Crony capitalists unite!

Timothy P.Carney writes,

Obama's closeness to subsidized industrial giants General Electric and Boeing (the CEOs of both of these companies are top advisers) and his ties to solar and wind companies (the top investor in Solyndra was an Obama campaign bundler) undermines Obama's anti-special-interest rhetoric and highlights how government intervention ends up benefiting the biggest and most connected companies.

Republicans have hinted that they will run against the collusion of Big Business and Big Government. Romney, after winning the Pennsylvania primary last month, pledged, through restoring free markets, to "stop the unfairness of politicians giving taxpayer money to their friends' businesses."

Congressional Republicans have launched investigations into the Solyndra deal. "Crony capitalism" has become a common phrase on the GOP campaign trail.

So Ex-Im, a naked example of corporate welfare mostly benefiting one giant corporation, presented a great opportunity for a Republican fight. As President Obama campaigned hard for reauthorization of Ex-Im, free-market institutions in Washington called for abolition....

But the business lobby is almost unanimously agreed in the opposite direction. The Chamber of Commerce, National Association of Manufacturers, Business Roundtable, American Petroleum Institute and most big businesses have lobbied to reauthorize the agency and raise the lending cap to $140 billion.

On Wednesday, House Republicans sided with their business base over their conservative base -- 147 House Republicans, including the entire leadership, voted for reauthorization, compared with 93 nays.

Who says the Republicans never agree with Obama?