Pretty hard to add much to this one. Sarah pretty much nails it:
Stimulus Bill Anniversary Proves Not-So-Stimulating
Today at 9:04am
One year ago today, President Obama signed a nearly trillion dollar stimulus package and handed our children the bill. What did we get for that massive price tag? Many promises, but the promises have proven false. On this stimulus anniversary, Washington needs to hear our message that Americans expect, and deserve, better.
Americans were promised the stimulus would keep unemployment under 8%. It’s now well over that. We were promised it would be targeted and pork-free. It’s been loaded with pork, corporate giveaways, union bosses’ goodies, and other manners of waste. We were promised there would be no fraud, but our government now tells us it can’t even verify the eligibility of people applying for the $325 billion worth of stimulus tax provisions. We were promised there would be strict oversight, but billions of dollars apparently were allotted to congressional districts that don’t even exist. We were promised it would provide "green jobs" for Americans, but 80% of the $2 billion they spent on alternative energy went to purchase wind turbines built in China! We were promised it would help state governments weather the recession, but states receiving the stimulus bait will be in worse fiscal shape now because local governments will be on the hook for new unfunded mandates and continuation of government programs they couldn’t afford in the first place – as many of us governors warned state legislatures.
One year later, we see plainly that the stimulus was not a well-thought out plan. It hasn’t revived our economy; instead the debt-ridden package will prove to be a drag on our economy. It hasn’t put us on the path to a better future; instead it’s unfairly mortgaged our children’s future and stolen opportunities from them. It hasn’t strengthened us; instead it endangers our freedom and security by making us even more beholden to foreign lenders. The legacy of the stimulus isn’t jobs or economic growth – it’s more dangerous debt.
But there is hope! And this hope lies in draining the swamp in D.C. and sending Commonsense Conservatives to Washington who understand the need for fiscal restraint. Those who are willing to rein in spending, respect Constitutional limits, and repeal the stimulus should get our support, and those who have been part of the problem should be replaced.
In this election year, we’ll see many daring Davids take on entrenched Goliaths. Just one of these many brave souls is a northern Wisconsin patriot named Sean Duffy. He’s running in Wisconsin’s 7th congressional district against a liberal Goliath who’s been in Congress over 40 years now and has the dubious distinction of being the author of the stimulus bill. To commemorate the anniversary of the signing of the stimulus, Sean Duffy is holding a fundraising "money bomb" for his campaign so he can replace the career politician who drafted this government-bloating behemoth.
If you’re frustrated about the waste in the stimulus bill, please support a solid fiscal conservative who will work to repeal it. Please visit Sean Duffy’s website and help him help us correct the mistakes of this past year.
On this first anniversary of the stimulus, let’s send a message to the big-spenders in Washington by helping Sean Duffy unseat the author of the stimulus. Let’s put government back on our side and get to work revitalizing America!
- Sarah Palin
One thing I like about Sarah’s blogging, she provides plenty of links to back up what she says. Please make sure you take the time to visit each link and learn even more.
Make no mistake about it, Obama’s pork laden "stimulus package" is a disaster for all Americans. Good money thrown after bad in an orgy of government spending that looked to build the perfect communist utopian state. Epic Fail on every account!
Although it’s hard to add to what Sarah has written, I did want to include more on all of the money that went to foreign energy firms. West Coast editor Stacy Drake brought this one to my attention from the San Diego Union-Tribune:
Foreign energy firms getting windfall of U.S. stimulus funds
Money is used to buy turbines made abroad
Of the more than $2 billion the federal government has given out to boost the economy and create green-energy jobs, more than three-quarters has gone to foreign-owned companies that dominate the global wind-power industry. This latest finding by the Investigative Reporting Workshop, a nonprofit at American University in Washington, D.C., is illustrated clearly in San Diego County, where about a dozen commercial wind developers have offices.
La Jolla is the headquarters for Eurus Energy America, the subsidiary of a Japanese firm that received $91 million in federal stimulus money for a wind farm in western Texas. It plans to apply for more money to fund a wind project in Oregon.
EnXco, a French-owned firm with American headquarters in Escondido, has received $69.5 million in stimulus money for its wind farm in Indiana. It installed 53 German-made turbines at the site. EnXco also is operating the Texas wind farm for Eurus.
