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Rick Perry's Crony Socialism Problem

Puppycow

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Puppycow
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Rick Perry's Crony Capitalism Problem (Wall Street Journal)

The Emerging Technology Fund was created at Mr. Perry's behest in 2005 to act as a kind of public-sector venture capital firm, largely to provide funding for tech start-ups in Texas. Since then, the fund has committed nearly $200 million of taxpayer money to fund 133 companies. Mr. Perry told a group of CEOs in May that the fund's "strategic investments are what's helping us keep groundbreaking innovations in the state." The governor, together with the lieutenant governor and the speaker of the Texas House, enjoys ultimate decision-making power over the fund's investments.

Among the companies that the Emerging Technology Fund has invested in is Convergen LifeSciences, Inc. It received a $4.5 million grant last year—the second largest grant in the history of the fund. The founder and executive chairman of Convergen is David G. Nance.

In 2009, when Mr. Nance submitted his application for a $4.5 million Emerging Technology Fund grant for Convergen, he and his partners had invested only $1,000 of their own money into their new company, according to documentation prepared by the governor's office in February 2010. But over the years, Mr. Nance managed to invest a lot more than $1,000 in Mr. Perry. Texas Ethics Commission records show that Mr. Nance donated $75,000 to Mr. Perry's campaigns between 2001 and 2006.
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So basically Rick Perry's recipe for economic success in Texas is central planning of the economy. It's taking taxpayer money and having the government give it to private companies. I don't know if Crony Capitalism or Crony Socialism is the right word for this. But it sounds like great work if you can get it! Note also how they refer to grants as "investments." Investments would be if the taxpayer gets repaid with interest eventually. Grants means free money that doesn't have to be repaid. It's a taxpayer subsidy for private companies, which in turn donate part or their money to Rick Perry.
 
It gets worse:
Starting in 2008, Mr. Perry also appropriated approximately $2 million in federal taxpayer money through the auspices of the Wagner-Peyser Act—a federal works program founded during the New Deal and overseen in Texas by Mr. Perry's office—to a nonprofit launched by Mr. Nance called Innovate Texas. The nonprofit was meant to help entrepreneurs by linking them to investors. It began receiving funding on Dec. 31, 2008, soon after Mr. Nance's previous company, Introgen Therapeutics, declared bankruptcy on Dec. 3. According to state records, Mr. Nance paid himself $250,000 for the two years he ran Innovate Texas. Innovate Texas, whose listed phone number is not a working number, could not be reached for comment.
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Sounds like Innovate Texas is a sham to funnel money into Mr. Nance's pockets.

Meanwhile, Mr. Nance is suing the Attorney General of Texas to keep the Texas Emerging Technology Fund records secret!
That's right. He thinks that taxpayers don't even have a right to know what the decision to spend their money was based on!
 
Things like this are why Perry won't get the nomination. Too many skeletons in too many closets.
 
So, where are BaC and mhaze and "Skeptic" and all the others, denouncing this as socialism?
 
Other than keeping the decision-making records secret, which I admit is worrying and which I will look into, how is this different from NASA?

NASA also takes taxpayer dollars and funnels them to private companies to drive innovation and boost the economy.

I'm not convinced that the government investing in specific technologies, markets, or industries is particularly socialist. Nor do I think it even remotely resembles "central planning of the economy". I think there's a pretty large gap between "investing" and "planning".

Nor even do I think that government investment such as NASA or this fund is inconsistent with moderate conservatism--or Texas conservatism, for that matter.
 
theprestige said:
Other than keeping the decision-making records secret, which I admit is worrying and which I will look into, how is this different from NASA?

NASA also takes taxpayer dollars and funnels them to private companies to drive innovation and boost the economy.

I'm not convinced that the government investing in specific technologies, markets, or industries is particularly socialist. Nor do I think it even remotely resembles "central planning of the economy". I think there's a pretty large gap between "investing" and "planning".

Nor even do I think that government investment such as NASA or this fund is inconsistent with moderate conservatism--or Texas conservatism, for that matter.
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NASA? Really, you can't see the difference or you don't want to?

The Texas Emerging Technology Fund seems to be an entitlement program for the well-connected. I would think that moderate conservatism would be against entitlement programs.
 
theprestige said:
Other than keeping the decision-making records secret, which I admit is worrying and which I will look into, how is this different from NASA?

NASA also takes taxpayer dollars and funnels them to private companies to drive innovation and boost the economy.

I'm not convinced that the government investing in specific technologies, markets, or industries is particularly socialist. Nor do I think it even remotely resembles "central planning of the economy". I think there's a pretty large gap between "investing" and "planning".

Nor even do I think that government investment such as NASA or this fund is inconsistent with moderate conservatism--or Texas conservatism, for that matter.
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It would be like NASA, if Obama and Biden decided what all the money can be spent on. If would be like NASA if NASA's books were secret. It would be like NASA if NASA didn't have a working telephone number.

So, it would be like NASA if it were like NASA.

But it's not.
 
theprestige said:
I'm not convinced that the government investing in specific technologies, markets, or industries is particularly socialist. Nor do I think it even remotely resembles "central planning of the economy". I think there's a pretty large gap between "investing" and "planning".
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Odd that in almost every other discussion of spending you would characterize it as "planning", but in this one case you can disassociate enough to refer to spending as "investing".

Daredelvis
 
Haters gonna hate. It's all just bigotry and prejudice. You guys with your facts don't realize that facts are meaningless. You could use facts to prove anything even remotely true (apologies to Homer).
 
BenBurch said:
We fire these shots way too early.

The time for this one would have been 5 minutes after he had the nomination sewn up.
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This was published in the Wall Street Journal, so it probably comes from oppo research by Mitt Romney and helpfully supplied to the right reporter to make sure it gets out there. The timing suggests this too. It came out right after Perry announced his run.
 
theprestige said:
Other than keeping the decision-making records secret, which I admit is worrying and which I will look into, how is this different from NASA?

NASA also takes taxpayer dollars and funnels them to private companies to drive innovation and boost the economy.

I'm not convinced that the government investing in specific technologies, markets, or industries is particularly socialist. Nor do I think it even remotely resembles "central planning of the economy". I think there's a pretty large gap between "investing" and "planning".

Nor even do I think that government investment such as NASA or this fund is inconsistent with moderate conservatism--or Texas conservatism, for that matter.
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Were you in favor of Cash for Clunkers or the government rescue of GM and Chrysler? Would you favor an American Emerging Technology Fund controlled by the President, the Vice President and the Speaker of the House which could award grants to campaign donors of the president? Do you think that entrepreneurs and venture capitalists need a government-supported non-profit without a working telephone number to find each other?
 
Puppycow said:
It gets worse:


Sounds like Innovate Texas is a sham to funnel money into Mr. Nance's pockets.

Meanwhile, Mr. Nance is suing the Attorney General of Texas to keep the Texas Emerging Technology Fund records secret!
That's right. He thinks that taxpayers don't even have a right to know what the decision to spend their money was based on!
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You can't say that!!!
That reflects badly on Perry and therefore is racist and bigoted!!!
 
nvidiot said:
Uhhhh... Whut?
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Gov. Rick Perry is backtracking on one of the most controversial decisions he made since taking over as Texas governor in 2000.
Perry, campaigning in Iowa on Monday, called his order to require sixth-grade girls to be vaccinated from the virus that causes cervical cancer "a mistake."
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He made this statement during his first campaign stop. Mandatory healthcare = Socialism!

http://www.wfaa.com/news/politics/r...-vaccination-mandate-a-mistake-127801118.html
 
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