Report: Hundreds of Millions Missing From Corzine's MF Global Mess

Have they checked the coffers for the Obama re-election campaign? If anything, the ability to make hundreds of millions of dollars disappear certainly enhances Jon Corzine's shot at becoming Obama's next Treasury Secretary.

Federal regulators have discovered that hundreds of millions of dollars in customer money have gone missing from MF Global in recent days, prompting an investigation into the company’s operations as it filed for bankruptcy on Monday, according to several people briefed on the matter.

The revelation of the missing money scuttled an 11th hour deal for MF Global to sell a major part of itself to a rival brokerage firm. MF Global, the powerhouse commodities brokerage run by Jon S. Corzine, had staked its survival on completing the deal.

Now, the investigation threatens to tarnish the reputation of Mr. Corzine, the former New Jersey Governor and Goldman Sachs chief who oversaw MF Global’s demise, making it the first American victim of Europe’s debt crisis.

What began as nearly $1 billion missing had dropped to less than $700 million by late Monday. It is unclear where the money went, and some money is expected to trickle in over the coming days as the firm sorts through the bankruptcy process, the people said.

Worth noting there's one word is conspicuously missing from the story. See if you can guess.

Great News: Anthony Weiner Still Spending Campaign Cash

He's not the only one. These creeps may have been kicked out of Congress, but they're still living large.

Social media enthusiast and former Congressman Anthony Weiner has continued to spend campaign contributions in the three months since he resigned from office in a naked photo scandal in June. Mr. Weiner has spent $130,000 on travel expenses, consulting, research and legal fees.

Congressional newspaper The Hill checked up on Mr. Weiner’s expenses as well as those of two of his fellow scandal plagued ex-New York Congressmen–Chris Lee and Eric Massa. All three men continue to spend campaign contributions.

Mr. Weiner, who is married, resigned from his post representing Queens’ ninth Congressional district June 16 after it was discovered he sent numerous lewd pictures to women on Facebook and Twitter. His post-scandal spending was documented in campaign disclosure reports filed with the federal election commission for the third quarter of this year, which began about two weeks after he resigned and ended September 30. According to the The Hill Mr. Weiner’s campaign spent $10,000 on travel expenses, $25,000 on consulting firms and “policy research” and just under $30,000 on legal fees during the third quarter.

Spending campaign cash after resigning from Congress isn’t illegal as long as the costs are connected to official activity.

What official activities does he still have?

For their part, Lee and Massa are spending what amounts to tip money when compared to Weiner.

Via The Hill link:

The FEC filings indicate that Weiner received a handful of contributions as his scandal peaked in mid-June. Two of those came from actor Mike Myers of “Austin Powers” fame, who gave him the maximum donation of $5,000 — $2,500 for his primary campaign and $2,500 for the general election.

The donations are dated June 14, just two days before Weiner announced in a televised news conference that he would resign. Myers’s publicist, Ina Treciokas, told The Hill that the checks were cut weeks earlier — “way before any of [the scandal] had been reported.”

Holder To Be Hit With Subpoena Today

Is it any wonder Team Obama and his union goons have orchestrated this juvenile anti-Wall Street protest? It's been a diversion from the possible criminal activity of his Attorney General, not to mention the Solyndra scandal. But can the media continue to ignore the story now that Eric Holder is about to be hit with a subpoena?

Via CBS News reporter Sharyl Attkisson, one of the few in the media who's actually reported on the massive Fast and Furious scandal.

Atty Gen to be sent document subpoena as early as today. Communications with more than a dozen officials on gunwalker sought.

Darrell Issa gangster-slapped Holder Monday.

If Holder ignores this subpoena, and I have every reason to believe he will, he needs to be removed from office.

Update: More here.

CBS News has learned a Congressional subpoena directed to Attorney General Eric Holder could go out as early as Tuesday, ordering him to appear before lawmakers and testify about when he was aware of a controversial gun smuggling operation known as Fast and Furious.

CBS News investigative correspondent Sharyl Attkisson reports the the subpoena will come from the House Oversight Committee, led by Republican Darrell Issa. It will ask for communications among senior Justice Department officials related to Fast and Furious and "gunwalking."

