RUSH: I tell you, you students with college loans and you parents of students with college loans, do you realize what dupes you are to the regime? It is amazing. The student loan program “reform,” it’s amazing. We got a random act of journalism here by the Atlantic Monthly that illustrates just how few people this affects, how hugely expensive it is. It’s a farce. It’s a total farce. It misleads and it deceives students, and it’s gonna end up saving students $8. This is one of the biggest jokes to come down the pike in a long time, and I’m gonna set it straight. It’s a convoluted, intricately woven web of deceit. But that’s what I do here is make the complex understandable.
I’m gonna take a stab at this as we kick off the big program today.
All right, we have a random act of journalism from the Atlantic Monthly, of all places, left-wing rag with a couple of faux, pseudo-conservatives writing now and then for so-called balance. They published an article yesterday about Obama’s student loan bailout, and their headline is this: “Obama’s Student Loan Order Saves the Average Grad Less Than $10 a Month.” So that’s what Obama thinks it costs to buy their vote. You students, you parents of students, your votes can be had for eight bucks. Now, granted, you wouldn’t know this if I, El Rushbo, wasn’t about to tell you because I don’t think you read Atlantic Monthly, and I wouldn’t blame you if you don’t. It’s one of the reasons I get combat pay. I do. I’m gonna explain it to you. But that’s what your vote is worth.
Now, obviously they think that you believe you’re going to get much more help and much more assistance and relief than eight bucks. But you’re not. The subheadline in the Atlantic Monthly story spells out how even $10 is overly optimistic. Here’s what it says. “The monthly impact of the president’s new effort for most Americans paying off college debt will be between $4 and $8.” The article goes on to talk about how outrageous the cost of a college education is, how outrageously it’s gone up, which has caused student loans to have grown by 511% since 1999, and most student loan debt — get this, now. This is interesting. Most student loan debt was accrued over the past ten years. Eighty-two percent of all student loans from the get-go, from the beginning of student loans, 82% of all debt has been accrued over the past ten years, and they go on to say that Obama’s proposals are basically meaningless, which is what we tried to say here yesterday, but it’s nice to see that others are noticing it, too.
So here’s a pretty good overview of the whole situation. And, by the way, this is all being done by executive order. And I am here to tell you that if Bush or any Republican was using the executive order process this way there would be howling from all corners. Bypassing Congress, executive fiat, who does he think he is? What does he think this is? A dictatorship? Those kinds of headlines and questions would be out there. The Drive-Bys would be filled with cries of imperial executive branch actions. But with Obama, all you hear is the crickets chirping, even if you hear that.
“Obama’s Student Loan Order Saves the Average Grad Less Than $10 a Month — The monthly impact of the president’s new effort for most Americans paying off college debt will be between $4 and $8. Of the many long-term problems the U.S. economy faces, student loans are a big one. Education costs are rising very quickly and incomes aren’t. As a result, students will have to borrow more and more money to obtain university degrees and will have a tougher time paying their loans. President Obama seeks to respond to this question with an executive order in the next part of his ‘We Can’t Wait’ unilateral stimulus effort.”
The Atlantic Monthly is doing what they can to throw him a bone: “While the president’s heart may be in the right place, his effort isn’t like to have much impact. The cost of college is growing rapidly. That wouldn’t be a problem if incomes were growing as quickly as tuition and fees. They aren’t. In order to cope with the growing expense of college, more students are relying on bigger loans.” And, by the way, folks, what are they getting for these loans, for these educations, for these degrees? What are they getting? You know, Suzy Creamcheese gets into George Washington University and borrows from the government the requisite $212,000 to obtain an undergraduate degree, and what is Suzy Creamcheese’s degree in? She spent it on a degree in Oppressed People in the Orient, some meaningless degree like Conflict Resolution 505, whatever, some meaningless, worthless degree. She’s comes out after borrowing $212,000 with no marketable skills, and the only thing she has learned at Bill Ayers University is it’s all America’s fault.
