October 6, 2011

Bad Odds
Obama Says We Need To Gamble On His Green Energy Agenda Despite Being Warned That Solyndra Was Not A Safe Enough Bet For Taxpayers
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President Obama: [A]nd all I can say is that the Department of Energy made these decisions based on their best judgment about what would make sense. And, you know, the nature of these programs are going to be ones in which, you know, for every success there may be one that does not work out as well. But that's exactly what the loan guarantee program was designed by Congress to do. It was take bets on these areas where we need to make sure that we're maintaining our lead. (President Barack Obama, Press Conference, Washington DC,
10/6/11)

SOLYNDRA MAY ONLY BE THE TIP OF THE ICEBERG WHEN IT COMES TO THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATIONS BAD BETS
Whats Terrifying Is That After Looking At Some Of The Ones That Came Next, This One [Solyndra] Started To Look Better, Another OMB E-Mail Exchange Said Of Solyndra. Bad Days Are Coming. (Amy
Harder, E-Mails Show Obama Was Warned; Bitter OMB, DOE Divide Over Solyndra, National Journal, 10/3/11)

Government Accountability Office: The Administration Didnt Do Its Due Diligence When Celebrating The $535 Million In Stimulus Funds For Solyndra. It's not his statements the administration will regret; it's the loan guarantees. The President was celebrating $535 million in federal promises from the Department of Energy to the solar startup. The administration didn't do its due diligence, says the Government Accountability Office. There's a consequence if you don't follow a rigorous process that's transparent, Franklin Rusco of GAO told the website iWatch News.(Scott McGrew, Solyndra Filing A Disaster For
Obama, NBC Bay Area News, 8/31/11)

Solyndra Was One Of Five Companies The Energy Department Failed To Properly Assess, Leaving The GAO Greatly Concerned. Government auditors are questioning whether the administration may have made other bad bets on clean energy. Frank Rusco, a Government Accountability Office director who helped lead a review of the Solyndra loan and the Energy Departments loan guarantee program, said GAO remains greatly concerned by its 2010 finding that the agency agreed to back with loans five companies without properly assessing their failure risks. The companies were not identified in the report, but the agency has since acknowledged that Solyndra was one. (Carol Leonnig, After Solyndra Failure, Auditors Wonder What Other Bad
Bets Obama Officials Made, The Washington Post, 9/1/11)

GAO Investigation Revealed Obamas Department Of Energy Favored Some Loan Applicants And Disadvantaged Others. That's when the Government Accountability Office issued an unusually blunt
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assessment of the Energy Department's loan program in general, concluding that the department had treated applicants inconsistently, favoring some and disadvantaging others. (Matthew Mosk, Brian Ross, And Ronnie
Greene, Solyndra Collapse A Waste Of Half A Billion By Obama, GOP Critics Say, ABC News , 9/1/11)

OBAMA WAS WARNED THAT HIS DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY WAS NOT CAREFUL ENOUGH WITH TAXPAYERS MONEY
Obama Was Personally Warned About The Financial And Political Risks Of The Department Of Energys Loan Guarantee Program That Aided Solyndra. Long before the politically connected California solar firm Solyndra went bankrupt, President Obama was warned by his top economic advisors about the financial and political risks of the Energy Department loan guarantee program that boosted the company's rapid ascent. (Tom Hamburger, Kim Geiger and Matea Gold, Obama Advisors Raised Warning Flags Before Solyndra Bankruptcy, Los Angeles
Times, 9/26/11)

NEC Director Larry Summers Told Obama The Energy Departments Loan Guarantee Program Wasnt Rigorous Enough In Its Selection Process. At a White House meeting in late October, Lawrence H. Summers, then director of the National Economic Council, and Timothy F. Geithner, the Treasury secretary, expressed concerns that the selection process for federal loan guarantees wasn't rigorous enough and raised the risk that funds could be going to the wrong companies, including ones that didn't need the help.
(Tom Hamburger, Kim Geiger and Matea Gold, Obama Advisors Raised Warning Flags Before Solyndra Bankruptcy, Los Angeles Times, 9/26/11)

Summers Thought The Government Would Wind Up Funding Flops. Not everyone in the administration agreed. Summers doubted that the government could do this kind of lending well, according to industry and administration officials. He believed the government would end up funding projects that would have been built anyway or funding projects that flopped. He resisted efforts to move money fast. (Steven Mufson And Carol D. Leonning, Some Clean-Energy Firms Found US Loan-Guarantee Program A Bad Bet, The Washington
Post, 9/26/11)

Obamas Energy Czar Carol Browner Wanted Obama To Use The Treasury Department Rather Than The Energy Department For The Loan Guarantees. The Oct. 25, 2010, memo from Summers, energy czar Carol Browner and Ron Klain, then Vice President Bidens chief of staff, urged the president to move the loan guarantee money into a Treasury program that gives projects cash in lieu of tax credits. The Treasury grants would move money faster and not put the administration in the position of choosing technologies. (Steven
Mufson And Carol D. Leonning, Some Clean-Energy Firms Found US Loan-Guarantee Program A Bad Bet, The Washington Post, 9/26/11)