Scandal? What Scandal? Obama Fundraiser Pushed Solyndra Deal From Inside

Nothing to see here, folks. Move along. How convenient this drops late on a Friday afternoon.

An elite Obama fundraiser hired to help oversee the administration's energy loan program pushed and prodded career Department of Energy officials to move faster in approving a loan guarantee for Solyndra, even as his wife's law firm was representing the California solar company, according to internal emails made public late Friday.

"How hard is this? What is he waiting for?" wrote Steven J. Spinner, a high-tech consultant and energy investor who raised at least $500,000 for the candidate before being appointed to a key job helping oversee the energy loan guarantee program. "I have OVP [the Office of the Vice President] and WH [the White House] breathing down my neck on this."

Many of the emails were written just days after Spinner accepted a three-page ethics agreement in which he pledged he would "not participate in any discussion regarding any application involving [his wife's law firm] Wilson [Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati]."

The $535 million loan to Solyndra was ultimately approved in 2009 and for months was touted by President Obama as a model of his efforts to create new jobs in the emerging field of clean energy. But in late August, the company abruptly shut its doors and days later declared it was filing for bankruptcy. Now the loan is the subject of multiple investigations, by Congress and by the Department of Justice.

In one of the new emails shared with ABC News and other news outlets Friday, the White House appears to be bracing for the political fallout -- one high ranking energy official in the White House warns shortly before Solyndra's bankruptcy, on Aug. 26, that what's coming is a "*#~@ show" and "a mess."

So nice of them to share. Maybe they can start sharing with Darrell Issa.

H/T.

More here.

Via John Ekdahl, we've got a handy dandy Solyndra timesline.

Flashback: Biden On Nuclear Option In 2005: 'I Pray To God' Democrats Do Not Do This When We Have Power

That was then, this is now.

In a shocking development Thursday evening, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) triggered a rarely used procedural option informally called the “nuclear option” to change the Senate rules.

Reid and 50 members of his caucus voted to change Senate rules unilaterally to prevent Republicans from forcing votes on uncomfortable amendments after the chamber has voted to move to final passage of a bill.

Reid’s coup passed by a vote of 51-48, leaving Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) fuming.

Eh, rules are only for Republicans.

Fast and Furious Scandal: 'We're Gonna Hit the Reset Button'

Here we go, reshuffling the deck chairs on the sinking ship.

There's a major reshuffling at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms amid the Fast and Furious "gunwalking" scandal. In making the announcement this afternoon, Acting Director Todd Jones told reporters "we're gonna hit the reset button."

Among the changes, the current acting director of the beleaguered ATF Phoenix office where Fast and Furious was based, Tom Brandon, is being moved to Washington DC headquarters as Deputy Director. Brandon temporarily took over in Phoenix after the transfer of Special Agent in Charge Bill Newell, who led Fast and Furious.

Two key figures at ATF headquarters who were involved in Fast and Furious, and have testified before Congress, are being demoted. They include ATF Deputy Director Billy Hoover, who will become the Special Agent in Charge of the Washington field division; and Mark Chait, Assistant Director in Charge of Field Operations, who will become Special Agent in Charge of the Baltimore field division.

Uh, when is Eric Holder's "demotion" coming?

There's speculation Sharyl Attkisson is being silenced by CBS. Sure doesn't appear to be the case.

CBS Reporter Says WH Screamed at Her Over Fast and Furious

On The Laura Ingraham Show today, CBS reporter Sharyl Attkisson tells the story of abuse from the White House. Waaah, you're being so unfair!



H/T Matt Wolking.

From the transcript:

1:31 - In between the yelling that I received from Justice Department yesterday, the spokeswoman--who would not put anything in writing, I was asking for her explanation so there would be clarity and no confusion later over what had been said, she wouldn't put anything in writing--so we talked on the phone and she said things such as the question Holder answered was different than the one he asked. But he phrased it, he said very explicitly, 'I probably heard about Fast and Furious for the first time over the last few weeks.'