A-Power Energy Generation Systems, a Chinese-owned company that might get federal grants through a consortium building a wind farm in western Texas, lists a vacant office in downtown San Diego as its U.S. address on recent filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Cannon Power Group of San Diego has received $19 million to expand a wind farm east of Portland in Washington. The company spent about half of that money overseas to pay for wind turbines it said it couldn’t get stateside.
The Reporting Workshop’s initial analysis of wind-energy grants was released in October and outraged some lawmakers. Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., cited the group’s report — and news that $450 million in stimulus money might go to a group installing Chinese-made wind turbines in Texas — when he asked the secretary of energy to deny federal financing to firms that use foreign-made turbines.
American wind companies are receiving stimulus grants, but some such as Cannon Power spend much of that money abroad because few U.S. companies manufacture turbines.
Mark Anderson, chief executive officer of Eurus Energy America, a subsidiary of Tokyo-based Eurus Energy Holdings Corp., said his company would not have been able to move forward with other projects without the guarantee of stimulus money.
Eurus received $91 million in grants for the Bull Creek Wind Farm in Texas. It has the capacity to power about 48,000 homes a year.
Eurus is building a wind farm in Oregon. The company plans to seek green grants for that project, Anderson said.
"We plan to put more and more money into the United States," he said.
Eurus employs 20 people in San Diego, Anderson said, and has assets worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
Its Texas project created between 300 and 400 jobs for construction, including 10 for operation, and is benefiting the local economy through property taxes and land leases, Anderson said. For the project, Eurus bought Mitsubishi turbines, which are manufactured abroad.
EnXco, the French-owned firm based in Escondido, also went abroad to buy turbines, from German manufacturer REpower. A spokesman for EnXco said the project created more than 200 construction jobs as well as a dozen permanent jobs. It has the capacity to power about 29,000 homes per year.
A-Power, based in northeast China, is part of a group building a wind farm in western Texas using turbines it is manufacturing in China. This is the project that affronted Schumer after the group announced plans to collect $450 million in stimulus grants.
In a letter, Schumer asked Energy Secretary Steven Chu to reject requests for stimulus grants from companies that buy key components abroad.
"In all due respect, I remind the secretary there is a four-letter word associated with the stimulus — J-O-B-S," Schumer told ABC News. "Very few jobs here, lots of jobs in China. That is not what I intended or any other legislator who voted for the stimulus intended."
Chu responded on Facebook: "But manufacturers will not build plants here and grow their production capacity here unless there is domestic demand; and, until recently, that was not the case."
In SEC filings this year, A-Power Energy Generation Systems lists a suite in a high-rise in downtown San Diego as its business and mailing address. However, the suite door is locked, and a building manager said A-Power is not a tenant.
When reached on his cell phone, Chief Operating Officer John Lin said he did not have time to answer questions.
Gary Hardke, president of Cannon Power Group, a renewable-energy company near Torrey Pines, said his company had no choice but to go abroad to buy parts for its wind farm in Klickitat, Wash. Two main U.S. manufacturers, GE Energy and Clipper Windpower, either did not make a turbine the size that Cannon wanted or were sold out.
Cannon bought the turbines — made up mostly of blades, towers and nacelles (the part in the middle that houses components such as the rotor and generator) — from Siemens, a German company that also was the main contractor.
In all, Hardke estimated, more than 50 percent of the stimulus grant went to Siemens.
"I appreciate that cosmetically it doesn’t look good, but the reality is … the grants (must) go into the project costs," he said.
Cannon is expecting $151 million more in stimulus grants to expand the wind farm and hopes all the parts will come from the United States.
Hardke pointed to ways the stimulus cash will do what lawmakers intended — boost the local economy. Cannon pays about $3 million a year to lease land from about 40 individual owners as well as $2 million in property taxes.
The project is in a county where nearly 20 percent of residents earn less than the poverty level, according to a 2009 U.S. Census release. It created more than 300 construction jobs, Hardke said, and 20 to 30 to operate the farm.
"There isn’t a family in Klickitat that doesn’t know someone employed by the project," he said.
"The ongoing economic development benefit in rural America is really significant."
The icing on the cake, he said, is "clean energy — really significantly helping the environment."
There are an incredible amount of links to more information at the Union-Tribune’s website so please be sure to visit them here. Wind energy is a huge boondoggle. a real waste, and as we are finding out, these turbines will not opperate in the subzero weather in the areas they are being placed! (Read more here)
What a mess.
This is more failure by our president and his corrupt government. It is past time for talking and time action. We must stop this insanity, and stop it now.
You can start by helping Sean Duffy!
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