“I think this is a land of opportunity for every single person, every single citizen of this great nation. And I want to make sure that we keep America a place of opportunity, where everyone has a fair shot. They get as much education as they can afford and with their time they’re able to get and if they have a willingness to work hard and the right values, they ought to be able to provide for their family and have a shot of realizing their dreams.”
~Mitt Romney, 6/27/2012

Think about this man’s worldview for a minute.

What Romney’s Life Has Been Like
He was born with a silver spoon in his mouth … his father was a CEO of American Motors, Governor and actually ran for President in the Republican party.  He went to expensive private schools his entire life from Montessori school age to when he graduated from Harvard with TWO degrees (bravo).  He leveraged his status as son of the former Governor of Michigan with two Harvard degrees to start working in private equity.

His private equity experience consisted of making tens of millions buying profitable companies with small down payments … borrowing lots of money based on the value of those companies … using that money to pay himself and his partners back to eliminate risk … forcing the company to pay management fees … cutting workers pay and benefits and then either sell the company after they gutted it or it went bankrupt and all the employees lost their pensions.

He made millions of dollars in investments paying lower tax rates than the average middle class family and has consistently railed against paying even what the middle class tax burden is.  Remember – he knows guys who own companies with NASCAR.  He likes “sport” not “sports”.

What Romney’s Life Has NOT BEEN Like
He didn’t pay for his expensive private schools … he didn’t pay for going to Harvard.  He didn’t need to borrow money via school loans to pay for his college either.  He didn’t need to work two jobs just so he could share an apartment with 4 other guys and go to school just to make it.  He didn’t leave school and then hitting the pavement to try to find a job; after all – his dad was the Governor of Michigan.  He didn’t have to worry about whether or not he should pay for food or his medications.  He didn’t have to join the military in order to pay for going to college.  He didn’t have to “shop around” to find the right college for him.

Mitt Romney’s Solution
Here is what Mitt is proposing relative to Americans going to college:

#1 – Get as much education as you can afford.  He literally said “the best thing I can do for you is to tell you to shop around.”  If you’re poor – sorry.  Try Pell Grants maybe?  (See #2)

#2 – Draconian cuts to Pell Grants for poor students who can’t afford college.  He strongly embraced the House GOP budget plan which has about $17 Billion a year in cuts from the Pell Grant program (source).  Pell Grants are considered part of the “European entitlement society” which he very much wants to avoid.  No more Pell Grants – sorry.  (See #3)

#3 – Join the military.  And as he puts it “YEAH, WE’LL GIVE YOU HELP.”

#4 – Go to war with Iran.  If you can make it through four full years of our next war to annex Iran as America’s 51st state … then ”YEAH, WE’LL GIVE YOU HELP.”

“Recognize that college is expensive,” Romney explained. “You don’t want to have huge debts. I know that it would be popular for me to stand up and say I’m going to give you government money to make sure you pay for your college. But I’m not going to promise that. What I’m going to tell you is shop around, get a good price.

I FEEL THAT IF YOU ARE WILLING TO SERVE YOUR COUNTRY IN THE MILITARY FOR INSTANCE, THAT’S A PLACE WHERE WE’RE GOING TO SAY, ‘YEAH, WE’LL GIVE YOU HELP.   

Don’t expect the government to forget the debt that you take on.  Recognize that you have to pay it back…. If you can’t afford it – shop around.”
~Mitt Romney

And you can see just how out of touch this guy is with his position on education.  Watch this compilation of clips from Mitt Romney talking to real Americans … and the solutions that he proposes.  Are you kidding me?  THIS GUY is running for President?

But – this country’s education system is a total farce.  As we’ve written HERE - unintelligent students of privilege are more likely to complete college than poor, intelligent students.  America is NOT a meritocracy; it’s all about whether or not you won the sperm lottery or not.

This is why Republicans really don’t care if student’s interest rates double or not (source); they only came to a compromise because politically it was untenable for them.

There is the study from Stanford that showed, “Family income is now nearly as strong as parental education in predicting children’s achievement.”  You can find that study HERE.

Do you remember when President Obama mocked the Republican member of Congress for comparing government backed student loans to stage 3 cancer?  You can see that HERE.

“One member of Congress who compared these student loans…I’m not kidding here….to a stage 3 cancer of Socialism.  Stage 3 Cancer.  I don’t know where to start.  What do you mean?  What are you talking about?  Come on.  Just when you think you’ve heard it all in Washington….somebody comes up with a new way to go off the deep end.”
~President Obama

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