**Written by Doug Powers What’s a week without more suspicious Solyndra news? This should be enough to get us by until the inevitable almost weekly document dump that could come tomorrow. From the Washington Times : Fast running out of money, solar-panel maker Solyndra LLC last summer sold off nearly $60 million worth of inventory for less than $20 million in cash to a newly formed corporate entity closely tied to the company’s biggest investors, records show. Backed by $535 million in federal loan guarantees but burning through the little cash it had left, Solyndra made its first sale in late July to a corporate entity that had been formed just a day earlier. Three more transactions followed over the next few weeks with the same buyer, Solyndra Solar II. Todd Zywicki, bankruptcy professor at the George Mason University School of Law, said it’s not unusual for troubled companies to sell off assets to improve liquidity. But he said the inventory sales figure cited by Solyndra — $58.1 million in inventory for $17.5 million in cash — seems unusual. “The test under the bankruptcy code is whether the sale was for reasonably equivalent value and selling inventory at such a huge discount raises real concerns,” he said. “If Solyndra Solar II is owned or controlled by any insiders or anything like that, then it becomes even more suspicious.” No word on how much the whistling robots were re-sold for. Would the aforementioned bankruptcy professor consider these to be “insiders”? Solyndra Solar II was formed in Delaware by affiliates of Solyndra’s debtor in possession lender — investors Argonaut Private Equity and Madrone Capital Partners — as well as other debt holders, bankruptcy and government records show. Another special-purpose entity, Solyndra Solar LLC, was formed to purchase the company’s accounts receivable. Argonaut is the investment arm of a foundation headed by billionaire Oklahoma businessman George Kaiser. Madrone Partners has ties to Wal-Mart’s Walton family. The real test is to wait and see if Solyndra Solar II (Electric Boondoggleoo) sells that inventory for which they paid $17.5 million back to the government for ten times that amount so the Department of Energy can offer it to the next clean energy upstart taxpayers will be on the hook for and thus complete the “green jobs circle of life.” Obviously glass tubes used in solar panels must have not been in demand during the resale process. Your tax dollars at work : **Written by Doug Powers Twitter @ThePowersThatBe
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Report: Solyndra Sold Assets Cheap to Entity with Close Ties to Investors
( Click for full-size ; Source: GOP Oversight ) Scroll for updates… Forget Klownald Trump. This is your story of the day. Attorney General Eric Holder is on Capitol Hill day, facing another round of questions from relentless GOP watchdogs led by House Oversight and Govenrment Reform chair Darrell Issa. You can watch the proceedings live on CSPAN online here . The grilling comes as Border Patrol agent Brian Terry’s family files suit against the lying ATF: The family of slain U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry charged Wednesday that the top federal prosecutor in Phoenix lied to them about the guns found at the crime scene in an attempt to hide the weapons’ connection to the ATF’s failed Fast and Furious gun-tracking operation. Terry was killed in December 2010, allegedly by Mexican bandits carrying at least two AK-47 semiautomatic rifles that had been purchased in Arizona as part of Fast and Furious. The operation was intended to catch drug lords using illegal weapons, but the ATF immediately lost track of 1,700 firearms. The Terry family alleged that then-U.S. Atty. Dennis K. Burke told them last March that the two weapons came from a store in Texas and were not part of Fast and Furious. The family made their allegations in a “notice of claim” stating that they intend to sue the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and the Justice Department for $25 million. They called the gun-tracking operation “abominable, reckless, nonsensical.” Burke has resigned and has declined to discuss Fast and Furious. But the family’s claim notice strongly suggests that the federal government initially sought to keep Fast and Furious under wraps and hoped it would not be linked to the slaying. House GOP leaders repeat what whistleblowers have been telling us from the start: Top White House/DOJ knew. They knew: Top Department of Justice officials had extensive knowledge of and involvement in Operation Fast and Furious, claims a new report released Thursday, hours before Attorney General Eric Holder’s scheduled testimony to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. The report released by Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., and Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, top lawmakers investigating the botched gunrunning operation, claims Justice Department officials in Washington and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were involved in the coordination in the early stages of the operation. Related Interactive Report released by Issa and Grassley on Fast and Furious Republican