Tea at Trianon: The Democrats’ Push to ‘Cancel’ $50k in Student Loan Debt

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Tuesday, November 24, 2020

The Democrats’ Push to ‘Cancel’ $50k in Student Loan Debt

From FEE:

While this legally dubious use of executive authority is still a matter of debate in Democratic circles, most elected Democrats support “canceling” some student debt via legislation. For example, in May House Democrats passed the “HEROES Act,” a COVID-19 relief package that included $10,000 in taxpayer-financed student debt relief. (To be clear, student debt “cancelation” just means that taxpayers must pay it off.)

Suffice it to say that, to varying extents, student debt cancellation is at the top of the Democratic Party’s agenda. This means the policy is worth serious scrutiny—and it doesn’t hold up well.

For one, progressives claim to be champions of the working class who simply want to use the government to help uplift society’s most vulnerable. Yet with student debt cancellation, liberal politicians are prioritizing the interests of a relatively privileged and well-off segment of their constituency.
That’s right: Taxpayer-financed student debt relief is actually a regressive policy, which means that it disproportionately benefits the wealthy. (Read more.)