A New White House Solyndra? [UPDATED: Or Not . . . ]

No, I’m not talking about the two other White House backed solar start-ups that failed in August, though they’re part of the picture. I’m talking about LightSquared. Like Solyndra, which combines solar with cylindrical (The New Shape of Solar!), we have light + shape, presumably because people respond to light plus shape when they think of the light-working Lightworker.

The four-star Air Force general who oversees U.S. Space Command walked into a highly secured room on Capitol Hill a week ago to give a classified briefing to lawmakers and staff, and dropped a surprise. Pressed by members, Gen. William Shelton said the White House tried to pressure him to change his testimony to make it more favorable to a company tied to a large Democratic donor.

The episode—confirmed by The Daily Beast in interviews with administration officials and the chairman of a congressional oversight committee—is the latest in a string of incidents that have given Republicans sudden fodder for questions about whether the Obama administration is politically interfering in routine government matters that affect donors or fundraisers. Already, the FBI and a House committee are investigating a federal loan guarantee to a now failed solar firm called Solyndra that is tied to a large Obama fundraiser.

Now the Pentagon has been raising concerns about a new wireless project by a satellite broadband company in Virginia called LightSquared, whose majority owner is an investment fund run by Democratic donor Philip Falcone. Gen. Shelton was originally scheduled to testify Aug. 3 to a House committee that the project would interfere with the military’s sensitive Global Positioning Satellite capabilities, which control automated driving directions and missile targeting, among other things.

Not since Bill Clinton gave missile guidance technology to the Chinese so that Hughes Satellite could send payloads into orbit more cheaply has any Presidential interference in commerce been so potentially devastating to the United States. Read the whole thing, of course, while considering how little your security is worth to the White House when campaign contributions are at stake. Via @allahpundit on Twitter.

UPDATE: LightSquared contacted me and a lot of other Twitterers/bloggers on Twitter with a link to the following rebuttal by their CEO.

September 15, 2011
Sanjiv Ahuja, Chairman and CEO of LightSquared Corrects the Record
Special interests are trying to distract attention from the facts.
For eight years, LightSquared has navigated the regulatory process to win approvals to build America’s first privately funded coast-to-coast wireless broadband service. LightSquared’s plan to invest billions of dollars to use its frequencies for an integrated ground-space network has been supported by both Republican and Democratic regulators — Michael Powell and Kevin Martin, FCC Chairmen appointed by President Bush, and Julius Genachowski, the FCC Chairman appointed by President Obama. In fact, the regulatory approvals that paved our way came in the mid-2000’s, during the Bush administration under Powell and Martin.
Regulators from both parties understand LightSquared’s approach will create more competition in the marketplace, put downward pressure on the prices paid by consumers, create good paying jobs in the tech sector, and give Americans access to the most modern cellular technology. LightSquared’s plan has drawn bipartisan support because it’s right for the country.
Any suggestion that LightSquared has run roughshod over the regulatory process is contradicted by the reality of eight long years spent gaining approvals. Just this week, there has been another request from the government for an additional round of testing of LightSquared’s network.
We understand that some in the telecom sector fear the challenges for their business model that LightSquared presents. We understand the opposition of some in the GPS industry; many of their devices “squat” on someone else’s spectrum and while technological fixes are readily available, some companies are loath to make the necessary engineering changes and would instead prefer to get access to someone else’s spectrum for free.
It’s also ludicrous to suggest LightSquared’s success depends on political connections. This is a private company that has never taken one dollar in taxpayer money. About $10,600 sits in the LightSquared PAC. The founder of LightSquared has given to candidates in both political parties in the last eight years, with two thirds of his contributions going to Republicans because of the founder’s free market philosophy. I gave $30,400 in contributions to both parties in late 2010. It’s difficult to charge that LightSquared has undue political influence when it was denied the opportunity to testify at today’s hearing of the House Armed Service Committee’s Strategic Forces Subcommittee – or even be allowed a one-on-one meeting with the chairman of that committee prior to the hearing, as the GPS industry was given.
This entrepreneurial company is poised to create thousands of jobs and invest $8 billion to help provide American consumers with cheaper, better cellular service. It’s time Washington politicians stop using LightSquared as a piñata. Smart engineers, not political rhetoric, should decide LightSquared’s fate.
If LightSquared is blocked from entering the wireless market, consumers will lose out on the benefits of a new source of more competition, better service and lower prices

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The long-form answer to the GPS question is here (pdf).

But see Michelle Malkin on the rogues gallery of folks involved with LightSquared. As was highlighted in the Cal Boender fiasco, the Chicago Way is to make what should be a straightforward regulatory matter an opportunity for pay to play, so that there will be payoffs, if not directly to Mr. Big, then to his functionaries and hangers on, who will reward this indirect largesse with loyalty. That Genachowski has chosen to dismiss a request that he testify before Congress is just the way things are done in the Thug Boy administration. I imagine he’ll now be subpoenaed, but that he’ll continue to thumb his nose for as long as he can get away with it.

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