OT: So much for those California “Green” Jobs

[Allan from Fallbrook]

Pri: I would say in most instances, the law (and the respective regulatory agency) are in place and the law is insufficiently enforced and/or overseen, or the law is in place, but the regulatory agency is wrong for the job (such as the Office of Thrift Supervision and derivatives).

I think Obama did have an opportunity right after he took office to pursue enforcement issues more vigorously, but, in fairness, he did have a helluva lot on his plate and preventing another depression was more important than prosecuting offenders. Still, it needs to be said: Both the Dems and the GOP are in the pocket of Big Money and Wall Street. Even if you’re not prosecuting anybody, the sight of bankers paying themselves bonuses right after bailout, while millions are either struggling simply to pay bills or are out of work entirely, struck me as both profane and obscene.

The GOP is supposed to be a bunch of hard-hearted SOBs and inarguably pro-business. The Dems, on the other hand, are supposed to be the party of the people and the conscience of the nation. I don’t think you’d get much argument that Obama has not really lived up to that, especially when it comes to Wall Street, which appears to have been given a total hall-pass.

[Veritas]

More Crony Capitalism from the Dems: “The Daily Caller is reporting that George Kaiser, the billionaire Obama campaign bundler who later convinced the administration to provide $535 million in taxpayer funds for Solyndra, contributed $10,000 to the Urban Health Initiative, a notorious program created by now-First Lady Michelle Obama while she was at the University of Chicago Medical Center.”

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/277593/obamas-solyndra-crony-kaiser-contributed-michelles-charity-while-pressing-public-fundi

And the beat goes on.

[Veritas]

It is all Bush’s fault:
“General Motors (Government Motors [GM]) in 2008 received Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) coin. TARP being the first of the giant government violations of the private sector – about which then President and capitalism assailant George W. Bush ridiculously said “’I’ve abandoned free-market principles to save the free-market system.’”

“These multi-trillion dollar government money anvils – TARP, the 2009 alleged “stimulus,” Cash-for-Clunkers, Cash-for-Caulkers, ad nauseum – have been repeatedly dropped on our collective economic heads.”
http://biggovernment.com/files/2011/02/government_motors-300×300.jpg

Damn! Dumb and Dumber.

[mike92104]

[quote=AK]I worked in the (figurative and literal) trenches of a previous “green jobs” boom-bust cycle in California … the underground storage tank remediation bubble, which happened to coincide with the ’90s recession.

Enormous sums of money went to waste (pun intended) in an effort to clean up contamination caused by leaking gasoline/diesel/solvent/etc. tanks, much of it coming from “user fees” that were indirectly passed on to consumers. Much of the money came from struggling small businesses too, especially mom-and-pop gas stations. Who profited? Much of it went to snake-oil vendors and other charlatans who charged extortionate prices for unproven technology. Some of it went to incompetent or borderline criminal contractors. Certainly the general public and the business community did not benefit in proportion to the amount of money spent.

In the end I saw some efficient, cost-effective technology emerge from the mess. But by then the public and private sectors were both flat broke.[/quote]

And now the only people with enough money to open up a gas station are the large oil companies that the leftists despise.

[Zeitgeist]

Robots that resembled “a big freezer with wheels” maneuvered around the factory transporting panels from one machine to another, said George Garma, 49, a former Solyndra equipment maintenance technician from Fremont. The Disney tunes alerted workers to the robots’ presence. ‘It was first class,’ David Chan, 51, who was an information-technology contractor for Solyndra, said in an interview. ‘I’ve been in the business for 25 years and have seen some elaborate buildings. I’ve never seen a facility like it.’”

Wow! For that price they should do more than whistle Disney tunes. Wonder what tunes they whistled?

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-28/solyndra-s-733-million-plant-had-whistling-robots-spa-showers.html

[briansd1]

the Republican-led Energy and Commerce Committee is investigating Solyndra, forcing its executives to take the Fifth Amendment, and releasing embarrassing White House e-mails. I looked it up: every single Republican on that committee who was in office in 2005 voted for the loan guarantee program that they are now so gleefully condemning.

This is kinda like saying Hillary voted for the war.

[Zeitgeist]

What a waste of taxpayer money!
“DETROIT—Electric cars face new scrutiny after a fire in a Chevrolet Volt prompted a federal investigation into lithium ion batteries, even after U.S. regulators said their own crash test likely led to the blaze.”

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204190504577036543852189580.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

[patientrenter]

[quote=Zeitgeist]What a waste of taxpayer money!….[/quote]

I don’t know enough about the Volt to say if it is a waste of taxpayer money. But it is clear that the Volt was created by the government deciding which technical solution to a problem was best. Yes, we like the lobby that got the government’s ear on this, because it represents smart, technical, environmentally conscious people like us. However, the problems with Solyndra and maybe the Volt show that the government is much better off providing equal incentives for any solution that works, and letting individuals and companies come up with the actual solutions.

In the case of gasoline consumption, that means applying a higher tax on oil, applied in predictable and roughly equal increments over many years, and letting the higher gas prices spur industry and people to come up with solutions. People would arrange to travel to work less, and to buy more fuel-efficient cars. Industry would adapt housing to cater to the people moving, and would make cars of all types that use less gasoline.

It’s always easier to get things done if you use the natural flow. Smart tax policy that creates incentives for a wide variety of solutions, in a way that is equal for equal results, can be far more effective than trying to pick winning solutions.

[Zeitgeist]

“Yes, we like the lobby that got the government’s ear on this, because it represents smart, technical, environmentally conscious people like us.”

Speak for yourself patient. I do not want the government pissing money away on stupid wars or stupid technology. We need smart people like Jobs and Gates in the government, not bureaucratic buffoons who have no appreciation of making a living because they have always been on the government dole. The people making the decisions in this administration are in bed with the environmentalists and other fringe groups and are draining the life blood out of the country like the vampires they are.

[Coronita]

Another one bites the dust.

Aptera…

http://www.autoblog.com/2011/12/02/aptera-close-stop-end-shut-down/

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2011/dec/02/carmaker-closes-without-green-energy-aid/

[Zeitgeist]

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[Zeitgeist]

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[Veritas]

And another one bites the dust:
“On Monday, Solar Trust of America became the latest solar developer to file for bankruptcy in Delaware federal court, putting into jeopardy photovoltaic power plant projects utilities were counting on to generate 2,000 megawatts of electricity – enough t0 light hundreds of thousands of homes at peak output. Among the projects was what would have been the world’s largest solar station, the Blythe Solar Power Project, a 1,000-megawatt power plant to be built in the Mojave Desert that had received a $2.1 billion federal loan guarantee offer.”

http://www.forbes.com/sites/toddwoody/2012/04/03/collapse-of-german-solar-companies-threaten-californias-big-solar-projects/

[svelte]

Nissan, which has said it expects to sell 1.5 million electric vehicles around the world by 2015, has sold just 12,000 battery-electric Leafs in Japan since launching the model in 2010, according to the report.

http://www.autoblog.com/2012/04/03/reputation-of-electric-cars-takes-a-hit-in-japan-due-to-tsunami/

[Coronita]

I guess this is what they mean when they said they would create Green Jobs…

GSA Green Jobs:

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