Q On Solyndra. I understand the White House has pushed back hard on Republicans launching attacks and --after the fact, 20/20 hindsight -- saying we shouldn’t have done it. But the L.A. Times had a story --
MR. CARNEY: You mean Republicans who solicited on behalf of companies in their states and districts loan guarantees through the program, and in those solicitations talked about the wonderful merits of the program and its job-creating potentials and the importance of the clean energy industry to the future of America and our energy independence? (Laughter.) You mean those letters?
Q Is there a question in there? (Laughter.)
MR. CARNEY: And those same Republicans have now come out against the program.
Q And as FOX reported last week, Darrell Issa, one of those Republicans, did push for clean energy money, even though he’s attacked the administration. There.
The L.A. Times, though, yesterday, reported not after the fact, but in real time, in October of 2010, people inside the White House, Democrats -- Larry Summers, Secretary Geithner -- said that this loan program has problems, it doesn’t have enough oversight. And they wrote him -- at one point, I think it was Larry Summers wrote a memo to the President saying, this could undermine your clean energy agenda.
So my question is -- I understand the back-and-forth with the Republicans, but why would people inside this White House who are saying there may be real problems here, why was that ignored?
MR. CARNEY: Well, I think -- just to make clear -- I think the memo you’re talking about was authored by a number of people. It was a memo that represented the discussion internally within the administration about this program. And I think it’s entirely to be expected that the President’s advisors would scrutinize a program like this, and might have differing opinions about it and about how best to achieve the President’s goal here, which was to help this vital industry, broadly speaking -- the clean energy, clean technology industry -- take hold and grow in this country so that we can compete effectively with the Chinese, the Indians and the Europeans, the Brazilians, in the 21st century.
It would be a remarkable day when on major policy issues there were no debates or disagreements or differences of opinion about how best to approach it. And the result of that process was some actions to improve the program. It’s important to remember that Solyndra, for example, was the first loan out of this program and that the program has continued and evolved as it’s gone on.
So, again, going back to the memo, I think it’s -- memos are written all the time that reflect assessments by advisors to the President and others in the administration with their views.
Q Also important to note that people are not perfect and mistakes are made. Has this administration learned anything from the episode that makes you say, we’ve got to be more careful next time we spend a half a billion dollars?
MR. CARNEY: First of all, we are constantly reassessing not just this program but others, and making adjustments to make them better, more accountable, more efficient, lower the risk of -- increase their chances of success, lower the risk of failure.
As regards this particular loan, as we’ve made clear, we’re not -- we’re disappointed that this particular company did not succeed. The nature of this program is to fund companies that might not otherwise get funding. To help that industry grow, there is risk involved. Overall, we believe that the investments are vital because we are not content with the idea that we should cede vital industries of the 21st century to our competitors overseas. It’s just -- we don’t want be buying all this important technology from the Indians, the Chinese, the Europeans, the Brazilians. And I don’t think most Americans want -- they don’t view America as that kind of country.
And it’s vital to this country’s economic growth that we, in effect, take these risks, as previous generations and previous administrations have, to make sure that the United States of America continues to be leading the world in cutting-edge technologies.
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