Back in October 2010, blogger Tigerhawk recalled what one of his Princeton classmates, who was originally from Romania, said about the nature of life under socialism:

One recurring tool of socialist tyranny is the capricious enforcement of unworkable laws.

He quoted the passage in making a point about the “capricious enforcement” which was an inevitable feature of the unworkable mess better known as Obamacare.

But two and a half years later, it’s evident that observation could just as easily have been applied to our byzantine tax code, our environmental regulations, and even laws pertaining to press freedoms under the Obama administration.  As Dan wrote earlier today, the only folks who are surprised by any of these scandals are the ones who haven’t been paying attention to what has been going with our government since January 20, 2009.

In the case of the Obama administration, though, it’s not strictly capricious enforcement, but selective enforcement, always with a partisan goal in mind.  The IRS targeting of the Tea Party and conservative organizations is appalling, but one would have to be naive not to believe, as ABC’s Trey Hardin noted today, that it wasn’t authorized by someone in the West Wing.  Hardin observed (audio at the link):

I will tell you this on the IRS front. I’ve worked in this town for over 20 years in the White House and on Capitol Hill and I can say with a very strong sense of certainty that there are people very close to this president that not only knew what the IRS were doing but authorized it. It simply just does not happen at an agency level like that without political advisers likely in the West Wing certainly connected to the president’s ongoing campaign organization.

And it’s not just the IRS.  Earlier today it came out that the EPA waived fees for leftist organizations and leftist journalists who requested information, but not for conservative ones:   “Conservative groups seeking information from the Environmental Protection Agency have been routinely hindered by fees normally waived for media and watchdog groups, while fees for more than 90 percent of requests from green groups were waived, according to requests reviewed by the Competitive Enterprise Institute.”  Yes, this would be the same EPA that has classified carbon dioxide as a pollutant, making the mere act of exhaling potentially troublesome.

A coincidence?  I think not.  This is the same administration committed to picking winners and losers on most matters.  Hence, it should surprise no one that while oil companies are prosecuted for the deaths of eagles and other protected species, the bird-killing wind farms are naturally given a pass.   Clearly, some energy companies are more equal than others.

It’s the same with journalists.  Just a day after the AP snooping scandal broke, the administration is playing favorites again.  Jake Tapper has gained a reputation as one who can be counted on to ask tough questions of the White House with greater frequency than the reporters at most of the other lamestream news organizations.  Well, today Professor Jacobson at Legal Insurrection is reporting that the White House played Jake Tapper by selectively leaking one e-mail with the apparent aim of creating a diversion in the reporting about the Benghazi cover-up.  Jacobson writes: “Like I said, this entire diversion of leaking a single email out of a chain of emails to Tapper was simply meant to put critics of the administration back on their heels and to provide an excuse for White House defenders to throw around words like ‘doctored.’”

And so what else do we see today?  Well, all of a sudden the administration’s lackeys in the press such as Hilary Rosen are now out expressing their sympathy for poor Jay Carney.  I guess they’re afraid of ending up as the subject of a DOJ snooping scandal or an IRS investigation or a selective leak.

From Bloomberg[1]: Gore Is Romney-Rich With $200 Million After Bush Defeat

In 1999, Al Gore…had a net worth of about $1.7 million…In January, the Current TV network, which he helped to start in 2004, was sold to Qatari-owned Al Jazeera Satellite Network for about $500 million [of which Gore] grossed an estimated $70 million…

Two weeks later, Gore exercised options, at $7.48 a share, on 59,000 shares of Apple Inc. stock…about a $30 million payday…

How Gore achieved this is as much about timing and luck as it is about business skills. His Apple board tenure has coincided with a 5,900 percent increase in its stock price. Current TV was a moribund “fixer-upper” when Al Jazeera stepped in to buy it at “a huge valuation,”…

Gore also had his share of flubs, most of them in his efforts at green-tech investing…

The article goes on to report praise of Gore – from people who likely got money or power by being connected with him. And to give numerous examples of Gore making money from, in essence, being well-connected. Here is one pair:

After losing to Bush [in 2000], he had enough wealth by March 2008 to put $35 million into hedge funds and private partnerships through Capricorn Investment Group…founded by his buddy, Canadian billionaire Jeffrey Skoll…

By the time of the Capricorn investment, he was already starting to rake in cash from Generation Investment Management – - a fund that incorporates “sustainability” into its investment approach. [ed: I read that as government "green" subsidies] Gore co-founded GIM in 2004 with former Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Managing Director David W. Blood. [ed: Goldman-Sachs are top Obama donors]

Public filings show that in 2008 through 2011 London-based GIM racked up almost 140 million pounds ($218 million) in profits to be split among its 26 partners.

There are more examples; you can read the whole thing. What I find interesting is:

• The latest confirmation that, actually, Democrats are the party of the super-rich.
• The Gore-Romney contrast; how each man got rich. Romney did it by adding to the economy’s productive power[2]. Gore did it by exploiting his connections to the American government’s power and largesse, and also by pandering to the prejudices of various anti-Americans.[3]

(more…)

Those who rely on the legacy media for reports on this administration’s record with taxpayer dollars may not be as up to speed as those who follow conservative blogs about federal support for failing companies.

We know that Solyndra is just the tip of the iceberg, one of many green energy firms (receiving federal subsidies or loan guarantees) which are, well, not flourishing in the marketplace.  Last week, for example, we reported on the the 22 “clean energy companies supported by President Obama’s stimulus that are now failing or have filed for bankruptcy.”