6:05 - Laura: So they were literally screaming at you?
Attkisson: Yes. Well the DOJ woman was just yelling at me. The guy from the White House on Friday night literally screamed at me and cussed at me. [Laura: Who was the person? Who was the person at Justice screaming?] Eric Schultz. Oh, the person screaming was [DOJ spokeswoman] Tracy Schmaler, she was yelling not screaming. And the person who screamed at me was Eric Schultz at the White House."

7:33 - Laura: Do we know the exact number [of guns] that went over to Mexico?
Attkisson: We know more than 2,000 in Fast and Furious and I will soon be reporting on the fact that that is not the only case. 2,000 for that operation according to the agents involved.

8:28 - ...Is it sort of a drip, drip. And I'm certainly not the one to make the case for DOJ and White House about what I'm doing wrong. They will tell you that I'm the only reporter--as they told me--that is not reasonable. They say the Washington Post is reasonable, the LA Times is reasonable, the New York Times is reasonable, I'm the only one who thinks this is a story, and they think I'm unfair and biased by pursuing it.

Attkisson is one of the few reporters pursuing this scandal threatening to consume Obama. No wonder they're freaking out.

Meanwhile, it's time for a special investigator.

Update: More thoughts at AoSHQ.

Crony Capitalism: Beverly Perdue Donors Set to Cash In On Lucrative Land Deal

It pays to have friends in high places, especially when you're a bunch of greedy Democrat donors.

A state lawmaker and a group of Democratic political donors with ties to Gov. Beverly Perdue are poised to sell land at a handsome profit for a tire plant that's being lured with $100 million in state and local incentives, according to public records reviewed by The Associated Press.

As North Carolina's chief executive, the governor is a key decision maker in large incentives deals involving state money. She also helps appoint the board members of a foundation that's been asked to provide part of the tire plant's package. Perdue's campaign has received more than $52,000 from five men with an ownership stake in the Brunswick County industrial park proposed for the new facility.

The governor's son, Garrett Perdue, is also a lawyer and site-selection consultant for an influential law firm that a county official said was advising the tire company. The firm, Womble Carlyle Sandridge & Rice, does not disclose which projects the younger Perdue works on, citing attorney-client privilege.

How convenient her son is also involved in this deal.

Move along, nothing to see here. Just play dumb.

Bradshaw also said he had no idea the owners of the proposed Project Soccer site have been frequent contributors to the Democratic Party or Gov. Perdue.

Campaign finance records show Stephenson and members of his family have donated more than $85,000 to Democratic candidates over the last 20 years, including $14,000 to Perdue since 2004. Records show $8,000 in contributions to former Senate President Pro Tempore Marc Basnight, the Manteo Democrat who appointed Stephenson to the Golden LEAF board.

Walters and his wife have donated more than $34,000 to elected Democrats other than himself, including $14,000 to Perdue.

William E. Musselwhite, a Lumberton lawyer who owns a share of the land, has given more than $22,000 to state Democrats, including $14,500 to Perdue.

Dennis T. Worley, a Tabor City attorney and another of the owners, has given more than $28,000 to Democrats, including $7,700 to Perdue.

Kyle A. Cox, another Tabor City lawyer and part property owner, gave more than $11,000 to Democrats, including $2,000 to Perdue.

Bradshaw, the economic developer, said he doesn't care who owns the land.

"I don't know who these people are," Bradshaw said. "I don't know who contributes to who. I just want to bring these jobs to Brunswick County."

Wonderful: Obama OK's Two Solar Loans Worth $1 Billion

I guess that pesky Solyndra scandal won't be deterring the corrupt president from doling out more of your money. Why should Solyndra stop him? It's not as if many in the media are even reporting it.

Facing a Friday deadline, the Energy Department has approved two loan guarantees worth more than $1billion for solar energy projects in Nevada and Arizona.

Energy Secretary Steven Chu said the department has completed a $737 million loan guarantee to Tonopah Solar Energy for a 110 megawatt solar tower in Nevada, and a $337 million guarantee for Mesquite Solar 1 to develop a 150 megawatt solar plant in Arizona.

