The American economic model is a scam designed by Corporate America and their privileged fortunate sons for dividing the society as "rich or poor" under the veil of democracy. And you know what is the definition of a democratic country for the American politicians? A democratic country is a government elected by the people, and I wonder which people.

Democracy is civil participation, democracy is equal opportunity, democracy is not the casting of a vote for electing politicians, governments or presidents. Whenever the United States has a 'democratic' social infrastructure to represent the vested interests of the corporations and their privileged fortunate sons, then certainly the related public policies are all skewed to support the vested interests of the corporations and their privileged fortunate sons.

In the field of public policies, these policies are supported by 'rational' statistical correlation studies. Think about the recent Bush's public policy to provide money to single mothers to marry and get off welfare since married couples are shown to be better off economically than single mothers. This kind of mentality is called linear thinking, or "black or white' mentality as shown by president Bush when he tells the world to be "with US or against US."

This linear thinking mentality is carried on by Corporate America and their privileged fortunate sons as they are trying to take the world with their new form of colonization: the Free Market. And I am going to tell the story of the Free Market in education in the United States. We all know that the Free Market in health care has been rationed as some 40 million Americans don't have health insurance, and the Free Market in education is taking the same rationing approach, that is education only for our privileged fortunate sons.

Yesterday afternoon, I watched TV as CNN journalist Judy Woodruff was interviewing some college graduates from Emery University in Atalanta. Woodruff asked some students how they would cope in paying back their student loans, and these are some of the answers:

Student Rebecca Grayson owes $130,000 and plans to take a Master degree in law and take another $30,000 loan:

Well, I'm definitely scared about what the economy is going to bring and whether or not I'm going to be able to find a job. And that's one of the reasons why I'm staying in school indefinitely until I can find a job that would enable me to pay off my debt quickly. And, right now, it doesn't seem like I'll be able to find a job that is going to give me $160,000 that quick... It [the debt] definitely has affected my choice of career. I used to think that I would like to maybe work for the government in the foreign service or something along those lines. But jobs like that pay only like $40,000 a year. And it would take me a lifetime to pay off my debt.

Student Shundrikka Banks owes $25,000 and she was asked if taxpayers should subsidize education:

Definitely. I think it contributes to our overall competitiveness as a nation. I think that, when we have to make choices on jobs based on how much money we're going to make to pay back loans, I think it affects how diverse we are as a community in terms of what jobs we take. So, if you have to say, "I'm not going to be a teacher because I need to pay back my loans," and you get a high finance job or become a corporate lawyer, I think that affects us as an overall community. So, I think that it behooves us all to our contribute to our education so we can pursue whatever we want to do in life.

Pat Callan, president of the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, has recently stated that education is not affordable for the lowest income groups and that "For the poorest, the percentage of family income that it takes to finance a year of college has gone from 13 percent to almost 26 percent."

Equal opportunity for education is a basic premise for a democratic society, yet the paying back of student loans are determining the future lives of our youth; while at the same time, education is becoming more and more the inner sanctum for our priestly and compassionate fortunate sons.

References

Wed Lock: Dissecting the Bush administration marriage agenda. By Robert Kuttner, Web Exclusive: 4.1.02 The American Prospect http://www.prospect.org/webfeatures/2002/04/kuttner-r-04-01.html

CNN INSIDE POLITICS. What are Politicians Doing about the High Cost of College?; Bush Administration, Democrats Get New Lessons in Politics of Higher Education; Good News About Who is Going to College, Aired May 1, 2002 - 16:00 ET http://www.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0205/01/ip.00.html

College costs outpace family income, inflation From Kathy Slobogin and Dawn Tamir CNN, May 2, 2002 http://www.cnn.com/2002/fyi/teachers.ednews/05/02/college.costs/index.html http://www.highereducation.org/reports/losing_ground/ar.shtml