Now comes word that a federal agency is backing another such company:

Late last week, the Ex-Im loaned about $57 million to First Solar, ostensibly so the solar panel manufacturer could boost exports of its product to India. The Ex-Im’s press release says that the loan will help create 200 jobs at First Solar’s factory in Tempe, AZ. A quick calculation finds that the Ex-Im loan amounts to $285,000 per job.

This firm, observes Bryan Preston,

. . . is a curious choice for the Ex-Im to consider worthy of a huge loan. It was the worst performing firm on the SPX in 2011. It has also been linked with several junk bond firms. In March 2012, First Solar was found using government subsidies to “export” solar panels to itself.

But First Solar has connections, similar to the connections that won Solyndra its taxpayer-backed loans. According to Townhall columnist Marita Noon, several Obama campaign bundlers are investors in First Solar. Bruce Heyman, David Heller, and Jennifer Scully are all Obama bundlers who have investments in First Solar. First Solar CEO Michael Ahearn “gives generously (and exclusively) to Democrats.”

Can you imagine how much media coverage this would get if a Republican were doling out the bucks to a financially-troubled company producing a product near and dear to the conservative agenda — which included investors were ties to that politician’s political campaigns?

RELATED: Solyndra cash in Obama’s pocket

Another Obama Solar Company Goes Bankrupt …Taxpayers Lose $2 BILLION?

A California solar energy company that was unable to meet a deadline for an Energy Department loan guarantee last year has sought bankruptcy protection in Delaware.

Solar Trust of America’s Chapter 11 filing on Monday listed assets between $1 million and $10 million, and liabilities between $10 million and $50 million.

The filing comes amid the ongoing controversy surrounding Solyndra, a solar firm that received a half-billion dollar federal loan and was touted by the Obama administration before declaring bankruptcy last year.

At the same link you’ll find the text of an April 19, 2011 article reporting, “The U.S. Department of Energy has awarded a $2.1 billion loan guarantee to Solar Trust of America for a solar thermal power plant near Blythe, Calif.”

——-

*green companies taking federal subsidies and/or loan guarantees going bankrupt.

The left-leaning daily in our nation’s capital is finally reporting on an Obama administration scandal, but do wonder if they are doing so deliberately on a day when most people aren’t paying much attention to the news.

At least they do report how “infused” the green technology program was “at every level“:

Meant to create jobs and cut reliance on foreign oil, Obama’s green-technology program was infused with politics at every level, The Washington Post found in an analysis of thousands of memos, company records and internal ­e-mails. Political considerations were raised repeatedly by company investors, Energy Department bureaucrats and White House officials.

The records, some previously unreported, show that when warned that financial disaster might lie ahead, the administration remained steadfast in its support for Solyndra.

Via Instapundit.

Bruce alerts me to a tweet from Michael Johns, “Remember when Biden said they used to call @joncorzine for advice?”

“The reason why we called Jon,” the Vice President said (at about 0:44 above), “is that we knew he knew about the economy, about world markets, about how we had to respond unlike anyone we knew.”  Later, the Delaware Democrat reports (at 2:00) that they talked with Corzine a “long time about what the elements of a national package should be.”

Indeed, Biden wanted to start a mantra about where “Jon was right.”  Doesn’t look like the defeated Democrat of a pretty blue state was right about this: MF Global Trustee Says Shortfall Could Exceed $1.2 Billion. According to the New York Times,

The amount of customer money missing from the collapsed trading firm MF Global may be more than $1.2 billion — double previous estimates — the trustee dismantling the firm’s brokerage unit said on Monday.

. . . .

Regulators currently suspect that MF Global — at the time run by Jon S. Corzine, the former Democratic governor of New Jersey — improperly used customer money for its own purposes in the days before filing for Chapter 11 protection on Oct. 31.

Well, $1 billion is chump change to the Obama-Biden Democrats whose failed “stimulus” cost the country about 800 times that.   Can you imagine how much coverage the above clip would get if a top Republican had said this about a fellow partisan who led his company into a (possibly) billion-dollar bankruptcy?

Well, now we’re getting a better idea of what the “stimulus” failed; just look at the economic knowhow of some of the folk who designed it.

There are many things I would rather blog about than the Herman Cain proposal.  Newt Gingrich delivered a stellar performance in his debate with Herman Cain.  Mitt Romney released a bold plan to tackle federal spending, confront the debt and reform entitlements.  And yet the media have turned the coverage of the candidate into a circus.  So, we blog to put such sensationalism into context.

Barack Obama has been president for two-and-three-quarters years and we still don’t know the specifics of his plan to confront the debt — or reform entitlements.  Meanwhile, his White House stonewalls on Solyndra, refusing to provide documents requested by Congress.  And it’s not just Solyndra.  The White House won’t “cough up requested info” about other troubled companies receiving federal loans.

Now, we read that the White House Chief of Staff William M. Daley is turning

over day-to-day management of the West Wing to Pete Rouse, a veteran aide to President Obama, according to several people familiar with the matter. It is unusual for a White House chief of staff to relinquish part of the job.

Emphasis added.  ”Congressional Democrats,” reports Will Rahn

had criticized Daley, a former commerce secretary under President Clinton, for what some described as his imperfect understanding of the legislative branch, and his tense relationship with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. This stood in marked contrast to his predecessor, Rahm Emanuel, a former Democratic congressman who is now Mayor of Chicago.

This is pretty big news, yet on Memeorandum, in the wee hours of Tuesday morning, it is relegated to the middle of the page far below the stories on Herman Cain’s accuser. (more…)