The loans were approved under the same program that paid for a $535 million loan to Solyndra Inc., a now-bankrupt solar panel maker that has become a rallying cry for Republican critics of the Obama administration's green energy program.

They actually have $5 billion more ready to give away by Friday.

Great.

Update: More on those other loans forthcoming.

The Department of Energy is set this week to announce whether nine federal loan guarantees amounting to $6.5 billion for green energy projects will get final approval.

The number of full-time, permanent jobs they would create? According to the DOE's own figures, a grand total of 283. That is nearly $23 million per job.

It's also a drop in the bucket toward the five million green jobs President Obama promised as a candidate in 2008.

Criminal Charges Expected in Investigation of NC Governor's Campaign Expenses

Maybe North Carolina's Democrat Governor Beverly Perdue should suspend her re-election efforts while her campaign is under criminal investigation.

Last week, Wake County District Attorney Colon Willoughby let it be known that more criminal charges are expected in the investigation of Gov. Beverly Perdue’s campaign finances.

Willoughby’s comments to WRAL-TV confirmed that the investigation into unreported airplane flights by the Perdue campaign is continuing.

But the prosecutor added that he has seen nothing that implicates Perdue.

Willoughby has been reviewing information collected by the State Bureau of Investigation into Perdue campaign finances after an initial investigation by the State Board of Elections found dozens of unreported campaign flights.

The elections board review led to a $30,000 fine against the Perdue campaign. The governor admitted mistakes, but said none were intentional.

Still, a Perdue contributor, Robert Lee Caldwell of Morganton, was indicted in February on obstruction of justice charges. The indictment alleges that Caldwell paid for a plane to fly Perdue to a campaign stop, had someone else report paying for it, and then reimbursed the man with cash.

Again, no evidence shows that Perdue knew anything about it, and Caldwell is one donor out of thousands.

Willoughby’s words, though, mean that the investigation will likely be creeping closer to Perdue. He isn’t providing any hints about who might be charged, but political insiders believe that someone on the inside of the campaign could be the target.

If so, the political damage to Perdue won’t be inconsequential, even if she had no knowledge of events.

No politician can hope to control eager, sycophantic donors, especially when courts increasingly give a green light to all kinds of questionable political giving; controlling your campaign staff is another matter.

The obvious question that arises: What do these events portend for the 2012 election?

Perdue, who has certainly been aware that the campaign flight investigation wasn’t over, has given no indication that she won’t run for a second term.

She’s raising money. She’s been a visible, hands-on, active governor. Even if her poll numbers and public persona aren’t sparkling, she thrives in small gatherings with average folks and jetsetters.

Yes, she thrives by saying really stupid things, even though her media enablers want to pretend she was just joking.

'In a Rush to Meet Your Deadline, We Made an Honest Mistake'

Remember this shrieking banshee from the other day? Looks like she's already got some problems with the truth. For someone so eager to redistribute wealth she sure looks like she's been able to cash in on your tax dollars.

The campaign for Democratic Senate hopeful Elizabeth Warren said Friday she had been paid $192,722 for serving as chairman of a congressional committee that monitored the 2008 federal bank bailout, three times as much as had originally been acknowledged.

The Warren campaign revised the figure following a POLITICO report on Thursday highlighting the fact that the Congressional Oversight Panel, which oversaw the TARP program, has not publicly disclosed exactly how it spent $10.5 million on salaries, travel, consultants and other expenses. Warren said she now supports public access to the oversight panel’s records, though her campaign wouldn’t say if she plans to actively push to open up the records.

Warren served as the oversight panel’s chairman from its creation in the fall of 2008 until September 2010, when President Barack Obama tapped her to help launch the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Senate Republicans, however, blocked her from being formally appointed to head the new agency.

Warren spokesman Kyle Sullivan initially said Warren, who is seeking the Democratic nomination to take on Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) next year, had earned $64,289 for serving on the oversight panel, based on executive-branch financial disclosure statements she filed for 2009 and 2010.

But Sullivan told POLITICO on Friday that the campaign had overlooked $128,433 Warren earned from the panel in 2009.

