November 17, 2022

"Is this the end of it? And if so, why couldn’t the Biden administration foresee it being blocked so easily by the courts?"

"Why did they not have stronger legal cards to play with instead of having 43 million filers on a legal and emotional tightrope?"

A Reddit discussion of the current state of the student loan forgiveness program.

Why did Biden get 43 million hopes up?  You can hear the poignancy in the question... or do you think that's phony? Everyone knows the answer to why it was done despite the lack of "stronger legal cards." It's just a question of how outraged they will feel and who they will blame. At least some people will curse the courts — those damned conservatives  — and some will forgive Biden for toying with their feelings because it was worth it, given the modest Democratic Party success in the 2022 elections. You could also say the more obvious it was all along that the program would not hold up in court the less sense it made to invest serious expectations that you'd be getting that $10,000/$20,000 some day.

78 comments:

Michael K said...

It's the election, stupid !

farmgirl said...

Why? she asks…

Lurker21 said...

They probably did foresee it. But they got what they wanted out of it.

WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...

buying votes... the left have just begun to fight.

mccullough said...

The government won’t try to collect on defaulted loans.

So Joe can’t wipe away the student debt but he can just ignore it.

Iman said...

Are you not entertained?

Cheap political tricks pulled by one of this nation’s premier grifters.

n.n said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
tim maguire said...

I don't think there's any question it was a ploy to gin up the youth vote. They always supported Democrats and the Democrats finally figured out a way to get that support to the polls--offer lots of money that they don't have to do anything for. It may well be the most cynical play in the history of American politics.

And the beauty, as Disney discovered years ago, is that "youth" is a completely different group of people every few years, so they can keep repeating the same ploys over and over again confident that the mark will never get wise.

RideSpaceMountain said...

"Why did they not have stronger legal cards to play with instead of having 43 million filers on a legal and emotional tightrope?"

Jesus, Joseph, and doggystyle Mary, would you whiny millennials get back to griping about your party's failure to codify Roe v. Wade already? That's the only "emotional tightrope" you're allowed to gripe about at the moment.

Crawl back into your hug-box, take 2 lexapro, and stop being so ungrateful!

Sebastian said...

"Why did they not have stronger legal cards to play?"

1. There weren't any actual legal cards to play in the first place.
2. The cards they did play were trick cards.
3. They didn't think they needed any legal cards--calculating no one could challenge them in court for lack of standing.
4. They didn't think they needed any legal cards--even if the program was somehow shot down, it would still serve its political purpose.
5. Legal cards? What legal cards? What does legality have to with anything?

Dave Begley said...

Hey, kids! You got duped.

Now wise up. The Dem party is lying to you about EVERYTHING.

Enigma said...

Were Biden-supporting children taught The Boy Who Cried Wolf? Chicken Little? The Fox and the Thorn? Cast Your Bread Upon The Waters?

Reality and gravity have a way of biting back hard.

West TX Intermediate Crude said...

"As cynical as I try to be, I can't keep up."
-maybe PJ O'Rourke

Ann Althouse said...

6. They were playing on the other side of the game all along

Mr Wibble said...

The Biden Admin spent two years resisting all calls to forgive student debt. Anyone paying attention knew that it was a ploy.

Temujin said...

The students were political pawns in this. Biden had nothing to lose. If he could just declare an expenditure by the rest of America to cover the student loans, if he could get away with doing that- great. If not, the slap-down would come after the election and if it bought him 20,000- 100,000 more young people (and/or their parents) voting for him, then great.

At every level, in both the political class and at the grass roots, we all operate at maximum levels of cynicism these days. The students who actually thought they were getting a loan they did not have to pay back, were naive. And most probably Democrats. So Biden will not lose their vote. Because both their naiveté and their party loyalty, do not stop at the student loan grift.

Breezy said...

43 million adults self-identify as to having no idea how our three-pronged democratic republic actually works.

n.n said...

