The Boston Globe has the article Republicans assail Waltham battery maker’s deal with China.  The following are some quotes from the article:

A Chinese company’s preliminary agreement to invest in A123 Systems Inc. has ignited concerns that China could take control of the struggling Waltham battery maker’s advanced technology and spurred new criticisms by Republicans that the Obama administration squandered billions in stimulus money with investments in risky firms.
.
.
.
“This is just another example of Barack Obama’s failure to follow through on his economic promises and the millions of taxpayer dollars he has wasted,” said Kirsten Kukowski, a spokeswoman for the Republican National Committee. “It’s unfortunate Obama borrowed from the Chinese to give taxpayer money to prop up green energy companies that the Chinese are now buying already.”
.
.
.
A123’s agreement with Wanxiang comes as many US clean energy companies struggle to compete against Chinese rivals, which are bolstered by cheap labor and their government’s massive subsidies. US companies also complain that the Chinese government has done little to stop firms there from stealing their technology.
.
.
.
US Representative Cliff Stearns, a Republican from Florida who serves on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said the A123 deal shows the Obama administration is not doing enough to protect US technology. Earlier this year, he said, a Russian citizen gained control of the assets of Ener1 of New York, another troubled battery maker supported by the US taxpayers.

Let me see if I have this straight.  The Chinese and the Russians see this battery technology as a strategic investment.  The Republicans see this technology as valuable enough to want to keep it out of the hands of the Chinese and Russians.

The Republicans think it was a mistake for Obama to see the technology as strategic enough to want to invest our money in it.  They also don’t propose that he invest any more in order to compete with the Chinese and Russian investments.  They do want to block the Chinese and Russians from getting the technology we paid for, but they don’t want to see us invest any more.  If we don’t invest more, the companies with the technology will go out of business and bury their knowledge with them.  Meanwhile the Russian has a company that will further the technology it has, and the Chinese will be forced to invest their money elsewhere to develop these technologies.

In a few years we will be buying these technological products from the Russians and the Chinese instead of selling products to the world that capitalized on our head start in developing them.

So a Democratic President can recognize a strategic opportunity when he sees it, but the Republicans want to block his every efforts.  The Republicans claim to be good business people.  They think they know more than President Obama, The Chinese, and the Russian.  If the Republicans  are so smart, why aren’t we the country that is getting ahead in the world?

As I remember it, a former boss at Digital Equipment Company, Duane Dickhut , used to say on hearing a too timid business proposal, “This isn’t a business plan, this is a going out of business plan.”  The Republicans seem to have a lot of “going out of business plans” these days.