“In a rush to meet your deadline, we made an honest mistake,” Sullivan said. “And we misread a document and thought $64,289 was for 2009 and 2010. It was only for 2010.”

It's quite amazing how many "honest mistakes" these liberals make.

Some lunatics blame the dreaded "right-wing smear machine" for Warren's so-called honest mistake.

Sure, keep believing that.

NC Dem Senator: 'No, No There Are Not Any Bridges in North Carolina in Danger of Falling'

The only thing I can conclude from this is Obama is a shameless liar who would use fear to score cheap political points. Why am I not surprised?

Sen. Kay Hagan (D-N.C.) downplayed President Obama’s concern that Americans should not wait “until another bridge falls,” and in turn pass his jobs bill that promotes infrastructure improvements, saying that the bridges in her home state are safe.

“No, no there are not any bridges in North Carolina in danger of falling,” Hagan said to CNS News.

The president painted a bleaker picture during a Sept. 14 speech in North Carolina.

“In North Carolina alone, there are 153 structurally deficient bridges that need to be repaired. Four of them are near here, on or around the [Raleigh] Beltline. Why would we wait to act until another bridge falls?” Obama said.

This bridge nonsense has shown Obama at his lowest. It's as if he wants a bridge to collapse just so he can justify raising taxes. It's pathetic.

Axelrod Denies Knowing Obama: 'I Don’t Know Anybody Associated With Solyndra'

The best and brightest are suffering from some major memory loss.

Another top aide to President Obama is in Chicago talking about the bankruptcy of the solar power company Solyndra that got a big federal loan guarantee.

David Axelrod – Obama’s former senior adviser at the White House who is now back in Chicago running the president’s re-election campaign – is no joining former Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel in denying any knowledge of the Solyndra deal.

“I don’t know anybody associated with Solyndra and I know nothing about the project,” Axelrod said.

"How seriously has it hurt the president," Cameron asked.

“Now look, we have seeded clean energy technology projects all over this country. Many of them are very promising. Many of them are already showing success. And the fact is, when you invest in a large number of projects, some of them are not going to perform as they should. This was one of those cases,” Axelrod said.

But Republicans say it wasn’t necessary to put taxpayers on the hook for a half-billion dollar loan guarantee to meet that goal.

Last week Mayor Rahm Emanuel denied any knowledge of a developing scandal in Washington that dates back to his days as President Barack Obama’s chief of staff.

Emanuel was the chief of staff during the Obama administrations's green energy initiative when the loan was rushed through.

During a Chinatown news conference Friday, in which he was discussing his new wellness program, WLS Radio asked the mayor about his involvement with the Solyndra deal.

“Bill, ya know, I’m focusing on a major announcement today for the city of Chicago,” Emanuel tells Bill Cameron, “I don’t actually remember that or know about it. So, what I’m dealing is with what I’m dealing with here today.”

So Axelrod is also denying he knows George Kaiser?

George Kaiser’s four White House visits during the week before Solyndra secured its $535 million loan guarantee — and his $53,500 in donations to the president’s 2008 presidential campaign – have drawn scrutiny from critics questioning whether the Obama administration engaged in political favoritism. Now Kaiser’s philanthropic gift to one of Michelle Obama’s public health projects is another indication of what may amount to a White House fully engaged in crony capitalism.

“This tax document clearly shows that George Kaiser greased the wheels to gain favor with the Obama Administration for the purpose of receiving a half-billion dollar taxpayer-funded loan for Solyndra,” Citizens United president David Bossie told The Daily Caller. “It is evident that this was a pay-to-play scheme that reaches all the way up to the highest levels of the White House.”

Biden Flashback: 'Recovery Act Has Had an Unprecedentedly Low Level of Fraud'

Care to take that one back, Sheriff Joe?

“Sheriff” Joe Biden’s remarks could come back to haunt him when it comes to Solyndra, the solar company that went bankrupt after winning a $535 million loan guarantee from 2009’s economic stimulus package.