lawmakers Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) and Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) released a new report suggesting top Department of Justice officials had extensive knowledge of and involvement in Operation Fast and Furious. Justice headquarters “had much greater knowledge of, and involvement in, Fast and Furious than it has previously acknowledged,” the memo reads. Rep. Issa’s preview statement in the advance of the hearing is here : ate last year, after months of investigation, the Justice Department finally acknowledged the allegations were true. Fast and Furious was both reckless and flawed. The Justice Department, however, has been less than forthcoming in cooperating with the efforts of Congressional investigators to determine exactly what happened and who was responsible: • The Justice Department has delivered fewer than 8% of the 80,000 documents we know it has identified as being related to this flawed operation. • It has refused to allow investigators access to numerous witnesses who participated in the operation – one witness, after being served with a subpoena, invoked his Fifth Amendment right to protection against self-incrimination rather than answer questions. • Justice Department now asserts that many documents pertaining to internal discussions and decision making about its response to Operation Fast and Furious are off-limits to investigators. The American people deserve better from our nation’s top law enforcement agency. Thursday’s hearing will feature the nation’s top law enforcement official, Attorney General Eric Holder, who will be asked to explain his decision to withhold this factual evidence from investigators. What he is concerned this information would reveal? Why is the Department trying to keep its internal discussions about Operation Fast and Furious from after February 4, 2011 secret? Why did it take nearly nine months for the Justice Department to acknowledge its earlier denials were false? Why did senior Justice Department officials who knew about and received briefings on the operation fail to stop it? Should Americans have confidence in their chief law enforcement agency even though these same officials remain in their posts? There is now broad bipartisan agreement that the congressional investigation into Operation Fast and Furious has exposed a serious and deadly failure of government. We know that the life of a brave Border Patrol agent has been lost along with countless Mexican citizens who have been victimized by guns from Operation Fast and Furious. Attorney General Holder has acknowledged that the danger created by Fast and Furious will continue for years. This hearing is not about controversial struggles between gun control advocates and supporters of the Second Amendment. It is about the unifying, and what should be bipartisan, expectation that the Justice Department be held to a high standard and that those who failed to meet this standard should be held accountable. I look forward to Attorney General Holder’s testimony. After Issa threatened contempt charges against the Department of Justice Obstructionists, DOJ responded with…more obstruction: The Justice Department response Wednesday rejected Issa’s February 9, 2012, deadline to produce all demanded documents. Cole called the deadline “impossible” to meet because of the broad scope of the request. He did not directly refer to the threat of a contempt charge by Issa. …The hearing Thursday will not be the end of the battle over Operation Fast and Furious. The Justice Department’s inspector general continues to work on a detailed account of the origins of the operation, and who was involved. The report is not expected to be complete for at least a couple more months. Holder has promised when it is completed, he is prepared to make individuals accountable. But Holder says he has no plan to seek resignations or administer discipline until that report is complete. The corruption keeps piling up. Matthew Boyle has a hard-hitting investigative piece in the Daily Caller exposing yet another DOJ scandal involving alleged bribery of top officials involved in a financial fraud probe: A U.S. Justice Department source has told The Daily Caller that at least two DOJ prosecutors accepted cash bribes from allegedly corrupt finance executives who were indicted under court seal within the past 13 months, but never arrested or prosecuted. The sitting governor of the U.S. Virgin Islands, his attorney general and an unspecified number of Virgin Islands legislators also accepted bribes, the source said, adding that U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder is aware prosecutors and elected officials were bribed and otherwise compromised, but has not held anyone accountable. The bribed officials, an attorney with knowledge of the investigation told TheDC, remain on the taxpayers’ payroll at the Justice Department without any accountability. The DOJ source said Holder does not want to admit public officials accepted bribes while under his leadership. That source said that until the summer of 2011, the two compromised prosecutors were part of a team of more than 25 federal prosecutors pursuing a financial crime ring, and at least five other