She goes in, gets a stupid degree, worthless education, $210,000 in debt, and she has no marketable skills. And it’s America’s fault after she’s borrowed all this money. So now here comes Obama riding to the rescue after his buddies in academe — i.e., the Bill Ayers types — have taken these young skulls full of mush and turned them into basically pizza. That’s a little bone thrown to Herman Cain. They come out, they have worthless degrees and they’re profoundly in debt and Obama says, “Don’t worry, don’t worry, I’m here and I’ll make it okay.” Bigger loans, higher tuition, and, by the way, nobody ever complains that the colleges are charging tuition and fees that are rising out of the realm of reasonableness. Never happens. Student loans have grown by 511% since 1999. Disposable income has grown by just 73%.
There’s a chart here that accompanies this that illustrates that most outstanding loan debt, 82% of it, was accrued by students in the last ten years. Now, that is a stunning fact, folks. Tallying up all of the student loan debt in history, 82% of it was accrued in the last ten years.
So here’s Obama now out promoting a fraudulent solution, just like everything else he does is fraudulent. He’s not going to create jobs with his tax bill. He’s not gonna improve the housing market with that housing executive order. He has not gonna help students with the student loan executive order. It’s all about more lies. It’s all about more promises. Now, Obama’s executive orders. “The president seeks to make the situation a little bit easier for some of those graduates. He’s gonna create an executive order that has three components. Number one: Obama “will clear the way for borrowers with direct government loans and government-backed private loans to consolidate their balances. The White House estimates that this will cut the effective interest rate on student loans by up to 0.5%,” as in “Big whoop!”
Number two: His executive order “will limit the amount of student loan payments to 10% of a graduate’s income. (Currently, the limit is 15%.)” So the maximum payment that you would make is 10% of your income. Well, if you’re Suzy Cheesecake and you come out with that Diversity in the Orient degree after spending $212,000, you’re probably gonna get a job that might pay you $8,000 a year at some social services outfit or a nonprofit — and so that’s what your 10% repayment schedule is based on. In another executive order, Obama “will allow debt still outstanding after 20 years to be forgiven. (Currently, forgiveness occurs after 25 years.)” Now, the question: Why pay anything? Why pay off anything? These student loans are gonna end up costing the taxpayers anywhere between $800,000 and $900,000 per student.
The student, on the loan repayment, if they make the payment, will save eight to $10 maximum a month — four to $8, more realistically, a month — while Obama is out giving the impression that basically the student loan is gonna end up being free and forgiven, if you don’t pay it off in 20 years. The loan forgiveness section… Of all of these parts of Obama’s executive order, the loan forgiveness aspect will have the least impact, according to The Atlantic. “By moving the timeline from 25 to 20 years it could be significant in the long run but it won’t be felt for decades.” Remember: 82% of the current student loan debt outstanding was accrued in just the past ten years. So it will be at least another ten years before any of those borrowers have hit their 20-year mark in their student loan payments.
(interruption) “Why is a student loan more important than a mortgage?” The reason that a student loan is more important than a mortgage is as a campaign issue. That’s all this is. This is all a fraud. That’s my point in giving you all these numbers. The numbers we’re giving you here are real and illustrate the fraudulent aspects of this. Obama realizes… (interruption) Snerdley, we prove it. Every time I start talking about education on this program, the phones melt. It matters to people. The education of their children matters to people like nothing else does. They are very concerned about it. Obama knows it, so here he comes with this magical student loan reform, and the point is (impression), “I’ve taken it over! Yeah, don’t worry about it. It’s not gonna cost you anything.”