With 20% funded... 80% unfunded Medicare/Medicaid/Obamacares (with and without shared responsibility), Bidencares would surely capsize the ship of state in order to relieve the burden of colleges given fraud... misrepresentation, and the students given a bad choice... choice.

hombre said...

"Why did Biden get 43 million hopes up?"

Democrats buy votes, even if they have to use IOUs.

Levi Starks said...

They made no mistakes at all.
It played out perfectly.
100% political benefit,
No actual money spent.
Who won’t be holding them accountable?
The very same media which made it possible.
It was simply marvelous.

Jake said...

It was funny reading through those comments. It seems plenty of people are pretty deluded. On whatever side of the issue they comment on. We're living in Clown World.

s'opihjerdt said...

I will gladly pay you Wednesday for your vote on Tuesday
J wellington biden

Levi Starks said...

In fact, next you should find the story about how in the run up to the election Biden sold off the last of the strategic oil reserves, the Reserves that former president Trump wanted to top off when oil was $20 something a barrel. But Congress turned him down cold.

RideSpaceMountain said...

I'm amazed there's no 'Hawaiian federal judge' comment/joke in here yet. I guess if you want something done, you've got to woo it yourself.

Wa St Blogger said...

In a game of poker, if you don't know who the mark is, you are the mark. The Dems don't use legal cards. They deal from a marked deck. They play for the house, and the house likes the results. And the marks can't believe that the game could possibly be rigged. The dealer says all the right things...

Big Mike said...

Some more rubes self-identify. The Democrats bought the votes of a lot of college-educated Gen-Z voters (make that miseducated if not maleducated) with a “promise” that they knew would not withstand legal scrutiny. And if it somehow did withstand legal scrutiny, they would have found some other excuse not to implement the program. They bought your votes for the midterms; that’s all they ever cared about.

A word to the kiddies. You will not ever understand any politicians until you understand the word “cynical.” Get your dictionaries, get a thesaurus. Figure it out.

Owen said...

Great comments. I particularly like tim maguire’s point (at 9:18) that the “youth” vote is the gift that keeps on giving. See also P. T. Barnum, who said something about the birth rate of suckers.

What disgusts me the most about this craptastic giveaway was its larger moral message: you can ignore your legal obligations whenever they become inconvenient. And as for the schools’ role in jacking up their prices and encouraging the kids to sign up for that E-Z Finance Kit? The forgiveness scam would allow them to skate and indeed would encourage them to do it again.

John Borell said...

You got duped, kids.

Don't feel bad, Joe Manchin got duped, too. And he should know better.

Jeff Vader said...

Really fun watching spoiled children’s world view coke crashing down

MacMacConnell said...

Biden promised a bribe for votes with no cash to cover it.

The young are stupid.

Winston said...

Well, why wouldn't we expect that grift to work again. Prediction: The snowflake loan giveback becomes a seasonal thing, election season.

mezzrow said...

This + SBF, alight in flames - all only ten days after they have played their part in saving democracy. If they aren't there, they never existed. How good is YOUR memory?

This is how you win hearts and minds? Only those minds too addled or not aware enough to notice or remember the events. Only those hearts that want to see the world burn.

What a victory. Stein's law is ruthless, but the inevitable punishment can be postposed for a purpose. How long? This feels like a lesson in that temporal element to this reader.

More to come.

Achilles said...

Owen said...

Great comments. I particularly like tim maguire’s point (at 9:18) that the “youth” vote is the gift that keeps on giving. See also P. T. Barnum, who said something about the birth rate of suckers.

You know who are bigger suckers than democrat voters?

Republican voters.

wendybar said...

VOTES!! The suckers voted for him and his lies. Suckers.

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

Democrats are fine with being used and abused by their leaders as long as they win. Just win Baby!

gilbar said...

some will forgive Biden for toying with their feelings because it was worth it, given the modest Democratic Party success in the 2022 elections.

Of COURSE they will!
Democrats are Born stupid, then go to special stupid schools for Years to perfect their stupidity.
Just Look at (or read) them, they are NOT the sharpest ho's in the shed

Yancey Ward said...