prosecutors tasked to the case were also compromised by the criminal suspects they were investigating, without being bribed. Washington knew what it was getting when it confirmed corruptocrat Eric Holder. Innocent people have paid with their lives. Ignoring this man and his boss’s utter, systematic contempt for the rule of law has yielded deadly consequences. America, let’s not make that mistake again. *** Update: Go to my Twitter account for live-tweeting of the hearing. Most jaw-dropping moment so far: Indignant Holder demanding he get “credit” for his work at DOJ. Running joke: Every time gun-control Democrats call for more “tools.” There are plenty enough of them in charge in Washington. Side note: Donald Trump stepping on this important hearing tells you everything you need to know about his purported interest in advancing conservative/GOP interests. Circus, circus. Video clips: GOP Rep. Issa’s opening statement: GOP Rep. Patrick Henry underscores that there’s been no accountability for 13 months: GOP Rep. Anne Marie Buerkle confronts Holder with Terry family’s plea for action. At the five-minute mark, you can’t hear it, but Democrats advised Holder: “Don’t answer:”
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Fast and Furious showdown: Holder/Obama defend bloody culture of contempt; Update: Fortress Holder, Stonewall City; vid clips added, Dems advise,…
At The Hill , ” Crossroads GPS hits Obama over Solyndra with new ad campaign “: Crossroads GPS is taking aim at President Obama over his administration’s $535 million loan guarantee to failed solar company Solyndra with a new national television advertisement. In the new ad, the nonprofit group created by Karl Rove and Ed Gillespie paints the Solyndra loan guarantee as a corrupt deal aimed at benefiting the president’s campaign donors. “Laid-off workers forgotten. Tell President Obama we need jobs, not more insider deals,” the $500,000 ad, which will run on cable for a week, says. It’s the latest attempt by conservative groups to punish Obama politically over the loan guarantee. Americans for Prosperity — a group partially funded by the billionaire Koch brothers — has spent more than $8 million on two advertisements that hit Obama over the loan guarantee. More at the link .
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Crossroads GPS Goes Up With Huge New Ad Buy Slamming Obama on Solyndra
Back in November, I spotlighted Obama’s half-billion-dollar crony drug deal involving a no-bid contract with politically-connected SIGA. Refresher course here . In November, Democrat Sen. Claire McCaskill — chair of the Senate Subcommittee on Contracting and Oversight and up for re-election in less than a year — asked HHS to review the contract. Last week, the NYPost reported that SIGA execs dumped stock when they learned the contract would be far less than they anticipated last spring. Today, GOP Rep. Renee Ellmers of North Carolina asked the HHS Inspector General to investigate: “Yesterday afternoon I submitted my second letter to the Inspector General at the Department of Health and Human Services regarding apparent gross impropriety on behalf of the Obama Administration.” “The more I investigate this deal, the more shocked I become at the potential corruption and insider influence taking place at the highest levels of our government. I cannot help but see the similarities between this case and the Solyndra scandal, since both involve rewarding companies tied to Obama donors, billions in taxpayer dollars, and insider dealing.” “The decisions made by HHS have caused a legitimate small business in North Carolina to be denied a level playing field to provide smallpox treatments in the event of a national emergency. I will be very interested to see how the Administration explains their actions in awarding a billion-dollar corporation such a substantial contract when it falsely claimed to be a small business.” Federal law requires that a certain amount of grants for this research and production be set aside for small businesses. In turn, small businesses will compete for these contracts and “grant awards” while convincing the government that their products will provide the most effective treatment and protections, at the lowest cost to the American taxpayer. The two companies at the center of this – SIGA and Chimerix – competed for this award and submitted their own proposals for drugs to combat smallpox. SIGA’s small business status was challenged and the SBA ruled twice that they were “Other Than Small,” and therefore ineligible for a small business set-aside contract. But rather than acknowledging SBA’s decision, HHS pulled the small business set-aside and reissued the contract as a sole-source, non-compete to SIGA Corp. for $2.8 billion. MacAndrews & Forbes Holdings, Inc. is a corporation wholly owned by Ronald Perelman, and TransTech Pharma, Inc. (a privately-held drug discovery company controlled by MacAndrews & Forbes). In November 2003, Perelman announced he would invest $10 million through MacAndrews and Forbes into SIGA Technologies – at the time a tiny biotech company that was developing oral drugs to prevent and treat diseases, including smallpox and anthrax. Scandals? What scandals?
