The entire point of loan guarantees is to provide financing for things that are seen to be socially desirable but that are not financial sure things - banks don't loan money unless they are absolutely sure that they will get their money back with a reasonable (or unreasonable) profit. It's expected that a certain percentage of them will default...that's what the guarantee is all about. Besides the energy program, other examples are student loans and VA home loans.

I'm not yet convinced that Solyndra's loan guarantee was a political payoff, which is what is being alleged (in those terms or not), and carefully selected excerpts from some 80,000 emails aren't about to convince me. There is an investigation ongoing, and I shall make no more comments on the topic until a report is issued.