It was illegal on its face. The Constitution is very, very clear on the matter- the President can't spend money that Congress has not appropriated. What Biden might have been able to get away with is the shuffle the money around within the Department of Education to pay for some of this, but that, of course, means someones else has to do without the same funds.

Yancey Ward said...

My prediction, though, is that Biden will likely ignore this ruling, and the word will go out that you can default on the loans without consequence. The republic we had is dying, and this is just one more milepost marker.

cubanbob said...

The Democrat Party is the Gimme Dat Party. People who vote Democrat have larceny in their hearts.

gilbar said...

Dave Begley said...
Hey, kids! You got duped.
John Borell said...
You got duped, kids.

Kids Kids Kids.. you can't spend your whole life worrying about your mistakes! You fucked up.
You trusted us! Hey, make the best of it!

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

That kind of king đź‘‘ like power was never going to pass constitutional muster.

All somebody with a little imagination had to do was ask a student; “what would you say if, say, a president Trump had the power to forgive anybody’s loan?”

But, no. Everybody just played along like this frog\fraud had all the makings of a Prince Charming.

“If you see fraud and you don’t call out fraud, you are a fraud” - Nassim Taleb

Anthony said...

Note to Millennials:

First, go look up Pavlov's dogs.

Second, you're not Pavlov. You're the dogs.

Thus endeth the lesson.

Martin L. Shoemaker said...

“Legal cards” is a metaphor that implies it’s not about constitutions, laws, and separation of powers, it’s about having better rhetorical weapons in your arsenal. Legislatures are supposed to work from rhetoric, but courts aren’t.

Real American said...

They're just doing whatever they want by executive order and daring the courts to stop them because they know that Congress can't and won't. This strategy more or less started with Obama and Biden's handlers are taking it to the next level because they don't care about the political fallout and Biden is too incapacitated to say no.

Dude1394 said...

And the media somehow cannot figure out the right questions.

Leland said...

I'm struggling believing 43 million people filed for student loan forgiveness. That's greater than 10% of the US population and just about 1/3rd the US population has a college degree. Oh yeah, I'm forgetting the college dropouts. Never mind. They were foolish then and now. So, 43 million Americans identify as foolish and untrustworthy.

FullMoon said...

Follow the link and read the comments.

Peripheral in assistant principle at very expensive private grade school. Completely ignorant of the situation, expecting forgiveness any time now. No doubt will blame republicans if disappointed.

Other peripheral with BS working as EMT while continuing education, equally ignorant but pissed off that he (and parents) saved money for college and he wants his money back.

I acknowledge similar ignorance until it was recently blocked. But pretty darn easy to see the unfairness of the situation.

mikee said...

That the perpetual suckers, described by Lincoln as those you can fool all the time, fell for the administration's vote buying scheme of loan forgiveness is not surprising.

You've got to remember that these are just simple farmers, err, um, I mean students. These are people of the land-grant colleges and diversity degrees. The common clay of the university. You know… morons. [With full credit to Mel Brooks and Gene Wilder and Cleavon Little]

What is surprising is that a large number of those others, who can only be fooled some of the time, were upset that their own non-school indebtedness was not addressed in the Biden vote buying scheme. And of course, it is also surprising they thought it would happen. Suckers.

Christopher B said...

As far as I understood the program, nobody was actually *getting* any cash so chalk anybody thinking that to more Biden/Democrat-approved disinformation. It was all forgiveness of future loan payments so if you had been responsible, or were just unlucky enough to have payed off your loans before the pandemic forgiveness kicked in, you weren't getting jack, either.

I haven't looked but does this ruling also include the rumored alteration of the income-based repayment plans?

