It's all about the bankers-- again.  As I've said in this blog numerous times, the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act is poised to dispense critical aid to low-income college students and the colleges they attend-- if the lending industry doesn't kill it first.

The savings that would result from a move to direct lending are substantial.  Money would go directly to the neediest college students and to community colleges, a sector that is swamped and struggling in this recession. This investment in human capital is in so many ways a no-brainer-- it'll generate a large return, benefit folks in nearly every community in the country, and support the American dream.

Of course, the bankers will have none of it. In the current system they draw profits on the backs of students, lending them money and selling those loans to the government.  They are so...

 I'm generally put off by "Tea Party" people who rant and rave about Obama's birth certificate, "death panels," and dream of returning to the gold standard.  But on one core point, I'm in a great deal of sympathy-Washington is often corrupted by powerful lobbyists who turn legislators away from helping ordinary Americans.

The latest example come in this week's financial reform debates in the Senate, who are grinding through drafts of financial regulation reform proposals aimed at preventing another meltdown.  A necessary element is President Obama's proposed new consumer protection agency that will guard against financial institutions who sell expensive and bloated products. But lobbyists for banks and financial institutions are all over the process, weakening it wherever they can.

This week's evidence comes...

For those of us who are committed to the notion that it is important for the United States to open up intellectual and cultural relations with Cuba, the last year has been quite frustrating. We had hoped that the Obama administration would reject the exceptionally restrictive policies of George W. Bush's presidency since Obama would not be as self-evidently obligated to the Cuban-American hardliners as Bush had been. Indeed, since a Latin American summit was scheduled to take place only a month after President Obama's inauguration, we thought there was a good chance that the new administration would signal its commitment to open engagement with the southern hemisphere by announcing that it was abandoning most or all of the Bush restrictions on travel by Americans to Cuba.

But of course Senator Menendez lost no time in signalling that he would use his considerable power to...

1. Ask the job candidate to state his or her maternal grandmother's maiden name. If the candidate knows it, that candidate is a female.

2. Put a round rubber object on the table. If the candidate picks it up and simply looks at it, the candidate is female. If the person starts throwing the object into the air as high as possible or at the wall as hard as possible within 10 seconds, the person is male.

3. Make available several small "free" items -- such as packets of sugar, Band-Aids, Post-It notes, miniature Sharpies, and/or multi-colored paperclips. If the person fills up pockets, handbags, and cheeks with as many of these items as possible in order to take them home, that person is...

In response to my recent blog about the conversion to an all DL program, Kevin Carey, a person I admire and respect deeply (and with whom I almost always agree) countered with a compilation of his, Ben Miller's and Jason Delisle's thoughts. Since Jason and Ben are former colleagues, I appreciate that they both chimed in since I know that together they have spent a great deal of time and energy thinking about student loan issues.  This is precisely the kind of dialogue that the higher education policy world needs since people with deep knowledge of the topic and a similar appreciation for the benefits of higher education can have different opinions and thoughts about how to solve some of the great challenges we face.  Through this sort of dialogue, we might be able to rise above political posturing and actually come to some good solutions. 

I must remember that I am a man, and that consequently I am in the habit of sleeping, and in my dreams representing to myself the same things or sometimes even less probable things, than do those who are insane in their waking moments. How often has it happened to me that in the night I dreamt that I found myself in this particular place, that I was dressed and seated near the fire, whilst in reality I was lying undressed in bed! At this moment it does indeed seem to me that it is with eyes awake that I am looking at this paper; that this head which I move is not asleep, that it is deliberately and of set purpose that I extend my hand and perceive it; what happens in sleep does not appear so clear nor so distinct as does all this. But in thinking over this I remind myself that on many occasions I have in sleep been deceived by similar illusions, and in dwelling carefully...

Paul Basken's article, "Complexities Grow for the Student Loan Bill as Senate Action Finally Draws Near," provides an insightful update on the challenges that the Administration will face in eliminating the bank-based Federal Family Education Loan (FFEL) program and converting to the government-run Direct Loan (DL) program. The ironies associated with this effort are numerous. As Paul points out, on one hand the Administration is trying to garner support for another jobs bill, yet on the other, it wants to eliminate an entire industry. On one hand, the Department of Education is complaining about the horrible behavior of FFEL lenders, yet on the other, they will hire a few of them to be the contractual servicers of the loans issued by...

In response to the question Diane Auer Jones poses below about student loan reforms, my colleague Ben Miller (who has a frighteningly detailed understanding of the intricacies of federal loan policy) offers the following:

Because the piece has a lot going on, let's go through it one step at a time. Jones writes:

On one hand the Administration is trying to garner support for another jobs bill, yet on the other, it wants to eliminate an entire industry.

No matter how you run the numbers, the entire student loan industry will NOT be eliminated. In the doomsday scenario, about one-third of the 35,000 jobs--about 11,550--could be lost, but it's also

The Wall Street Journal has an editorial today on student protests in the UC system, entitled "California's College Dreamers." The piece opens by chastising students for not investigating the tuition hikes enough to discover "that compensation packages won from the state by unions were a big reason for the hike."

The editorial notes that the UC system lost out on $800 million dollars alone this year after the state diverted $3 billion to cover rising government worker pension costs. The skyrocketing costs the editors attribute to a 1999 bill in which state legislators refigured pension benefits on the assumption that "investment returns would grow at a 8.25% rate in perpetuity." Among other things, the bill refigured benefits for public-safety employees that had a...

How smart can a rock band be? Super-smart, that's how smart. If you have 2 minutes to spare, turn on your sound, click HERE, and enjoy a delightful rock n' roll romp through Western art history. The Franco-American band, Hold Your Horses, will delight anyone with even the least sense of humor and the littlest bit of knowledge about painting. I played this for my advanced painting class yesterday (a sort of on-the-spot midterm), and I’m here to report that my students passed this little exam with flying colors. My personal favorite is “Las Meninas,” but “The Raft of the Medusa" gives it a run for its money.