The Federal Governments Failure in the Quest for Flight

Government success is fast becoming an oxymoron.  Alright, I’ll concede that some projects in the past have been successful, such as the Hoover Dam and the space program, but I’m hard pressed for others.  The Obama administration’s adventures of misfortune are rapidly eroding the public’s confidence in government “investments.”  The latest casualty is Fisker Motor Company, which by the way,  is an Al Gore venture.  They are facing bankruptcy.  Here is an excerpt from The Examiner:

Fisker Automotive laid off three quarters of its staff today to avoid bankruptcy while it seeks an angel with big bucks to help it become operational again.

The maker of the luxury hybrid Karma says it has “at least” $30 million in cash, and $15 million more due after settling a claim this week with its bankrupt battery maker A123 Systems, according to Reuters.

But the company owes $192 million on a $193 million Department of Energy “green” loan. It was supposed to receive $529 million, but the DOE declined to pay the full amount in May 2011 after Fisker fell behind on its targets. Executives who kept their jobs are trying to renegotiate a $10 million loan payment due on April 22.

The federal government has a long history of wasting money.  I recently watched a documentary on the race for the first in flight; it came down to the Wright brothers and Sam Langley.  We all know who won, but what we weren’t told is that the Wright brothers invested their own money, whereas Langley was funded by the federal government.  Langley received over $50,000 from the federal government in the form of a grant.  The Wright brothers, however, invested $1000 and that included room, board and transportation of their airplane to Kitty Hawk, NC.

 

Government failures aren’t just an Obama phenomenon.  It’s a Washington D.C. tradition.  

 

Source:  http://washingtonexaminer.com/fisker-lays-off-75-percent-of-workforce-as-bankruptcy-looms/article/2526429?custom_click=rss

Chemtex Bio-Scam Comes to North Carolina

Another green energy boondoggle is coming to North Carolina. Chemtex, a subsidiary of an Italian based company, has received millions of dollars in federal government guaranteed loans. Their objective is to turn grassy plants into a viable fuel for automobiles.

The Oxford-based Biofuels Center has gotten $20 million from taxpayers for its 10-year mission of establishing a biofuels industry that converts grasses, wood pulp and even algae into motor fuels the future may demand. The center calls itself the nation’s only state agency with a mission to help businesses, universities and others involved in the science, growing, production and logistics of biofuels.

“Anyplace that can grow has the capability for biofuels,” Biofuels Center President Steven Burke said. But “North Carolina is perfectly suited, for we have diversity of land, growing conditions and climate able to grow a large variety of fuel plants.”

Chemtex hopes to “take some pretty marginal land, land that’s not producing major value to farmers, like sprayfield land. We see that as an opportunity,” project manager Allana Whitney said.

Hope springs eternal for the green energy tricksters. Failure is an option when the taxpayers are footing the bill:

The ethanol plant is waiting for the U.S. Agriculture Department to approve a loan guarantee. The state’s first ethanol plant went bankrupt last year despite $35 million in USDA loan guarantees and millions more in loans and private investment. That Raeford-based company couldn’t produce ethanol cheaply enough after surging demand for corn from developing countries drove up the price.

Not only was this ethanol plant a failure, so have been many others. Georgia’s Ranger Fuels is one of the more notable schemes that the taxpayers were scammed on. Vinod Khosla, one of Obama’s campaign bundlers, profited handsomely off of this taxpayer funded largess:

The failed Range Fuels wood-to-ethanol factory in southeastern Georgia that sucked up $65 million in federal and state tax dollars was sold Tuesday for pennies on the dollar to another bio-fuel maker with equally grand plans to transform the alternative energy world.

LanzaTech, a New Zealand-based biofuel company, paid $5.1 million for the plant in Soperton. Its main financial backer: Vinod Khosla, a California entrepreneur who also bankrolled Range Fuels, and helped secure its government loans, before Range went bust last year.LanzaTech hasn't received the same type of loans, but the company has received $7million from the U.S. departments of Energy and Transportation to assist in the development of alternative fuels.

I wonder which Obama bundler is involved with this Chemtex loan. But I digress.

Many believe in the potential of biofuels. Unfortunately, these products are heavily subsidized, and have proven to be harmful to engines. But that doesn’t stop the enthusiasm of some politicians. Even republicans are on board:

Sen. Harris Blake, R-Moore, said lawmakers are looking forward to a payoff on biofuels from taxpayers’ investments.

“We spent a lot of money on that biofuels center, I mean big bucks,” said Blake, who backs drilling for the natural gas believed to be in underground deposits centered on his home district. “Now we need to do something if we think there’s any potential future for it. A lot of people think there (is).”


And the green energy boondoggle continues on.