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The SIGA scandal: Calls for investigation mount
Obama’s “Razist” Lobbyist Moves Up by Michelle Malkin Creators Syndicate Copyright 2012 With public attention focused on the GOP primaries, the White House quietly promoted another self-dealing lobbyist to serve as President Obama’s top domestic policy adviser. Promises? What broken promises? Cecilia Munoz, the current director of intergovernmental affairs at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., will now serve as head of the Domestic Policy Council. She’ll wield heightened influence at Obama’s daily morning briefings and expand her reach from immigration issues to education, health care and beyond. Gushing headlines heralded the advancement of Obama’s top Hispanic civil rights “advocate” as a win for the “middle class.” But Munoz is a veteran member of the Beltway lobbyist class whose former organization is reaping a taxpayer-funded windfall as she climbs the government ladder. Before joining Team Obama, Munoz spent two decades as chief registered lobbyist for the National Council of La Raza (“The Race”). Whose “middle class” does The Race represent? I’ve tracked the radical identity politics-driven group for years as it promoted drivers’ licenses and in-state college tuition breaks for illegal aliens; opposed cooperative immigration enforcement efforts between local, state and federal authorities; and opposed a secure fence along the southern border. Under Munoz, The Race advised the Mexican government on how to lobby for illegal alien amnesty in the United States. Mexico’s Institute for Mexicans Residing Abroad rewarded her with its Ohtli Prize for her service to the country. Their country, not ours. The Race vehemently protested post-9/11 homeland security measures and joined a failed lawsuit to block immigration information-sharing between the feds and local police. The group also has called for TV and cable news networks to keep immigration enforcement proponents (including yours truly) off the airwaves, in addition to pushing for Fairness Doctrine policies to shut up their foes. Most recently, The Race and other open-borders groups pressured the White House to deliver the DREAM Act illegal alien student bailout by executive fiat — after it was defeated repeatedly by bipartisan majorities on Capitol Hill. Obama started issuing the amnesty waivers last August. This week, the White House announced an even wider expansion of waiver status to illegal aliens claiming “hardship.” Who has benefited from Munoz’s Beltway lobbying? No, not the American middle class. The biggest beneficiary has been La Raza’s coffers. According to analysts at nonpartisan Judicial Watch in Washington, The Race raked in $4.1 million in federal subsidies in 2009 and more than $11 million in 2010. Much of that money came straight from the Obama stimulus boondoggle, and much of it went to mortgage counseling. As a result of “strategic partnerships” with Wachovia and Bank of America, The Race has succeeded in lowering mortgage application requirements and watering down documentation standards. Illegal aliens have secured countless federal and private home loans over the past decade thanks to the lending industry’s version of “don’t ask, don’t tell.” In addition, Munoz’s group collected a $1 million Democratic earmark that funded “community development” projects. And the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services kicked in $25,000 to co-sponsor the group’s annual conference in 2010. Munoz’s multi-culti armor has shielded her radical lobbying from scrutiny. You’ll recall that the Obama administration made a lofty vow to end lobbyist conflicts-of-interest as we know them. The declaration was crystal-clear: “No political appointees in an Obama-Biden administration will be permitted to work on regulations or contracts directly and substantially related to their prior employer for two years. And no political appointee will be able to lobby the executive branch after leaving government service during the remainder of the administration.” But something got lost in translation when the White House brought registered lobbyist Munoz aboard — to work on the very open-borders agenda she pushed at The Race. Team Obama invoked a shady “public interest” exemption to waive the lobbyist ban because, it determined, “Ms. Munoz’s knowledge and expertise are vital to the functioning of the Office of Intergovernmental Affairs.” Has Munoz recused herself on any of the myriad public policy issues she has advised the president on over the past two years? Who knows? The most transparent administration ever refuses to disclose recusal orders involving the nearly 100 lobbyists and ex-lobbyists on its payroll. Obama’s “Razist” revolving door isn’t a victory for “civil rights” or the 99 percent. It’s a triumph of politically correct business as usual.