OBAMA WAS WARNED THAT SOLYNDRA WAS NOT A GOOD BET BEFORE THE INITIAL LOAN IN 2009
OMB Had Deep Reservations About The Solyndra Loan In 2009. The emails also show deep reservations from analysts at the Office of Management and Budget about the decision to loan $535 million to Solyndra -- reservations that have since been justified. (Matthew Mosk And Ronnie Greene, Obama on Solyndra: 'Hindsight Is Always
20/20,' ABC News, 10/3/11)

March 10, 2009: WH Budget Analyst Said Solyndra Is NOT Ready For Prime Time This deal is not ready for prime time, one White House budget analyst wrote in a March 10, 2009 email, nine days before the administration formally announced the loan. (Matthew Mosk, Brian Ross And Ronnie Greene, Emails: Obama White House Monitored
Huge Loan to 'Connected' Firm, ABC News & iWatch News, 9/13/11)

August 2009: OMB Staffer Complained About Having To Do Rushed Approvals And That They Would Prefer To Have Sufficient Time To Do Our Due Diligence Reviews. We have ended up with a situation of having to do rushed approvals on a couple of occasions (and we are worried about Solyndra at the end of the week), one official wrote. That Aug. 31, 2009, message, written by a senior OMB staffer and sent to Terrell P. McSweeny, Bidens domestic policy adviser, concluded, We would prefer to have sufficient
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time to do our due diligence reviews. (Joe Stephens and Carol D. Leonnig, White House Pressed On $500 Million Loan To Solar Company Now Under
Investigation, The Washington Post, 9/13/11)

Obamas Energy Department Knew In August Of 2009 That Solyndra Would Run Out Of Money In September 2011, Leaving Taxpayers On The Hook. On August 20, 2009, an Energy Department staffer examining a pending loan to a California clean energy start-up came to a startling conclusion: The company would run out of money by September 2011. The government would, in effect, be placing taxpayers on the hook for a business likely to founder. (Ronnie Greene And Matthew Mosk, Obama Administration Agreed To Solyndra Loan Days After Insiders
Foresaw Firm's Failure, iWatch News, 9/14/11)

Still, Things Moved And Fast. (Ronnie Greene And Matthew Mosk, Obama Administration Agreed To Solyndra Loan Days After Insiders
Foresaw Firm's Failure, iWatch News, 9/14/11)

AND WAS WARNED AGAIN BEFORE THE LOAN RESTRUCTURING WHEN TAXPAYERS TOOK A BACK SEAT TO PRIVATE INVESTORS LINKED TO THE OBAMA CAMPAIGN
January 2011: Federal Reviewers Said It Would Be Far Cheaper To Not Restructure The Loan. New records obtained by The Washington Post show that some federal reviewers warned internally earlier this year that it would be far cheaper for the government to allow Solyndra to shut down and sell off its assets, rather than to restructure the deal and bet on the company recovering. (Carol D. Leonning And Joe Stephens, Lawmakers
Question Solyndra Loan Decision, The Washington Post, 9/14/11)

A Preliminary Estimate By The Office Of Management And Budget In January Showed That Restructuring Solyndra Could Cost Taxpayers Up To $168 Million More Than Liquidation.(Carol D. Leonning
And Joe Stephens, Lawmakers Question Solyndra Loan Decision, The Washington Post, 9/14/11)

OMB Staffers Warned That Restructuring Solyndras Loan Would Be Throwing Good Money After Bad. OMB staff members had warned that the Energy Departments restructuring of Solyndras loan might be throwing good money after bad, other e-mails show, and could cost taxpayers $168 million more than if Solyndra had liquidated in January. (Carol D. Leonnig & Joe Stephens, Obama Administration Emails: Giving More Taxpayer Money To Solyndra Was
Risky, The Washington Post, 9/15/11)

The U.S. Department Of Energy Learned In December That Solyndra Was Violating Its Federal Loan Deal, But The Agency Changed The Loan Terms To Allow The Solar Company To Continue Receiving Taxpayer Funds, Federal Officials Confirmed Wednesday. (Carol Leonig, Solyndra Violated Loan Terms In 2010 But Got More
Federal Money, DOE Confirms, The Washington Post, 9/28/11)

Solyndra Technically Defaulted On Its Government Loan In Late 2010. Solyndra LLC had such steep financial problems in late 2010 that the company violated terms of its loan-guarantee agreement with the Department of Energy and technically defaulted on its $535 million loan, according to people familiar with the matter. (Deborah Solomon, Solyndra Said To Have Violated Terms Of Its US Loan, The Wall Street Journal,9/28/11)

Solyndra Failed To Pay A $5 Million Payment In December 2010. The failed solar-panel maker, which is under numerous criminal and congressional investigations, ran so short of cash in December 2010 that it was unable to satisfy certain terms of its U.S. loan agreement, these people said. The agreement required Solyndra to provide $5 million in equity to a subsidiary building its factory but cash-flow problems prevented those payments. (Deborah Solomon, Solyndra Said To Have Violated Terms Of Its
US Loan, The Wall Street Journal,9/28/11)

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