President Obama named his vice president the sheriff of the stimulus, and Biden’s duties were to ensure that no money was wasted in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

Biden, a key figure in any White House negotiation with leaders on Capitol Hill, has boasted of his success in limiting fraud and waste in the stimulus.

“Now, there were a lot of naysayers back then who said that there was no way we could implement the Recovery Act without massive waste, fraud and abuse,” Biden said in a June 13 post on the White House blog announcing the new “Campaign to Cut Waste,” which was to root out wasteful government spending at every agency and department.

“You know what? They were wrong. Thanks to our diligence (and some help from advanced computer models and sophisticated data analysis), the Recovery Act has had an unprecedentedly low level of fraud, with less than 0.6 percent of all awards experiencing any waste or abuse.”

Obama asked Biden to reprise his sheriff role Wednesday, appointing him to lead a review of how agencies spend taxpayer dollars following a Justice Department report that found “extravagant” spending on conferences, including $16 muffins.

The Solyndra controversy represents a small portion of the total stimulus funds, but it still strikes at the administration’s promise to prevent fraud and waste. And Biden finds himself in the middle of the controversy.

Republicans argue the White House rushed the loan to Solyndra so that Biden could announce it at a company event in 2009, when the administration was pushing green energy as a way to create jobs.

According to Obama flunky Jay Carney, this was merely an "investment" that didn't pan out. Nothing to see here, move along.

"The reason why fledgling, cutting-edge industries need this kind of assistance is because they can be high risk as well as high reward," White House press secretary Jay Carney said. He also observed that "what happened here is an investment did not pan out."

Um, so why not let everything out in the open rather that running for cover and stonewalling investigators?

Meanwhile, to no surprise we've got an apparent Soros stench emanating from another Obama scandal. Imagine our surprise.

As Republican lawmakers begin to dig into the White House's cozy relationship with a startup wireless company and the wealthy Democratic donor who owns it, a new character has appeared on the story's edges: liberal superdonor, conservative bete noire and controversial investor George Soros.

Soros reportedly invested in the telecom company LightSquared through a hedge fund, and many of the nonprofits he finances have backed LightSquared in regulatory and policy disputes.

Ethically-Challenged Tax Cheat to Be Immortalized on Capitol Hill

Today a portrait of the odious Charles Rangel is to be unveiled at the Capitol.

This should be the portrait he's remembered for.

He may have been censured by his House colleagues, but Rep. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) will have his visage permanently displayed on Capitol Hill.

The House Ways and Means Committee, which Rangel chaired until he lost his gavel following accusations of ethics violations, is hosting a ceremony and reception Thursday to unveil Rangel’s official portrait in Longworth House Office Building.

House leaders including Speaker John Boehner, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Minority Whip Steny Hoyer will speak at the ceremony. Two New York senators, Democrats Kirsten Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer, will also give remarks.

I understand it's likely a formality, but shouldn't Speaker Boehner have found somewhere else to be during this sham?

Drip Drip Drip: Another Obama Fundraiser Mired in Solyndra Scandal

The cover-up threatening to consume Obama continues to unravel.

The White House faced mounting political complications as a second top fundraiser for President Obama was linked to a federal loan guarantee program that backed a now-bankrupt Silicon Valley solar energy company, and as two California lawmakers called for investigations of a state tax break granted to the firm.

Steve Spinner, who helped monitor the Energy Department's issuance of $25 billion in government loan guarantees to renewable energy projects, was one of Obama's top fundraisers in 2008 and is raising money for the president's 2012 reelection campaign.

Spinner did not have any role in the selection of applicants for the loan program and, in fact, was recused from the decision to grant a $535-million loan guarantee to Solyndra Inc. because his wife's law firm represented the company, administration officials said Friday.

But Spinner's role as a top official in the Energy Department program, which had not been previously revealed, is likely to spur new inquiries into whether political influence played a role in the handling of the "green" energy fund. Solyndra faces a congressional probe, a criminal investigation and separate internal inquiries at the Energy and Treasury departments.

"This will fuel more questions, and now you've got real people involved at the inspector-general level who will be turning over chairs and cabinets, asking questions," said Stanley Brand, a criminal defense and ethics lawyer in Washington who has served as general counsel to the U.S. House of Representatives.