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Obama’s “Razist” Lobbyist Moves Up
Through the freakin’ looking glass!! At New York Post , ” White House threw secret ‘Alice in Wonderland’ bash during recession .” And Atlas Shrugs, ” OBAMA IN WONDERLAND: WHITE HOUSE THREW SECRET #’ALICE IN WONDERLAND’ BASH DURING RECESSION, MICHELLE’S MILLION DOLLAR RAGS .”
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Oh My! Obama White House Threw Secret ‘Wonderland’ Costume Ball!
Photoshop source: Courage in America The Year in Obama Scandals — and Scandal Deniers by Michelle Malkin Creators Syndicate Copyright 2011 With 2011 drawing to a close, it is time to account. As an early-and-often chronicler of Chicago-on-the-Potomac, I am amazed at the stubborn and clingy persistence of President Barack Obama’s snowblowers in the media. See no scandal, hear no scandal, speak no scandal. Dartmouth College professor Brendan Nyhan asserted in May — while Operation Fast and Furious subpoenas were flying on Capitol Hill — that “one of the least remarked upon aspects of the Obama presidency has been the lack of scandals .” Conveniently, he defines scandal as a “widespread elite perception of wrongdoing.” So as long as left-wing Ivy League scribes refuse to perceive something to be a scandal — never mind the actual suffering endured by the family of murdered Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry , whose death came at the hands of a Mexican cartel thug wielding a Fast and Furious gun walked across the southern border under Attorney General Eric Holder’s watch — there is no scandal! Self-serving much? Mother Jones’ Kevin Drum likewise proclaimed: “Obama’s presidency has so far been almost completely free of scandal .” This after the year kicked off in January with the departure of lying eco-radical czar Carol Browner . In backroom negotiations, she infamously bullied auto execs to “put nothing in writing, ever.” The previous fall, the White House’s own oil spill panel had singled out Browner for misleading the public about the scientific evidence for the administration’s Draconian drilling moratorium and “contributing to the perception that the government’s findings were more exact than they actually were.” The Interior Department inspector general and federal judges likewise blasted drilling ban book-cooking by Browner and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, who falsely rewrote the White House drilling ban report to doctor the Obama-appointed panel’s own overwhelming scientific objections to the job-killing edict. In February, federal judge Martin Feldman in Louisiana excoriated the Obama Interior Department for defying his May 2010 order to lift its fraudulent ban on offshore oil and gas drilling in the Gulf. He called out the administration’s culture of contempt and “determined disregard” for the law. This spring saw rising public anger over the preferential Obamacare waiver process (which I first reported on in September 2010 ). Some 2,000 lucky golden ticket winners were freed from the costly federal mandates — including a handful of fancy restaurants in Aloha Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco district , the entire state of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s Nevada , and scores of local, state and national Big Labor organizations, from the Service Employees International Union and Teamsters on down. Meanwhile, as The Hill newspaper reported last month, other not-so-lucky Republican-led states seeking waivers, such as Indiana and Louisiana , were rejected. But it wasn’t just Republicans objecting to the president’s arbitrary Obamacare fiats. In July, congressional Democrats turned on the monstrous federal health bureaucracy known as the Independent Payment Advisory Board . The constitutionally suspect panel — freed from normal public notice, public comment and public review rules — would have unprecedented authority over health care spending and an expanding jurisdiction of private health care payment rates. Obama’s health and human services secretary, Kathleen Sebelius , faced separate legal questions over her overseer role in a hair-raising document-shredding case when she served as governor of Kansas. In October, a district judge in the Sunflower State suspended court proceedings in a high-profile criminal case against the abortion racketeers of Planned Parenthood . Bombshell court filings showed that Kansas health officials “ shredded documents related to felony charges the abortion giant faces ” and failed to disclose it for six years. That same month, Bloomberg News columnist Jonathan Alter gushed: “There is zero evidence … of corruption. Where is it?” Alter’s declaration of the “Obama Miracle” came just weeks after the politically driven half-billion-dollar Solyndra stimulus “investment” went bankrupt , prompting an FBI raid and ongoing criminal and congressional probes of the solar company funded by top White House bundler and visitor George Kaiser . As Solyndra and an avalanche of other ongoing green subsidy scams erupted, so did the LightSquared debacle — a federal broadband boondoggle involving billionaire hedge