I have said too many times to count we should not be subsidizing failed, inefficient technology like solar cells.  As with the ethanol fetish of the 2000s, solar energy has been spearheaded by a government leader who surrounded himself with scientific true believers rather than objective scientists who would look critically at claims. The billions wasted on keeping inefficient technology afloat could instead have been spent on basic research that might actually get us real solar technology.

America narrowly avoided having progressive anti-vaccine kook Robert Kennedy, Jr. (I know, anti-vaccine and progressive is redundant, since all of them are progressives) in the Obama administration - losing $1.4 billion in a bailout for his company, BrightSource, through a loan guarantee issued by a former employee-turned Department of Energy official.



Peter Schweizer, author of "Throw Them All Out" is outraged by that but it is likely a bargain. If he had made the EPA even less scientific than it is now with his quackery the costs to American public health would be unimaginable.

How did a company with $17 million in total revenue get $1.4 billion from the government?  They claimed they would create 1,400 jobs if everything went really, really well - like, a miracle occurred.  And $1 million a job was a pretty good deal to the Obama administration when they thought the economy was based off of Monopoly pretend money and they could just print more.