“Green” Obama cost taxpayers billions

[Nova78]

"Green" Obama cost taxpayers billions » Louisville News and Politics

While President Obama has been trying to attack Mitt Romney on Bain Capital, unsuccessfully and hypocritically in many people’s eyes, he continues to try and hide from one of the biggest failures of his Presidency. While Obama’s lies on Bain Capital and Mitt Romney are being exposed more and more everyday, more of Obama’s lies are surfacing.

One of the biggest? Obama and green energy.
Nearly everyone knows of the story of Obama’s failed Solyndra Energy project, costing taxpayers $535 million, as well as 1,100 jobs, many do not know that Solyndra was targeted by federal investigators who concluded that they had indeed benefitted from special treatment.

Federal auditors had flagged the $535 million loan to Solyndra, saying some applicants had benefited from special treatment.

What raised suspicion? One of the lead private investors in Solyndra was an Oklahoma billionaire who also served as an Obama “bundler,” raising money during the 2008 presidential campaign.

Good job Obama ,do you really think we need 4 more years of this loser,your kids and grandchildren will suffer for decades.......

 

[waltky]

Usin' energy loans & bankruptcy to circumvent the IRS...

IRS says ‘tax avoidance’ at heart of Solyndra bankruptcy plan
Wednesday, October 10, 2012 - The Internal Revenue Service urged a bankruptcy judge to reject solar panel maker Solyndra LLC’s bankruptcy plan Wednesday, saying it amounts to little more than an avenue for owners of an empty corporate shell to avoid paying taxes.

“The undeniable conclusion is that tax benefits drive this plan,” attorneys for the IRS wrote in a bankruptcy pleading. Arguing that the bankruptcy court ought not confirm a plan “whose principal purpose is tax avoidance,” attorneys said in filings in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware that the tax breaks would be worth more money than funds set aside for creditors. Taxpayers are on the hook for more than a half-billion dollars after the company filed for bankruptcy last year, just two years after winning a loan guarantee from the Department of Energy.

What’s more, government attorneys said that as far back as 2010, Solyndra owners had “planned meticulously” to be able to use Solyndra’s net operating losses to offset future tax liabilities. “The only reason for the shell corporation to exist post-confirmation is to enable its owners to exploit these tax attributes, which would be lost in liquidation,” the IRS argued in court papers. One owner valued the so-called tax attributes at $150 million, dwarfing the $7 million to $8 million set aside by the reorganization plan for unsecured creditors, according to the government’s objection, which was filed by the Justice Department on behalf of the IRS. Under Solyndra’s reorganization plan, two big investors in the company, Madrone Partners LP and Argonaut Ventures, together would own nearly all of a shell company formed in the wake of Solyndra’s bankruptcy reorganization.

But the IRS said in court papers that there was little reason for the shell company to exist other than to help the owners avoid taxes. Argonaut is the investment arm of a family foundation headed by Oklahoma businessman George Kaiser, a fundraiser for Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign. Madrone has ties to the family that owns Wal-Mart Stores Inc. Even as company officials negotiated a restructuring deal with the Energy Department to keep Solyndra afloat, the company’s owners were “intently focused” on how to preserve their ability to use net operating losses as they privately prepared for the possibility that Solyndra would go broke, according to the government attorneys.

In one email, dated Dec. 7, 2010, Steve Mitchell, a managing director at Argonaut who served on Solyndra’s board, told attorneys that there was a “decent likelihood” that Solyndra would go bankrupt within 10 days. Mr. Mitchell devoted much of the rest of the email to “the need to preserve an estimated $750 million of NOLs in Solyndra,” referring to net operating losses, according to the court filing. “We need to discuss appropriate course of action in the event of filing and trustee appointment,” Mr. Mitchell told the attorneys. “The company has a significant NOL, potentially as high [as] $750 million, and George [Kaiser] has a high interest in understanding any manner in which we can preserve the NOLs.” A spokesman for Mr. Kaiser was not immediately available Wednesday.

Read more: IRS says 'tax avoidance' at heart of Solyndra bankruptcy plan - Washington Times IRS says 'tax avoidance' at heart of Solyndra bankruptcy plan - Washington Times

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Influence peddling runs deep in energy loan deal; BrightSource emails show cajoling
Wednesday, October 10, 2012 - The White House contends that all energy loan guarantees, including the more than $500 million given to now-bankrupt solar firm Solyndra, are awarded solely on the merits of the project, with no political influence from President Obama, Vice President Joseph R. Biden or other administration officials.

But a series of emails from solar power giant BrightSource Energy Inc. show how the company applied political pressure and used behind-the-scenes cajoling to win a $1.6 billion loan guarantee in April 2011. Emails obtained by The Washington Times show BrightSource leaders discussing in great detail how to best push the Energy Department to green-light the loan to fund the company’s massive Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System in California’s Mojave Desert, the largest loan guarantee issued by the administration. “We have a lot of force gearing up to leaverage [sic] them now, including the WH and VP office [Sen. Harry] Reid and [Sen. Dianne] Feinstein, and Gov. [Jerry] Brown” of California, reads an early March 2011 email from Arthur Haubenstock, the company’s vice president of regulatory affairs.

Mr. Haubenstock goes on to question whether the company should push its administration contacts to immediately arrange a call between Energy Secretary Steven Chu and Interior Secretary Kenneth L. Salazar, a project proponent, or keep it in their back pocket “to blast through any last roadblock that may appear.” The emails, which date from 2009 to April 2011, lay out lobbying strategies and key themes to be repeated to administration officials in the hopes they would exert influence on Mr. Chu and others at the top of the loan program.

Other emails from 2009 and the first 10 months of 2010 show apparent political calculations that BrightSource and affiliate companies hoped to use to their advantage. On Dec. 3, 2009, Bernard Toon — formerly Mr. Biden’s chief of staff who later became a lobbyist for Bechtel Corp., a mammoth construction company and contractor for the Ivanpah project — lays out how the project could help two influential Democratic senators. “Calls are in to Biden’s staff and I will be approaching the political affairs office at the White House tomorrow as well, as this project could benefit two senators who are in cycle and whose races will be tough next year — [Barbara] Boxer and the Majority Leader, Sen. Reid,” he wrote in the message to BrightSource CEO John Woolard.

Emails also highlight other points to be hit during conversations with administration officials, one of which is that “1,000+ jobs” could be created in time for the 2010 midterm elections. The vice president’s office contends that the loan not being approved until after the 2010 elections is proof that politics wasn’t involved. “The fact remains that the Department of Energy made the loan guarantee based on its assessment of the project’s merits at the time, not on input from the White House or the office of the vice president,” Mr. Biden’s office told The Times. The administration made similar arguments about the more than $500 million it awarded to the now-bankrupt solar company Solyndra LLC.

BrightSource — whose investors include Google Inc., BP Global, Chevron Corp. and Morgan Stanley — doesn’t dispute the fact that it touted the project to influence-peddlers and the most powerful in Washington. While admitting that it ramped up the pressure in early 2011, BrightSource says politics played no role and that Ivanpah was simply deemed a worthy candidate for federal dollars.

Read more: Biden, Dems enlisted by energy company to win billion-dollar loan deal, emails show - Washington Times Biden, Dems enlisted by energy company to win billion-dollar loan deal, emails show - Washington Times