fund managers and Obama donors Philip Falcone and George Soros . In September, two high-ranking witnesses — William Shelton, the four-star general who heads the Air Force Space Command, and National Coordination Office for Space-Based Positioning, Navigation and Timing Director Anthony Russo — exposed how the White House had pressured them to alter their congressional testimony and play down concerns about LightSquared’s interference threat to military communications. The White House continues to block efforts to gain information about the Federal Communications Commission’s approval of a special waiver for the company, even as new government tests this month showed that the company’s “ signals caused harmful interference to the majority of … general purpose GPS receivers .” The Obama White House closed out the year with Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill of Missouri demanding a probe of the smelly $443 million no-bid smallpox antiviral pill contract with Siga Technologies — controlled by big lefty donor Ron Perelman. Then there was the small matter of massive voter fraud in Indiana , where a Democratic official resigned amid allegations that “dozens, if not hundreds,” of signatures were faked to get Obama on the state primary ballot in 2008. And while Americans busied themselves with the holidays, White House and Democratic campaign officials were dumping more than $70,000 in contributions from another deep-pocketed contributor — scandal-plagued pal and former New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine, who oversaw the collapse of MF Global . All this — and so much more — yet erstwhile “conservative” journalist Andrew Sullivan of Newsweek/The Daily Beast scoffed, “Where are all the scandals promised by Michelle Malkin?” There’s none so blind as those who will not see.
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The Year in Obama Scandals — and Scandal Deniers
**Written by Doug Powers We already know that MF Global CEO Jon Corzine was a coveted economic advisor to the Obama administration, but the company’s COO, Bradley Abelow, has also had a hand in designing the economy. Abelow, who also served as chief of staff to Jon Corzine during his tenure as New Jersey governor (and rumor has it he might also be a Vulcan ), has been advising the Environmental Protection Agency, perhaps on how to safeguard America’s economic lungs from inhaling any of the $1.2 billion that went up in smoke during his MF Global tenure. From the Washington Times : During two days of recent congressional hearings into how as much as $1.2 billion disappeared from MF Global customer accounts, the chief operating officer of the imploding investment firm responded again and again that he did not know. Yet as the House and Senate interrogated Bradley I. Abelow and other top executives at MF Global Holdings Ltd., lawmakers did not mention Mr. Abelow’s role as a financial adviser for the Environmental Protection Agency, which as of Tuesday listed him as the chairman of its financial advisory board. Even as he finds himself the public face of a bankruptcy and admitted to lawmakers that he had no idea how client funds disappeared, Congress and the administration have voiced no public concern about Mr. Abelow’s role advising the $8.6 billion government agency on its finances. It might seem odd that the EPA even has a “financial adviser,” considering the agency appears to exist in order to design ways to cripple and subsequently bankrupt private industry , but if that’s the goal then I suppose an MF Global exec was a good choice for the position. Sure enough, Abelow is still listed on the EPA’s Financial Advisory Board page : I know what you’re thinking: “How did this guy not end up as a green loans adviser for the Department of Energy?” Give it time… give it time. **Written by Doug Powers Twitter @ThePowersThatBe
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Of Course: MF Global COO Still Listed as EPA Financial Adviser
Ben “The Price is Right” Nelson, who infamously sold out on Obamacare, is hanging up his hat. The people of Nebraska whom he betrayed and embarrassed won’t be shedding any tears. All together now: DLTDHYOTWO . Democratic Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska will announce today that he is retiring after two terms, a serious blow to Democratic efforts to hold onto their majority in the chamber next November. Nelson is scheduled to hold a press conference back home in Nebraska as early as today to make his decision official, said several Democratic insiders close to the leadership. The 70-year-old Nelson was considered one of the most endangered Democratic incumbents this cycle. GOP-affiliated outside groups have already dumped hundreds of thousands of dollars into TV ads bashing Nelson, while the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee spent over $1 million on their own ad blitz to bolster his image. The Cornhusker Kickback was not forgotten. Or forgiven . Entrenched incumbents of ALL political stripes, you’re on notice.
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So long, farewell, DLTDHYOTWO: Ben Nelson retires
