1,100 Green Jobs Go Poof!

An industry that probably never was goes upside down:

A star of the burgeoning clean energy industry frequently touted by President Obama, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and other national Democrats burned out today as Solyndra LLC announced that it is shutting its doors, laying off 1,100 employees and filing for bankruptcy.

This is the same firm that received the Department of Energy's first loan guarantee under Obama's economic stimulus program, worth $535 million and guaranteed by - who else? - the American taxpayer.

At the time, Obama praised Solyndra in May 2010 during a widely publicized speech at the company's new Fremont, California, facility that was made possible by the federal loan guarantee.

“The true engine of economic growth will always be companies like Solyndra, will always be America’s businesses, ” Obama told the assembled company employees. “Less than a year ago, we were standing on what was an empty lot. But through the Recovery Act, this company received a loan to expand its operations. This new factory is the result of those loans.”

And tomorrow you can go walk around an empty $700 million campus.

Rush did a pretty good riff on this story yesterday. Here you have a solar company that couldn't survive even though its main power source, the sun, is still there and still putting out free energy. It pretty much proves there is no real industry there, just companies that manage to pump themselves full of federal unicorn dollars based on somebody's green dream...until they go bankrupt.