Back on the campaign trail, President Obama began a series of college speeches. Guess he’s running for president of the senior class. He seems to prefer spending time with starstruck college students rather than the glowering Putin. Or, working on fixing this train wreck of a health care plan or thinking about the limping economy. Guess it takes his mind off his approval rating which seems to reflect his aversion to work. It sure beats his mess of a foreign policy. Go to war, don’t go to war.
So, he tells the kids on campus that he feels their pain over the rising cost of tuition and their increasing student loan bills, which naturally rise to meet the tuition inflation. He plans to fix the problem. He failed to tell the students that the government caused the tuition inflation. Nor does he mention that the country is on the hook for a trillion dollars in student loans which seem to be defaulting at an alarming rate, much like home mortgages were just before that house of cards collapsed. Why cause our young people to think about the real world when he and they were having so much fun in the unreal world of academia, a place he dearly loves. It’s hard to beat campaigning unless its endless vacations, which preceded the campus tour. Or, campaigning in small towns which preceded the vacation(the economy is good speech tour).
Here are a few of the things the president failed to mention in his campus speech. And, sadly, our students didn’t ask, since we pay so much these days to have them brainwashed by left-wing teacher’s assistants(real professor don’t teach anymore, they consult and write useless books, you see to supplement their bloated salaries)
1. Federal aid is the number one factor in tuition inflation. In 1964 it was $231 million, now it’s $105 billion. Grants are up from $6.4 billion in 1981 to $49 billion. Colleges and universities are using this money to build fancy facilities while they just let their endowment funds grow tax-free. (Harvard is now $31 billion)
2. Obama likes to talk about CEO pay and fuel the protests against the one- percenter’s. I’m sure he didn’t address the compensation of the university officials where he spoke. Many are paid in excess of two million a year, have a private jet, a free residence that is a mansion by any terms, get free loans, and other generous perks. None of this is tied to any performance goal. Like graduating kids that get jobs. Or, pay off loans on time, or graduation rates.
3. He surely didn’t mention the proliferation of administrators that have been added to staffs as the government money flowed into the tills. The University of California system employs 2,358 administrators in the president’s office. While the private sector cut jobs and staff during the economic downturn, the college/university sector, like the government sector, added jobs. Both sectors are run in a similar fashion. Inefficiency, bureaucracy, and zero accountability. Both are financed with taxpayer dollars, which are virtually unlimited.
4. He did mention that all kids should go to college. Just as Clinton said every American should be able to own a house. But, every American couldn’t afford to own a house, and every kid is not equipped to handle college. In the first case, we forced banks to loan money to those who couldn’t afford a house, backed up their bad loans with Freddie and Fannie and the FHA, then watched as the banks got blamed for what the government did. Now, we watch as kids get grants, universities get grants, and kids who shouldn’t be in college get loans. The end result will be the same. See, here’s the problem. Twenty percent of jobs in this country require a college degree and thirty percent of the public has a degree. Mr. Obama wants 100 percent to try to get a degree and has no plan to increase the demand for jobs requiring a degree. That’s why so many cab drivers have their degree hanging on the sun visor.
5. He did propose the solution to the mess the government has made of college tuition by their involvement should be fixed by more government involvement. Of course, he didn’t mention that student loans are defaulting at an alarming rate in this stagnant economy where Janie with that degree in African studies can’t get a job and Jackie who dropped out after two years and a 10% class attendance rate is in prison for peddling drugs on campus will never pay his student loan. No, he suggests capping their loan payments at 10% of their discretionary income and forgiving their outstanding balances after 20 years. grads who take jobs in government have their loans forgiven after 10 years. ( government jobs are more important to this country, you see).
6. He did propose tieing federal aid to graduation rates. Keep in mind in secondary education where jobs are being tied to student tests, teachers are being caught raising test scores. With the Obama plan a chimp will get a degree at Harvard.
7. He always makes you believe his goal is to help the poor get education. A good goal. Grants have always been aimed in that direction. Today 7% of graduates come from the bottom income quartile and that number was 12% in 1970 before all the aid started flowing and the tuition inflation began to get out of hand.
So, when the president goes to college he needs to call it the great campus apology tour. He needs to tell the students he is sorry for the way their government is messing up their lives and their futures. He needs to tell them that he will ask congress to fix the root causes of the problem. Cut grants and aid so universities have to cut costs and lower tuitions. Reduce the numbers of students applying to fit the jobs available for graduates which will reduce the numbers of applicants and the numbers of universities and cut the hell out of needless jobs on those campuses that survive. When the government money stops flowing the real cost of education will get realistic.
Those poor students, if they only were getting a quality education, they would make Obama’s visits very painful. They would tell him he was the problem and tell him to fix the problem instead of applauding like witless sheep and those who worship the Kardashians.