Source: http://www.rockymounttelegram.com/news/ncwire/ethanol-maker-see-green-field-grown-fuel-1096993

http://costonscomplaint.blogspot.com/2012/01/obamas-green-baron-scams-georgia-on.html

N.C. Health Choice Ensnares More Dependents Through Federal Grants

The state of North Carolina has found another federal government “gift” to add to its coffers. This time the graft is designed to ensnare as many citizens as possible into a specious health insurance scheme. And how did the Tar Heel state come into this taxpayer largess?

The state has earned a $21 million bonus from the federal government for enrolling more children in a public-private health insurance program and making it easier for them to stay in it.

North Carolina was one of 23 states sharing $296 million in bonuses awarded for cutting application paperwork and exceeding enrollment targets.

N.C. Health Choice, the state version of the national Children's Health Insurance Program, enrolls about 150,000 children, according to the state Department of Health and Human Services. That's up from about 134,000 in 2010.

The program offers free or reduced-price insurance to children whose parents cannot afford private insurance. It was approved in 1997 and was reauthorized in 2009.

This shouldn’t be something to brag about. Especially, since our national debt will soon exceed $16 trillion. And what are the qualifications for this subsidy?

The state does not require in-person interviews, which federal officials said are difficult for working parents to schedule.

North Carolina, like most other states, does not consider a family's assets, other than income, when determining children's eligibility.

"We know the only way children can succeed in education is if they show up to school healthy and ready to learn," said Mark Johnson, a spokesman for Gov. Bev Perdue.

"The Governor has made expanding health care coverage for eligible children a high priority in her administration, and today's announcement shows that work has paid off."

This is a system ripe for fraud and corruption. Instead of trying to provide an environment of opportunity and self-reliance, we have a bunch of politicians who’re thumping their chest over adding more dependents on the government dole. That’s nothing to be proud of.

Source: http://www.newsobserver.com/2011/12/29/1739723/insuring-kids-brings-reward.html#storylink=cpy

Governor Beverly Perdue Strong-Arms N.C. Energy Companies

Governor Beverly Perdue is about as shameless as her counterpart in the Oval Office. She has been caught bullying North Carolina’s three major energy companies into signing long-term contracts with a wind farm company. The three are resisting this pressure due to the fact that these farms are inefficient, and cost more than conventional sources of energy. That cost would be passed onto the consumer. But that is unimportant to the Governor, what is at stake is a $200 million federal government grant; and Bev just loves that “free money”.

Documents obtained by the Civitas Institute suggest Gov. Bev Perdue is attempting to strong-arm North Carolina’s three major utility companies into supplying more expensive energy to their customers in the northeastern part of the state. In a political power-play to reward big business reminiscent of the handling of the Solyndra debacle that embarrassed the Obama administration, Perdue is urging for special treatment that would secure a $200 million federal government subsidy for a multi-billion dollar Spanish company.

Perdue recently sent a letter to the heads of Duke, Dominion, and Progress Energy stressing the importance of the proposed Desert Wind Power Project in Elizabeth City to be built by Iberdrola Renewables (to see copies of the letters, click the links below). The Project involves the development of a 300 megawatt wind energy farm. In her letter, Perdue stated: “I urge you to give serious consideration to partnering with Iberdrola Renewables to make the Project a reality.” Perdue also added that it is urgent that a major utility provider agree to purchase power from the wind farm in order for it to be a “long-term success.”

Small problem: North Carolina’s major utility companies already said no to purchasing electricity from the wind power project because the rates Iberdrola were demanding are so much more expensive than the conventional energy currently being used by the utilities. As quoted in a recent Raleigh News & Observer article, Duke spokeswoman Betsy Alley Conway said, “What we are looking for is wind energy at a price that is cost-effective for the company and our customers. If we receive a proposal from developers that is a good value for our customers and our company, we would execute the contract.”

USA Today reported the following household energy cost:

Households paid a record $1,419 on average for electricity in 2010, the fifth consecutive yearly increase above the inflation rate, a USA TODAY analysis of government data found. The jump has added about $300 a year to what households pay for electricity. That's the largest sustained increase since a run-up in electricity prices during the 1970s.

Electricty is consuming a greater share of Americans' after-tax income than at any time since 1996 — about $1.50 of every $100 in income at a time when income growth has stagnated, a USA TODAY analysis of Bureau of Economic Analysis data found.

Even though Obama wasn’t able to pass cap and trade, his bureaucratic machine has found ways to punish us all. And it sure as hell doesn’t help, when our state politicians pile on with unnecessary, inefficient sources of energy that isn’t cost effective.

Source:

http://www.nccivitas.org/2011/perdue-bringing-solyndra-politics-to-north-carolina/

http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/energy/story/2011-12-13/electric-bills/51840042/1

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/electricity-costs-skyrocket-300-more-per-household-over-last-5-years/