BTW I will raise the labeling issue I have mentioned in other forums. Eighteen to twenty-nine year olds are not "Gen Z". The Boomer birth years ended sometime in the mid-1960s at the latest. About the time generation theories got hot in the 1980s the current generation was still forming, hence the "Gen X" moniker that eventually stuck. "Gen Y" therefore started sometime in the mid-1980s and was due to end at or near the year 2000, hence the adoption of the nickname "Millennials". The generation that is following the Millennials AKA Gen Y is therefore Gen Z, hardly any of whom are eligible to vote. The vast bulk of the 18-29 year olds that voted D+28 are Millennials.

stlcdr said...

It's still the Republicans fault that you aren't getting your money! That's the next card they can play.

s'opihjerdt said...

Guaranteed student loans are the definition of predatory lending. The guy from the truck driver training school explained that my son in law could get a CDL despite 3 duis.A banker who needed the loan to be repaid would have explained that no trucking company would ever hire him, and his education would be worthless.

Jupiter said...

"You could also say the more obvious it was all along that the program would not hold up in court the less sense it made to invest serious expectations that you'd be getting that $10,000/$20,000 some day."

The deal was that the Regime would make the courts allow the payoff. Which is entirely believable.

Beth B said...

"Flounder, you can't spend your whole life worrying about your mistakes! You fucked up. You trusted us! Hey, make the best of it!" - Eric Stratton, Rush Chairman

boatbuilder said...

And they will continue to vote Dem. Because even though this one never really had a chance, Uncle Joe is still promising free shit. The Republicans don’t even promise free shit.

Just Hilts said...

Joe “Otter” Biden: You fucked up! You trusted us.

Milo Minderbinder said...

These poor disadvantaged 30-somethings earning $100+k with school debts should start any paragraph by admitting they were fools. And they were just fooled again. Go get a real education.

n.n said...

Gen-S[elfie]. Take a bow... lower. Smile!

Just an old country lawyer said...

West TX Intermediate Crude said...
"As cynical as I try to be, I can't keep up."
-maybe PJ O'Rourke

11/17/22, 9:31 AM

One of my favorite quotes, but by Lily Tomlin.

Drago said...

John Borell: "Don't feel bad, Joe Manchin got duped, too. And he should know better."

No, he didn't.

It was more Failure Theater, and the payoff will be forthcoming. Paul Ryan secured a number of nice sinecures after he screwed conservatives over for several years. Richard Burr will be getting his payoff shortly for handing complete control of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence over to his corrupt pal Sen Mark Warner.

As we speak Larry Hogan and Asa Hutchinson are scrambling to position themselves even better for a liberal billionaire payoff.

MartyH said...

The Democrats could have passed student loan forgiveness with no Republican votes as part of the Inflation Reduction Act. Pelosi, Warren, et al are autocrats, not democrats. They refuse to self govern, relying on an imperial presidency to rule. Warren said as much in a post election NYT op-ed.

walter said...

They had his word as a Biden.

Fustigator said...

They were Rick-rolled. Just a starting lesson from the school of hard knocks before they eventually turn into, cynical, sarcastic, dark curmudgeons like myself.

But because I am already that way....this shit just makes me laugh at how stupid and naive they were/are.

Gusty Winds said...

Althouse wrote: Why did Biden get 43 million hopes up?....You could also say the more obvious it was all along that the program would not hold up in court the less sense it made to invest serious expectations that you'd be getting that $10,000/$20,000 some day.

Why??? For the votes.

And...because Biden and the Democrats really don't give a shit about these young people driven into massive debt.

Neither to the Colleges and Universities that took the money.

Josephbleau said...

This is obvious to anyone but Democrat voters. Why did the unified democrat government of 2021 not codify Rowe v Wade or SS Marriage. Why not reparations or socialism?

Because the masses don't vote for what they already have, they vote to get the next thing, so don't pass anything, just say you will. You can't afford to run out of bribe opportunities. And don't pass out the bribes until 45 days before the election, or the masses will forget.

Jim said...

Does no one remember that Biden tried out his mid-term election bribery scheme in the Georgia Primaries when he told the voters that if the Democrats won they'd get $2000? Where were you then? Where were the Republican prosecutors?

wendybar said...

