I said at the top, don’t listen to liberals, like Obama, and their empty rhetoric, watch what they actually do, if you want to get the whole story. And the fact of the matter is the Obama administration is fighting Boeing tooth and nail, in an unprecedented way never before seen by any Presidential administration in decades, to stop the company from building this plant and creating the 5000 jobs that would go along with it.

So about now you’re probably asking yourself why would this President, and his administration, who all claim to feel the pain of the American people desperately needing and wanting good, high-paying jobs, not want Boeing to build this plant and create all these badly needed jobs?”.

The reason is a simple one if you use (warning: oxymoron alert!) liberal logic. You see, they’re not the right kind of jobs! Only in the (warning: another oxymoron alert) mind of a liberal could the creation of 5000 new, good high-paying jobs be a bad thing, especially during these extremely tough economic times, be worth fighting against by any and all means necessary.

You see, Boeing built this plant (and finally opened it in June, defying the administration and the National Labor Relations Board) in North Charleston, South Carolina, which is a right to work state, meaning that the unions that represent the Boeing workers in Washington, and have a nasty reputation for calling for their people to walk off their jobs and strike if Boeing doesn’t succumb to their extortion, would not represent these workers. The jobs would be high-paying non-union jobs.

And that is the problem and the only reason why the Obama administration, through the auspices of its National Labor Relations Board, which Obama has packed with union thugs who have donated millions of dollars to him and the democrats, are fighting Boeing every step of the way, and for the first time in modern American history, are trying to keep a privately-owned American company from opening a plant where it sees fit. This is truly unprecedented stuff.

As with all things liberal, its not about the jobs, it’s about them being the right kind of jobs. Just like with most liberals its not good enough just to be a black person or a female or any minority, you’ve got to be the right kind of minority- a female or black liberal to actually count.

And because this administration in particular, and the democrat party in general, are beholden to the union goons and their millions of dollars that are given to virtually only democrats in every election (even though a lot of their members are Republicans and resent this), Obama and his NLRB are still fighting against this plant, even though it’s already up and running.

And not only is the Obama administration fighting against these excellent jobs being created in South Carolina, which has double-digit unemployment rate that exceeds the national average, and also the highest black unemployment rate in the U.S.A. (and a lot of these new jobs would go to minorities), but the man Obama recently appointed to head his jobs-creating task force, Jeff Imelt, the traitorous CEO of General Electric, just proudly announced that his company, GE, is going to partner with communist China in building commercial airplanes in China, built by Chinese workers, to directly compete against Boeing and its American workforce.

So the next time you hear Obama or any liberal rant about the need for American companies to create good, high-paying jobs for American workers, like the disgusting race-baiting black liberal congresswoman Frederica Wilson from Florida, who claimed that the high black unemployment rate is due mostly to racism, take it with extreme skepticism, and think about all the excellent, high-paying jobs in South Carolina that Boeing wants to create, and that Obama and the democrats are fighting against every step of the way, by any means possible.