Failed Bailout Killing Solar Legislation

At the top of my list of dropped stocks today you'd expect the banks. But what comes next...what, would you guess, is the biggest loser outside of the banking industry in my portfolio.

Is it the big corporations like GE who have a huge hand in banking and financing? The luxury stocks like Apple who sell expensive items that might be less appealing in a recession? No and No. It's the solar stocks.

Why? Why on earth would a crisis in the financial sector kill these renewable energy stocks.

Very simply, because it took us two years to get a passable bit of energy legislation through the senate. And now, with it sitting in the stack of bills the House needs to vote on before the session closes, it looks like we're just not going to get to around to it.

These people simply do not understand. The bailout is about preventing disaster...but what about planning for an America that can see beyond damage control to growth and prosperity. K.R. Sridhar said it very well in a recent e-mail to Thomas Friedman:

“As a nation, if we just focus on survival, the demise of our leadership is imminent. We are thrivers. Thrivers are constantly looking for new opportunities to seize and lead and be No. 1.”

But not only are we not greening the bailout, we're not even able to pass a tiny bit of legislation to promote the energy sources of the future. If we can't step up to the plate here...someone else will. And now that this financial crisis is preventing us from passing legislation that should have been passed two years ago, I'm really not sure if we can do it.