Don't look now, but Joe is fucking up everything. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11436901/State-treasurers-warn-small-businesses-suffer-cataclysmic-consequences-proposed-SEC-rule.html

Pianoman said...

The Dems want to blame the GOP for being uptight, selfish Old White Guys.

So Dems promise an illegal gift. And when the GOP stops them, the Dems shriek, "SEE??"

RNB said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
RNB said...

"If you want a picture of the future, imagine Lucy snatching the football away from Charlie Brown -- forever."

guitar joe said...

I suspected that Biden knew from the beginning that this wouldn't fly and did it to appease some of his party and staff. Cynical vote buying? Probably, but also, perhaps, a lesson to naĂŻve progressives that you can't just pull stuff out of thin air and expect it to come to completion. Many of my friends are, like me, boomers and democrats, and thought this was a ridiculous, middle to upper middle class entitlement. College is obscenely overpriced and when this tanks the administration should press colleges to use their bloated endowment programs to fund loan forgiveness and start looking for ways to cut costs.

tim in vermont said...

Remember when Joe Biden, as a Senator, pushed through the law that made student loans non-dischargeable? Oh yeah, and he son Hunter got a job as a vice president at a financial institution, while he juggled his time as a Bush appointed board member at Amtrak, all while fresh out of college.

That boy is amazing.

Robert Cook said...

"If you want a picture of the future, imagine Lucy snatching the football away from Charlie Brown -- forever."

Well...that's what it has been for decades.

gilbar said...

Milo Minderbinder said...
These poor disadvantaged 30-somethings earning $100+k with school debts should start any paragraph by admitting they were fools. And they were just fooled again. Go get a real education.

my 28 year old nephew graduated from NYU, with about $185,000 in student loan debt.
As soon as he got an okay paying job*, he went out and spend $285,000 on a small house in the near suburbs of Chicago. So, he's starting just about as much DEBT, as i had assets when i retired.
I'm assuming (HOPING) that he'll start getting some HUGE Bonuses, and Gigantic raises..
Seems More Likely, that he'll get laid off this winter

okay paying job* he makes about as much as i did when i retired 4 years ago..
But *i* lived in central Iowa; he lives in Chicago

Mason G said...

"Go get a real education."

This lesson is a start. And they didn't even have to take out another loan to get it.

JK Brown said...

Biden/Democrats always had the plan to hammer the Republican in the House for not "passing legislation". Just watch.

And they've sold it as it was going to be free cash that the indebted students could just cash to extend their college party experience, even if well after graduation. That was unlikely as loan "forgiveness" is a paperwork transfer, i.e., a revised statement showing a reduction in loan principle. The only cash involved is when the IRS demands their cut of this, now "income".

These are the "educated strata", as Mises called them, easily gulled by the newspapers according the C.S. Lewis.

“Why you fool, it’s the educated reader who CAN be gulled. All our difficulty comes with the others. When did you meet a workman who believes the papers? He takes it for granted that they’re all propaganda and skips the leading articles. He buys his paper for the football results and the little paragraphs about girls falling out of windows and corpses found in Mayfair flats. He is our problem. We have to recondition him. But the educated public, the people who read the high-brow weeklies, don’t need reconditioning. They’re all right already. They’ll believe anything.”
— C.S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength

Bunkypotatohead said...

There's another election coming up in two years. Joe can propose it again, and maybe the "students" will get lucky the next time around.
Idiots.

Drago said...

Bunkypotatohead: "There's another election coming up in two years. Joe can propose it again, and maybe the "students" will get lucky the next time around.
Idiots."

Given past practices, I would expect McConnell to toss about $10M or so to some democraticals to run ads blaming Trump for the failure of Biden's obviously unconstitutional student loan debt relief.

LA_Bob said...

With a complete joke like Biden as president and so many Dems in the House and Senate supporting his nutty agenda, it's very telling that the voters didn't see the Republicans as the clearly superior alternative. Either the voters are stupid or "bought", or the Republicans just don't have the credibility to persuade the dogs to stay away from the skunks.