Student debt relief

 

Jeffrey Sr. Clair :

+ Why are neoliberals and cultural conservatives opposed to student debt relief? Look no further than the reasons Ronald Reagan ended free-tuition in California’s state university system, when he was governor. Roger Freeman, one of Reagans top advisors in the 60s, who was later to help craft Nixon’s ruinous education policy, spelled it out pretty starkly: “We are in danger of producing an educated proletariate. That’s dynamite! We have to be selective on who we allow to go through higher education. If not, we will have a large number of highly trained and unemployed people.”

+ It’s probably a good time to revisit the Lewis Powell’s 1971 memo to the Chamber of Commerce on how to crush the left, where he lays out a plan (still the playbook for today’s Republicans) for how conservatives can take back universities from the Marxist contagion. He argues that one strategy is to raise the cost of higher education, both to keep the working classes out and to force those who do take out loans to get a degree to go to work in corporate American to pay off the debt.