The point is, “Don’t worry about it, I’m in charge, your student loan’s fine, we’re reforming the program, we’re gonna make it easy for you to make payments.” It’s a fraud. The real shame here is by the time it’s all implemented, the few number of people that will really affect is shocking. It’s like the mortgage and the underwater-foreclosure program — yeah, mortgage modification. Look at all the grandiose designs and promises, look at how many people actually participate in it — and then of that few, that small number, look at how many people actually got any assistance. Zilch, zero, nada. Same thing here. Campaign issue, pure and simple. Student loan more important than a mortgage because education’s a huge campaign issue to people. It really isn’t any more complicated than that. (interruption)
That’s right. You have to pay your mortgage off and you have to pay their student loans off. Exactly right. That’s exactly right. You’ve nailed it. You pay your mortgage, you pay it on time and then you’re gonna pay off their student loans. Well, that’s exactly what Obama stands for. Obama’s proposal was geared to getting the best headlines for the least amount of money. It’s all about optics. It’s all about compassion. It’s all about making the student loan community think that he cares. Fox News has a great interpretation of the Obama plan, and here’s the headline: “Obama Caps Taxpayers For Student Stimulus — Obama looks to wring stimulus from saturated student loan market.” One trillion dollars is the estimated amount of student loan debt owed by Americans — $1 trillion, and 82% of it accrued in the last ten years.
“In keeping with his new campaign, ‘We can’t wait,’ Obama today rolled out the plan…” and he’s seeking to use this power of the executive order to obtain a taxpayer-financed stimulus that Congress won’t approve. This is Chris Stirewalt at Fox. He says, “Take this example: If Suzy Creamcheese gets into George Washington University and borrows from the government the requisite $212,000 to obtain an undergraduate degree, her repayment schedule will be based on what she earns. If Suzy opts to heed the president’s call for public service…” This is one of the prerequisites to getting a good student loan, that after you graduate you go into public service. “If Suzy opts to heed the president’s call for public service, and takes a job as a city social worker earning $25,000, her payments would be limited to $1,411 a year after the $10,890 of poverty-level income is subtracted from her total exposure.”
So you take her $25,000, subtract ten-eight from it for the poverty level. “Twenty years at that rate would have taxpayers recoup only $28,220 of their $212,000 loan to Suzy.” That’s how all this works. “The president will also allow student debtors to refinance and consolidate loans on more favorable terms, further decreasing the payoff for taxpayers,” and all this comes at a moment when a lot of economists are warning of a “college debt bubble” that is distorting college tuition rates and threatening to further damage credit markets. The bottom line is it’s a huge fraud. It’s not gonna save anybody any money on the student side and the taxpayers get screwed royally. It’s another transfer, redistribution of wealth. It’s an optics move. It’s designed to make the recipients here think the government is taking care of ’em. They’re not gonna have to worry about their student loans anymore. “The Democrat Party’s great! Obama’s great! It’s a reelection issue, and it’s a fraud.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Look, if you want to understand this, think of it as reverse amortization. Think of it as the subprime mortgage crisis comes to student loans. That is how to look at this. The subprime mortgage technique, the subprime mortgage philosophy comes to student loans: You give money to people who will never be able to repay it on the basis that it’s not fair they can’t go to college, on the basis that everybody should go to college. You drum into people’s heads for generation after generation that your only ticket out of the murk and the mess that is the United States of America is a college education.
You get that drilled into every parent’s head, you get it drilled into every kid’s head, and you make college a mandatory life requirement — and then you put your buddies in charge of the colleges. You put your buddies in charge of curricula at the colleges, you put your buddies in the classrooms as professors, and you make sure that the tuition fees and all the costs associated with attending these colleges skyrocket year after year after year. You make sure that you never put any pressure on the university system, on Big Education, to lower their prices. You never accuse them of “gouging” like you accuse Walmart or Big Oil or Big Drug.
Big Education’s off-limits. As much as they want to charge, as much as they can charge, you support it — and the way you deal with it is the student loan program. So you convince everybody and every kid that the only hope, the only prayer they’ve got is an education. Then you get ’em in these classrooms and you teach ’em absolutely worthless drivel. They come out thinking America sucks, and they blame everybody else for making America suck. In the meantime, they owe somebody hundreds of thousands of dollars that they’re going to be paying the rest of their lives. Meaning, they are into whoever financed all this for ’em. What a scam they have created here!
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