He noted that none of the details that had emerged suggested any laws had been broken. "It's embarrassing, it's ham-handed, it looks bad, but so far all we have is the White House trying to advantage itself in a political way with a loan," he said.

The largest investments in Solyndra were funds operated on behalf of the family foundation of billionaire George Kaiser, another major fundraiser for Obama in 2008. Kaiser has denied personally investing in the solar energy company or talking to White House officials about the loan.

Read the rest.

Meanwhile, some media outlets are pretending that if you ignore this massive scandal then it apparently never happened.



This massive scandal sure looks like The Chicago Way.

This is not a new kind of politics. It's the old kind. The Chicago kind.

And now the Tribune Washington Bureau has reported that the U.S. Department of Energy employee who helped monitor the Solyndra loan guarantee was one of Obama's top fundraisers.

Fundraising? Contracts? Imagine that.

Steve Spinner was the Obama administration official in charge of handing out billions and billions of tax dollars to "green" energy deals. According to the Tribune story, Spinner the other day invited Obama's national political finance committee to a meeting in Chicago.

The name of the Obama fundraising initiative?

"Technology for Obama."

The idea of the Obama fundraisers getting together, talking "green," and perhaps offering taxpayer loan guarantees to insider businesses in the interest of helping the environment — it all seems rather fresh.

Like a mountain meadow.

Until you realize it's the same old politics, the same kind practiced in Washington and Chicago and anywhere else where appetites are satisfied by politicians. When the government picks winners and losers, who's the loser? Just look in the mirror, hold that thought, and tell me later.

Solyndra image via Cuffy Meigs

Democrat Attacks Obama: 'In My Entire Political Career, I've Never Seen Anything This Irresponsible'

It's a shame Attack Watch has stopped defending Obama and stopping rumors before they start. After several days of merciless ridicule they appear to have gone into hiding. Well, here's a fresh attack on Obama, so maybe they can come out and defend their man.

Leading House Democrats are accusing the Obama administration of ignoring the lingering mortgage crisis and threatening tens-of-millions of Americans with foreclosure in the process.

The lawmakers – encouraged by Obama's mention of mortgage-relief in his address to Congress last week – were quickly deflated just days later when their efforts to learn the details of the White House plan proved unsuccessful.

"The administration has been AWOL on this issue," charged Rep. Dennis Cardoza (D-Calif.), "and the American people are suffering because of the mismanagement."

"In my entire political career, I've never seen anything this irresponsible," he added.

If they think this is irresponsible, who knows what they think about the burgeoning Solyndra scandal. Meanwhile, much like anyone else trying to investigate the most corrupt administration ever, they're running into obstacles.

Cardoza said there's a growing sense the administration is stone-walling.

"They're giving us the same speech they'd given us months before," he said. "We've seen this dog-and-pony show before. It's nothing new. … That's the frustration.

Most transparent presidency ever!

Obama's 'Green Jobs' Scam Creates 3500 Jobs for $38 Billion

If the GOP has even the slightest clue they put a halt to this green jobs scam today and start in investigation into where this money has gone. The Solyndra scandal is merely the tip of the iceberg. Seriously, $38 billion for 3500 jobs? What the hell is going on here?

A $38.6 billion loan guarantee program that the Obama administration promised would create or save 65,000 jobs has created just a few thousand jobs two years after it began, government records show.

The program — designed to jump-start the nation’s clean technology industry by giving energy companies access to low-cost, government-backed loans — has directly created 3,545 new, permanent jobs after giving out almost half the allocated amount, according to Energy Department tallies.

President Obama has made “green jobs” a showcase of his recovery plan, vowing to foster new jobs, new technologies and more competitive American industries. But the loan guarantee program came under scrutiny Wednesday from Republicans and Democrats at a House oversight committee hearing about the collapse of Solyndra, a solar-panel maker whose closure could leave taxpayers on the hook for as much as $527 million.

