A Question of Competence
Jules Witcover

The Democratic loss of two special congressional elections was a blow to President Obama as he was traveling the country trying to sell his new American Jobs Act. But they are the least of his worries right now.

His press secretary sought limply to talk away the defeats on grounds that such special elections are poor barometers of broader public sentiment. In both races, though, the Republican victor "nationalized" the local elections by harping on Obama's failure to rescue the stagnant economy.

Something even more potentially damaging to the president's prospects for reelection next year, however, has just surfaced. It's the disclosure that a pet "green" project given a $535 million federal government loan recently went bankrupt and closed its doors, leaving American taxpayers at risk of swallowing most of the loss.

Solyndra, a start-up manufacturer of solar panels cited by Obama as a centerpiece of his efforts to create jobs through the encouragement of new, environmentally sound technologies, is under investigation now by a House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee.

Officials of Energy Department's loan guarantee loan program and the Office of Management and Budget were called on the carpet Wednesday to explain why the loan was made without adequate screening, and whether political pressure was applied to accelerate the process.

White House emails provided to the subcommittee indicated that federal officials two years ago were urged to sign off on the loan in time for Vice President Joe Biden to announce its approval at a scheduled groundbreaking ceremony at the site.

In his current sales effort for his jobs plan, Obama has urged voters to write and call their members of Congress to act on his urgent plea to "pass this bill ... right away" to put the nation's unemployed back to work in a variety of other jobs for which hiring has stalled.

Many corporations and businessmen have been holding off hiring while sitting on huge profits from higher productivity by fewer workers. Some have cited federal regulations, including costly environmental standards, as inhibitions. The Solyndra story, first reported by ABC News and The Washington Post, is certain to fuel more such complaints.

The Post also reported that the administration's clean-jobs loan program, having spent nearly half of the $38.6 billion at its disposal, has saved 33,000 jobs, all at the Ford Motor Co., but created only 3,545 new permanent jobs. The program was tasked with saving or creating 65,000 jobs.

Critics of the president's approach, including some Democrats in Congress, have argued that it relies too much on slow-developing projects and that it has been put forth as a comprehensive package vulnerable to cherry-picking by legislators favoring or opposing certain parts of it.

Politically, the danger to Obama of the Solyndra case is that it can cast his administration as lacking competence. That's an allegation that dogged the last Democratic president to be denied a second term, Jimmy Carter. So far the Obama administration has been relatively free of charges of either corruption or incompetence. The main rap against the president has been lack of backbone, which his all-in commitment to jobs creation was supposed to counter.

By including infrastructure repair and road building in that package, Obama paid lip service to the massive public works programs that organized labor and many liberal Democrats have urged as the fastest way to put American back to work. Anything that highlights a focus on green jobs invites, rather than curbs, criticism from already hostile conservatives in Congress and the country.

The charge of incompetence was not, certainly, the only factor that led to Carter's defeat for reelection in 1980. He ran against the hugely popular Ronald Reagan, who dispelled similar charges against him with wit, charm and immense self-assurance. So far, at least, the Republicans have not found another Reagan, though Texas Gov. Rick Perry is trying his best to offer himself as one.

Meanwhile, Obama is not helped by new disclosures that his high-sounding support of what Reagan used to call tree-hugging projects may not be as effective and altruistic as advertised, when swift job-creation is what is required right now.