The GOP lawmakers accused the administration of rushing approval of a guarantee of the firm’s project and failing to adequately vet it. “My goodness. We should be reviewing every one of these loan guarantee” projects, said Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.).

Obama’s efforts to create green jobs are lagging behind expectations at a time of persistently high unemployment. Many economists say that because alternative-­energy projects are so expensive and slow to ramp up, they are not the most efficient way to stimulate the economy.

Oh, so I guess they can say the results here were unexpected.

At least antique media outlets like the Washington Post are reporting this fiasco. If such a failure occurred during a GOP administration you can bet your last nickel this would be front page news across the country and at the top of every national newscast.

More on Solyndra (aka, Obama's Enron) here.

Kerry: 'This Tunnel Will Be a Bargain'

If you're wondering why John Kerry has a long face today, look no further.

It’s reassuring to know that Congress’ so-called Super Committee will have at least one solon on it who has a track record of being able to ferret out waste, fraud and abuse wherever it rears its bloated head.

How odd that John Kerry should be appointed to his august new position the very same week the Big Dig bargain tunnel of which he spoke so proudly has now sprung another “sinkhole.” We are informed that the sinkhole “poses no risk” to motorists, even though the Dig has already spent $3.5 million addressing the problem, with another $11.5 million budgeted to correct this latest fiasco.

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: “Consultants evaluating the problem are at a loss to explain why the area has settled so much.”

But don’t forget, this tunnel will be a bargain. Of course, the occasional setback could still occur. In which case you might want to paraphrase another of Liveshot’s famous questions: “Can I get me a submarine here?”

Ouch. Of course, you shouldn't expect Kerry or any other Massachusetts luminaries to admit they were wrong. Besides, suckers, it was your money they wasted on this fiasco. And if you dare voice dissent, you're just a bunch of inbred teabagging terrorists.

Without getting bogged down in the details, which in the spirit of transparency finally have been revealed four years after they were first noticed, the geniuses who built the bargain Big Dig tried to freeze some of the land under the tunnel. Imagine their shock when they discovered that what is frozen also can thaw.

Among other things, the melting water ruined a huge drainage pipe, a high-voltage electrical duct and even buckled pavement in the (above-ground) Postal Service parking lot.

At least that’s what you’ve read in the papers, anyway. But at that same ribbon-cutting where Liveshot told us the tunnel would be a bargain, U.S. Rep. Barney Frank told us that much of the Big Dig’s bad press “has been manufactured by the media.”

You know, like the made-up headlines about the Jamaica Plain woman being crushed by a 3-ton slab of concrete falling from the tunnel ceiling.

That’s why Kerry lectured the media this week about how they should stop covering the Tea Party.

Yes, perhaps the media should ignore the Tea Party for awhile and instead focus on these corrupt Democrats.

Thug Tactics: Senate Banking Committee to Probe S&P

Sure, this ought to help get America's credit standing back to where it was.

The Senate Banking committee has begun probing last week's decision by Standard and Poor's to downgrade the U.S. credit rating, a committee aide told Reuters on Monday.

The aide said the panel was gathering information about the S&P move but no decision had been made on whether it will hold hearings into the downgrade.

Would they ever accept responsibility? Hell no.

Congressional Democrats on Monday lashed out at Standard & Poor's, labeling the firm's decision to strip U.S. debt of its triple-A rating as "irresponsible" as stocks fell sharply on the first trading day following the downgrade.

But House Republican leaders watched the rout in the stock markets and warned colleagues not to feel pressured into raising taxes to address the U.S. debt of more than $14.3 trillion. The reactions underscored how lawmakers of all stripes are trying go back on offense and steer a path forward after being put on the defensive by the ratings firm's criticisms of a dysfunctional political process.

"I am deeply disappointed in S&P's decision to enter into the game of political punditry," Senate Banking Committee Chairman Tim Johnson (D., S.D.) said in a statement. He called the downgrade an "irresponsible move" that may " have spillover effects" such as higher borrowing costs for home buyers, credit- card holders, car buyers, and state and local governments.

Running up trillions in debt apparently isn't irresponsible.

After today's 634-point plunge, expect a repeat tomorrow.